Untangling the gender gap in symbolic racist attitudes among white Americans

Abstract

While the gender gap in voting has important political implications for understanding contemporary American politics, and continues to be a focus of a great deal of research, gender gaps in policy areas have also been identified and these gender gaps also have dramatic political implications, particularly in the context of understanding attitudes about race. Despite the advances in our understanding of the gender gap in voting, fewer investigations have explored potential gender differences in racial attitudes. The lack of research into racial attitudes among women and men is surprising in light of the election and re-election of President Obama and the continued “racialization” of many national political issues. In fact, few studies have explored contemporary differences between women and men in levels of symbolic racism. Moreover, among the existing studies of possible gender gaps in racial attitudes, the role of perceived discrimination is surprisingly absent. In this investigation, potential differences between men and women in racial attitudes, specifically symbolic racism, are explored with a focus on demographic, attitudinal, and perceptions of discrimination as possible explanations. Results from a nationally representative survey demonstrate a significant gender gap in symbolic racism with women expressing less racially resentful attitudes. Furthermore, this gender gap in racial attitudes appears to be explained largely by ideology, party identification, and differences between men and women in their perceived experiences with discrimination.