DEAR ABBY: I'm a professor of management at an Ohio liberal arts college. For 15 years, I have given students a writing assignment that's virtually identical to the issue raised by "Troubled Wife." My purpose is to check for gender bias. I give them all the same situation, but for half the class the working spouse is a woman, and for the other half, it's a man.
When I started doing this, if the working spouse was a man, about 60 percent of my students would say the wife should be required to attend. However, only 40 percent would require a husband to attend his wife's business social events.
Today the figure is closer to 50/50. My current business students appear to be indifferent to whether it is a husband urging his wife to attend or vice versa.
I see this as progress. -- GLENN BLAIR, MEDINA, OHIO
DEAR GLENN: So do I.