How Boy Professors Are Different from Girl Professors

My theory of how students make sense of professors:  Whatever conception of "God" students bring with them to college gets applied to their male instructors.  Whatever conception of "Mom" they bring with them to college gets applied to their female instructors.  Students are, on the whole, more likely to accept that God will, on occasion, be angry, distant, vengeful, than that Mom will behave in these ways.  A Mom who isn't unfailingly nurturing is a source of dismay. Any characteristics (race, ethnicity, gender ambiguity, relative youth, disability) that complicate students' ability to assimilate male instructors to God and female instructors to Mom is also a source of dismay. More...