Is Creativity Masculine? Visual Arts College Students’ Perceptions of the Gender Stereotyping of Creativity and Its Influence on Creative Self-Efficacy

Abstract

This study investigated visual arts college students’ perceptions of the gender stereotyping of creativity and the influence of this stereotyping on creative self-efficacy. The sample consisted of 1198 Chinese visual arts college students. The results showed that (a) both male and female students identified stereotypically masculine traits as more important to creativity than stereotypically feminine traits are, (b) male students demonstrated higher creative self-efficacy than their female counterparts did, and (c) students’ gender significantly moderated the effect of the gender stereotyping of creativity on creative self-efficacy. Specifically, the gender stereotyping of creativity had a positive effect on male students and a negative effect on female students. These findings revealed that gender stereotypes dominate concepts of creativity in Chinese art education and may hinder female students’ development of creative self-efficacy, resulting in gendered inequality in the visual arts field. The implications of these findings for visual arts education in China are discussed.