Gender-neutral pronouns reduce biases that favour men and improve positive feelings towards women and LGBT+ people

What’s in a name?

Friendly chat (iStock)

Using gender-neutral pronouns reduces the likelihood of people favouring male stereotypes and improves views of women and LGBT+ people, a new study suggests.

Researchers from Washington University in St Louis, Missouri, analysed the impact of gender-neutral pronouns on the views of 3,393 Swedes.

At the beginning of the study, participants were given a cartoon of a figure walking a dog.

They were then split into three groups and asked to complete a sentence describing what they thought was happening in the picture.

One group was told that they were only allowed to use neutral pronouns in their descriptions, another only female pronouns, while the third could only use male pronouns.

Researchers then asked the volunteers to complete a short story in three sentences about a person who was running for political office and assign them a first name.

"Today, I met a person who is interested in running for political office. The person is....” the sentence began.

Participants were also required to answer questions that analysed their views on women and LGBT+ people in public affairs.

According to the findings, which were published in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (PNAS), participants who used gender-neutral pronouns during the cartoon description task were more likely to use non-male names in their short story.

Gender neutral pronouns (iStock)

In addition, the researchers found the Swedish gender-neutral pronoun “hen” appeared to improve positive feelings towards women and LGBT+ people.

As a result, they believe the word helped to tackle attitudes that favour men, and raise awareness of other genders among participants.

In 2015, the Swedish Academy announced the country’s official dictionary of the Swedish language was to introduce the gender-neutral pronoun “hen”. The term sits alongside “han” (he) and “hon” (she).

“Let’s assume there are societies that generally agree on being more inclusive of women and LGBT+ individuals, and there are more than a few,” said Efrén Pérez, a political scientist professor and co-author of the study at the University of California in Los Angeles.

“Our findings suggest that the words we choose to use can matter in getting us a little bit closer toward reaching that ideal.”

Last month, the city of Berkeley in California passed an ordinance to ban the use of gender-specific language in its municipal code.

The new regulation means that terms like “manhole” and “firemen” are replaced with gender-neutral vernacular.

In 2017, students and staff at the University of Sussex were told to use gender-neutral pronouns following students’ requests to help prevent transgender discrimination on campus.

Sussex University Student Union (USSU) advised its members to “avoid making assumptions” and encourage the use of “them” and “they” instead of “he” or “she” when addressing a person whose gender identity has not been directly stated.