Document Type
Article
Publication Date
Summer 1980
Abstract
I cannot stress how important for . . . the future of human experience it is to take the development and explication of a feminine perspective in ... research seriously and to devote all our talents and energies collectively to its accomplishment. -Jane Anton
As research on women has increased, researchers have become increasingly concerned about how appropriate the existing research methodologies are for the study of women. In one of the earliest critiques, Rae Carlson argued that current research paradigms, which she characterized as involving manipulation, quantification, and control, not only impose restraints on the understanding of female psychology, but also lead to a general impoverishment in the capacity to say anything meaningful about human personality. Concomitantly, feminists began to question the widespread use of socioeconomic status as an independent variable. Marie R. Haug, for instance, pointed out that traditional measures of social class miscategorize about a third of all families because the characteristics of women, particularly working wives, are neglected in the allocation of class position to individuals and families.