Societal Gender Equality Research Articles

Attitudes to the gender division of labor and the transition to fatherhood

Most European countries, including Sweden, have witnessed considerable postponement of first births over the past several decades, and societal gender equality has been mentioned among the central reasons for the delay in childbearing. Continued postponement of parenthood over the life course can result in “final childlessness,” i.e. the individual will reach the end of his/her reproductive period without having become a parent. As levels of final childlessness have been increasing in most European countries, studies of childlessness have become more common. However, most of these studies deal exclusively with women, and the theorizing regarding what leads to final childlessness, particularly among men, is clearly underdeveloped. In this paper we will contribute to this research area by investigating the long-term relationships between attitudes toward domestic gender equality and men’s transition to parenthood in Sweden. Our dependent variable is a close approximation of “final childlessness.” We use Swedish panel survey data on attitudes to the gender division of labor among still childless young adults aged 22–30 in 1999, combined with register data on births in the period 1999–2012. The article shows that the initial delay in becoming fathers evidenced by more egalitarian men is not made up in the long term.

Human development index and women s employment relationship:an econometric analysis

The term of inequality has great importance on integrating women concept into socio-economic life in different cultures that has been addressed differently. Societal Gender Equality is one of the most controversial issues, and this study examines the origin of this concept. Also, the study seeks an answer for whether there is a relationship between the status of women in business life and Turkey’s Human Development Index regarding possible economic policies to be created. In the analysis, the years between 1990 and 2010 have been investigated, and ADF stationary test, casualty and least square method are used. As a result, a meaningful relation has been found between human development index and the employment rate of women. Moreover, the hypothesis that claims human development index is a result of women employment is accepted. Keywords: Gender equality, Human Development Index, employment of women. JEL Classification: J16, J71, C22

Undoing Gender in Housework? Participation in Domestic Chores by Italian Fathers and Children of Different Ages

The present article questions whether and to what extent daughters and sons learn how to “do gender” in housework in Italy, a country with low levels of societal gender equality. Using nationally representative time use survey data from Italy (Italian National Institute of Statistics, 2014, waves 2002–2003 and 2008–2009), where daily time use diaries are collected for entire households, logistic models investigate to what extent children (age 6–12), teenagers (age 13–19), and young adults (ages 20–25) participate in domestic chores and whether paternal involvement in housework (controlling for parental education and employment status) is positively associated with children’s participation in domestic chores. The results indicate that daughters are more likely to engage in domestic chores than are sons at all ages and that the gender gap is wider among young adults and teenagers than among children. Moreover, although both sons and daughters are more likely to engage in housework if their father does so, the effect of paternal involvement is much stronger for sons than daughters. These patterns suggest that the learning of housework is a gendered process—a finding that has important implications for the reproduction of gender inequalities in Italy and possibly elsewhere.

The gender gap in political participation in Muslim-majority countries

This study offers a comprehensive investigation of the gender gap in political participation among 13 Muslim-majority nations using World Values Survey data and applying multilevel analyses. It reveals a substantial gender gap, with men being significantly more likely to be politically active compared to women. As suggested in studies on advanced Western democracies, this gap can be partly explained by gender differences in socioeconomic characteristics and political attitudes. Furthermore, our analysis shows major cross-national differences in the extent of the gender gap among Muslim-majority nations. In contrast to what we had expected, these cross-national differences cannot be explained by levels of state Islamisation, modernisation or societal gender equality. Implications of these findings and suggestion for further research are discussed.

Can gender differences in educational performance of 15-year-old migrant pupils be explained by societal gender equality in origin and destination countries?

