The hypothesis that people have differential access (as measured by decision-processing time) to descriptive categories of what is applicable to male and female managers, who were effective or ineffective, was tested. A list of adjectives was presented sequentially on a CRT screen to 96 participants (48 men and 48 women, students and university employees), who evaluated each item as to “how characteristic” or “how uncharacteristic” the adjective was in describing a male or female effective (ineffective) manager. “How characteristic,” or rated prototypicality and decision-time were dependent measures. Analysis indicated that sex of target had little influence on either rated prototypicality or decision times when performance information was presented. Differences in correlations between decision times and prototypicality ratings varied primarily with the manipulation of effectiveness.