Affiliation During a Pandemic: How Gender, Gender Role Adherence, and Social Support Affect Adjustment

The current COVID-19 pandemic provided an excellent opportunity to explore gender differences in response to stress. In my study, I investigated how gender and adherence to the feminine gender role affected the extent to which people provided social support to others and how the provision of social support then affected fear of COVID-19 and well-being. In accordance with tend-and-befriend theory and social role theory, I expected to find main effects for gender and adherence to the feminine gender role in a sample of MTurk workers. I also predicted that providing a greater extent of social support to others would predict decreased fear of COVID-19 and increased well-being. Finally, I hypothesized that fear of COVID-19 and well-being would be inversely correlated. However, I found that it may be men with high adherence to the feminine gender role who provide the greatest extent of social support to others and that there may be an interaction between gender and adherence to the feminine gender role. Additionally, the provision of social support predicted both well-being and fear of COVID-19, which were inversely correlated. These findings suggest that gender is an incomplete explanatory variable in understanding why people affiliate in response to stress.