Gender, Power, and Colleague Aggression in U.S. State Senates

Abstract

In this paper, we present analysis of an original dataset of levels of colleague aggression among U.S. state senators, whether women senators face more of these behaviors than men, and whether numerical and positional gender inequality in state senates affects these relationships. The results indicate that, overall, colleague aggression in U.S. state senates is relatively rare, and, in general, women do not face more aggression than men. Under certain conditions, however, subsets of women senators experience more aggressive behaviors than their counterparts, male or female. Specifically, when they serve in senates with higher percentages of women or growing numbers of women, they are disproportionally targeted. There is also some evidence that women committee chairs are more likely than rank-and-file women to face this type of behavior.