職場女性都在討論玻璃屋頂，說得不到公平的升遷機會。可是，她們可能沒有意識到，這些障礙可能恰恰來自她們的女上司。有研究表明，很多位高權重的女性都不太愿意看到女下屬升職。這種現象叫做“蜂王綜合征”。

Queen bee syndrome was first defined by G.L. Staines, T.E. Jayaratne, and C. Tavris in 1973. It describes a woman in a position of authority who views or treats subordinates more critically if they are female. This phenomenon has been documented by several studies. Scientists from the University of Toronto speculated that the queen bee syndrome may be the reason that women find it more stressful to work for women managers; no difference was found in stress levels for male workers.

蜂王綜合征(queen bee syndrome)一詞最初由斯泰恩斯、賈亞拉特納和塔佛瑞斯在1973年定義，指處于領導地位的女性對女下屬更為嚴苛。這種現象在多個研究中均有記載。多倫多大學的科學家猜測，蜂王綜合征可能是女員工在女領導手下工作壓力更大的原因，而男員工的壓力水平則未見因領導性別不同而有變化。

Recent research has postulated that queen bee syndrome may be a product of certain cultural influences, especially those related to the modern workplace. Although significant steps have been made towards gender equality in most modern workplaces, research shows that, on average, women are still paid less than and achieve fewer promotions than their male counterparts. Based on these statistics, researchers have hypothesized that queen bee syndrome may be developed by women who have achieved high workplace positions within their respective fields as a way to defend against any gender bias found in their cultures. By opposing any attempts of subordinates of their own sex to advance in career paths, women with queen bee syndrome hope to fit in with their male counterparts by adhering to the cultural stigmas placed on gender in the workplace. (Source: Wikipedia)

近期已有研究假設蜂王綜合征可能是某些文化影響的產物，尤其在現代職場中。雖然現代職場已在性別平等方面有了很明顯的進步，不過有研究發現，平均來說，女性的收入和獲得升職的機會仍少于男性。在這些數據的基礎上，研究人員猜測，蜂王綜合征可能是在各自領域取得較高職場地位的女性用以抵抗她們所處文化中任何形式性別歧視的武器。患有蜂王綜合征的女性通過阻止同性下屬升遷這樣的職場文化惡習來使自己更好地融入同一級別的男同事當中。