Proceedings of the 3rd International Conference on Language and Cultural Communication (ICLCC 2025)

Prejudice as “Reverse Fuel”

The Pathways of Self-Esteem Levels Moderating Social Prejudice on Women’s Academic and Leadership Advancement

Authors
Kerui Huang1, *
1School of Psychology, Hainan Normal University, Haikou, Hainan, 571158, China
*Corresponding author. Email: 202173010621@hainnu.edu.cn
Corresponding Author
Kerui Huang
Available Online 10 July 2025.
DOI
10.2991/978-2-38476-444-0_27How to use a DOI?
Keywords
Social gender bias; Academic performance; Female leadership; Self-esteem moderation
Abstract

This study investigates the facilitating role of social gender bias on academic performance and leadership among highly educated women through the lens of the “reverse fuel” theory, while examining the moderating effect of self-esteem. A questionnaire survey was conducted with 84 women aged 18–25 holding bachelor’s degrees or higher. Key findings include: (1) Social gender bias significantly positively predicted academic performance (β = 0.312, p < 0.05) and leadership (β = 0.366, p < 0.05)), supporting Hypotheses H1 and H2; (2) Self-esteem did not significantly moderate the relationship between bias and outcomes (interaction term p > 0.05), rejecting H3. However, the present study demonstrated a significant direct effect of self-esteem level on academic performance (r = 0.417, p < 0.01) and leadership (r = 0.387, p < 0.01), suggesting that high self-esteem women are more likely to treat social prejudice through goal-directed behaviors rather than internalize negative stereotypes. These results challenge the traditional “bias-suppression” paradigm, suggesting that social bias may act as a hidden resource by triggering resistance motivation, offering implications for educational and organizational interventions based on psychological capital.

Copyright
© 2025 The Author(s)
Open Access
Open Access This chapter is licensed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/), which permits any noncommercial use, sharing, adaptation, distribution and reproduction in any medium or format, as long as you give appropriate credit to the original author(s) and the source, provide a link to the Creative Commons license and indicate if changes were made.

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Volume Title
Proceedings of the 3rd International Conference on Language and Cultural Communication (ICLCC 2025)
Series
Advances in Social Science, Education and Humanities Research
Publication Date
10 July 2025
ISBN
978-2-38476-444-0
ISSN
2352-5398
DOI
10.2991/978-2-38476-444-0_27How to use a DOI?
Copyright
© 2025 The Author(s)
Open Access
Open Access This chapter is licensed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/), which permits any noncommercial use, sharing, adaptation, distribution and reproduction in any medium or format, as long as you give appropriate credit to the original author(s) and the source, provide a link to the Creative Commons license and indicate if changes were made.

Cite this article

TY  - CONF
AU  - Kerui Huang
PY  - 2025
DA  - 2025/07/10
TI  - Prejudice as “Reverse Fuel”
BT  - Proceedings of the 3rd International Conference on Language and Cultural Communication (ICLCC 2025)
PB  - Atlantis Press
SP  - 230
EP  - 239
SN  - 2352-5398
UR  - https://doi.org/10.2991/978-2-38476-444-0_27
DO  - 10.2991/978-2-38476-444-0_27
ID  - Huang2025
ER  -