She dressed modestly, in a navy suit and dark-rimmed glasses. No flashy jewelry, little makeup.

She is a professor and psychologist with an impressive C.V.

She is white, and blond, and pretty — but not too pretty — with an intact family, suburban home and children.

She teared up in her testimony — her voice cracking — but she did not openly cry or break down.

And she smiled! She pleaded for caffeine and joked about Google interns renting out her home.

“These are all codes for ‘she is displaying proper expectations of femininity,’” said Marianne Cooper, a sociologist at Stanford who studies gender inequality. “Women are walking a very fine line. Too much or too little of something can lead people to discredit them. That so many people found Dr. Blasey Ford credible suggests that she was able to get across that tight rope and not fall off.”