The Gender Star: A study on the acceptance of gender-equal language from a psycholinguistic perspective

This study documents the influence of gendered language on language processing. Within the framework of an online psycholinguistic experiment, a sentence continuation paradigm (Gygax et al. 2008) was used to investigate whether the use of the gender star represents an adequate language alternative to the generic masculine. For this purpose, 36 experimental passages have been created, where the first sentence introduces a group of people using a role name in the plural form, and the second sentence concretized that there are some (but not exclusively) men or women in the group. Stereotypical knowledge in the form of jobs (e.g., Chirurgen, Politiker, Schauspieler) or leisure activities (e.g., Fußballfan) describing characteristics of a person or group of people was included, as was spelling (generic masculine or gender star). Special interest was paid to whether more positive judgments followed a gender star first sentence with a female continuation and, furthermore, whether faster reaction times were recorded in this scenario, since women are better represented mentally with a gender-appropriate wording alternative.

本研究旨在探讨性别化语言对语言处理的影响。在在线心理语言学实验的框架下，本研究采用了Gygax等人（2008年）提出的句子续写范式，以探究性别星号的使用是否能够作为一种适当的语言替代方案，用以替代通用的阳性性别表达。为此，研究者创建了36个实验段落，其中第一个句子通过使用复数形式的角色名称介绍一组人群，而第二个句子则具体说明了该群体中存在一些（但非仅限）男性或女性。段落中包含了描述个人或群体特征的典型知识，如职业（例如，外科医生、政治家、演员）或休闲活动（例如，足球迷），以及拼写（通用阳性性别或性别星号）。特别关注的是，性别星号开头的句子后是否跟随更多的积极判断，以及在此情境下是否记录了更快的反应时间，因为女性在心理上更易于接受性别适宜的措辞选择。