There's a really concrete phenomenon where this observation bears out in data: the "negotiation gap" myth.
For a while, the idea that the pay gap between men and women could be explained by women's reluctance to negotiate their salaries was fairly popular, to the point that the notion appeared in Sheryl Sanberg's 2013 book Lean In. It's an attractive idea because it's rooted in "female socialization" and provides us with an easy, individualist solution requiring no re-examination of systemic biases. To wit: What if we just asked women to negotiate more, to reach parity with their male counterparts? Surely, that would help narrow the gendered pay gap, yes?
The pay gap has persistently remained while the negotiation gap has shrunk, or even reversed. As it turns out it, when women negotiate more, they also get turned down for pay increases more, and the literature on the "negotiation gap" itself has resulted in more sexist beliefs among managers in workplaces.
Women weren't reluctant to negotiate because of Female Programming that made them too shy, bashful, demure, or non-confrontational. No, women were reacting rationally to hostile, misogynistic workplace environments, correctly intuiting that attempting to negotiate for higher pay would result in refusal and being labeled a "problem". The issue was never one of whether women adequately assert ourselves, but one of gendered biases, one of women's labor and talent and intellect being underestimated and undervalued.
In short, it is a pervasive cultural and systemic issue, a reflection of society's misogyny and the belief that we are lesser, deserve less, and are not worthy of the same treatment as men. "Female socialization" is women reacting to social hostility towards us, taking the path of least resistance when we know that asserting ourselves will be met with punitive measures.
I'd also like to add that this devaluation, this dismissal of our worth and humanity, is something trans women also grapple with and deal with. We are so often treated as and told we are disposable, that our worth is nothing beyond our sexual utility, that we do not even deserve to participate fully in society and deserve to languish on the margins.
Sounds pretty "female socialization" to me.
