Sex differences in gender role attitudes
Loading...
Date
2005-06
Authors
Journal Title
Journal ISSN
Volume Title
Publisher
The Ohio State University
Abstract
Past sociological research has found that women have made the transition from traditional gender roles to more non-traditional and egalitarian patterns more quickly than have men. This study argued that such discrepant behavior results from the incongruent gender role attitudes of men and women. In particular, it was hypothesized that women would respond to measures of gender role attitudes in a way that is more congruent with egalitarian gender ideology, while men would reply in a way that corresponds to traditional views of gender. This prediction was tested using data from the 2002 Monitoring the Future (MTF) 12th-Grade Survey, thereby providing a window into the contemporary and emerging gender ideology of young women and men. Results yielded highly significant sex differences regarding all three gender role attitude measures. Men were found to be much more likely than women to support a traditional gendered division of labor, to believe maternal employment to have negative effects on young children, and to regard maternal employment as an impediment to close mother-child relationships. However, men’s gender role beliefs were determined to be predominantly neutral—neither traditional nor egalitarian, rather than traditional. This suggests that greater levels of gender equality may arise as this young generation finds its place within social institutions.
Description
Keywords
sex roles, family attitudes, division of labor, youth attitudes, maternal employment