An examination of prejudice toward women with modern clothing in afghanistan society on the basis of stereotype content model, system justifying and social contact theory

In the present study, the aim was to examine how the stereotypes and perceived social distance towards women are varied in relation to their clothing (traditional or modern) in an Afghanistan sample. Initially, a pilot study was conducted in which data from 55 participants (26 females, 29 males) were collected, and the adjectives that will be used as gender stereotypes were determined. In the main study, out of 152 Muslim Afghan participants (55 men, 97 women), half were presented with a photo of an Afghan woman wearing traditional clothes (hijap), while the other half were presented a photo of the same woman wearing modern clothes. They were asked to evaluate the woman in the photo in terms of warmth and competence. Also, participants' perceived social distance with the woman in the photo was rated. In addition, the social contact frequency with women similar to the woman in the photo was asked. The ratings given by the participants in two different conditions were compared. The results of the Mixed Analysis of Variance showed that in the in the modern clothes condition, the woman in the photo was considered more competent but less warm compared to the condition in traditional clothing condition. The results also revealed that the participants had less social contact with women with modern clothes and their perceived social distance was larger towards those women. The second aim of the study was to test a model in which the variations in the perceived social distance for modern women is explained by those variables: the social contact frequency, the system justification tendency and the warmth and competence stereotypes. The model was tested on the data from the participants in the modern clothes condition. The Structural Equation Analysis was used for model testing. According to the results, the low frequency of contact with women in modern clothes is related to the higher tendency to justify traditional gender system, and a high level of justification of gender system is related to a higher level of perceived social distance. System justification is directly related to the perceived social distance, as well as indirectly related through stereotyping woman in modern clothes as less warmth.