In this paper, we attempt to explain the differences between reading and math scores of migrants’ children (8430 daughters and 8526 sons) in 17 OECD destination countries, coming from 45 origin countries or regions, using PISA 2009 data. In addition to the societal gender equality levels of the origin and destination countries (the gender empowerment measure), we use macro indicators of the origin countries’ educational systems, economic development and religions. We find that migrant daughters from countries with higher gender equality levels obtain higher reading scores than comparable migrant sons do (but this is not the case for math scores). In addition, the higher the gender equality levels in the destination countries, the lower the reading and math scores of both male and female migrants’ children in their destination countries. Further analyses suggest it is the difference between gender equality levels, rather than the levels themselves, that explains the educational performance of both female and male migrant pupils. Our results also show the low gender equality level in Islamic origin countries offers a possible explanation for the low educational performance of Islamic pupils, both male and female. Finally, migrants’ daughters seem to perform slightly better educationally, compared with migrants’ sons.

Monetary conflicts within co-residential unions: a comparative perspective

Although various studies indicate that money is a major source of conflict between cohabiting and marital partners, the existing research on what causes conflict within intimate relationships remains insufficient. Using data from the European Social Survey 2004/2005, this article explores the factors that predict monetary conflict between partners across 23 European countries. Previous research concerning financial conflicts has concentrated on individuallevel factors. This study adds a macro-level perspective to the existing body of research by exploring whether the rate of female labor force participation and societal gender equality are associated with the prevalence of conflict. Individual-level factors, such as personal characteristics, household controls, relative resources, and gender equality, explain the frequency of disagreements. At the macro-level, this study shows that relationship dynamics are affected by the institutional characteristics of countries. In particular, in countries where the rate of female labor force participation is high, conflicts over money are more common. However, societal gender equality does not explain the frequency of conflicts.

The Gendering of Language: A Comparison of Gender Equality in Countries with Gendered, Natural Gender, and Genderless Languages

Feminists have long argued that sexist language can have real world consequences for gender relations and the relative status of men and women, and recent research suggests that grammatical gender can shape how people interpret the world around them along gender lines (Boroditsky 2009). Although others have theorized about the connection between grammatical gender in language and societal gender equality (Stahlberg et al. 2007), the current work tests this link empirically by examining differences in gender equality between countries with gendered, natural gender, and genderless language systems. Of the 111 countries investigated, our findings suggest that countries where gendered languages are spoken evidence less gender equality compared to countries with other grammatical gender systems. Furthermore, countries where natural gender languages are spoken demonstrate greater gender equality, which may be due to the ease of creating gender symmetric revisions to instances of sexist language.

Gender Roles, Gender (In)equality and Fertility: An Empirical Test of Five Gender Equity Indices

The division of gender roles in the household and societal level gender (in)equality have been situated as one of the most powerful factors underlying fertility behaviour. Despite continued theoretical attention to this issue by demographers, empirical research integrating gender roles and equity in relation to fertility remains surprisingly sparse. This paper first provides a brief review of previous research that has examined gender roles and fertility followed by a comparison of six prominent gender equality indices: Gender-related Development Index (GDI), Gender Empowerment Measure (GEM), Gender Gap Index (GGI), Gender Equality Index (GEI), the European Union Gender Equality Index (EU-GEI) and the Social Institutions and Gender Index (SIGI). The paper then tests how five of these indices impact fertility intentions and behaviour using a series of multilevel (random-coefficient) logistic regression models, applying the European Social Survey (2004/5). The GDI, with its emphasis on human development, adjusted for gender, has the strongest and significant effect on fertility intentions. The EU-GEI, which focuses on the universal caregiver model, uncovers that more equity significantly lowers fertility intentions, but only for women. The remaining indicators show no significant impact. The paper concludes with a reflection and suggestions for future research.

Conflict and Housework: Does Country Context Matter?

In this article, I analyse housework conflict cross-nationally using a unique multi-level data set that pairs the 2004 European Social Survey data for respondents in 25 nations with societal measures of gender equality. At the individual-level, I test two theoretical approaches to subjective housework conflict: the distributive justice and relative resources perspectives. The results support both of these theories for men and women. At the country-level, I test the relationship between housework conflict and two country-level measures: societal gender equality and rates of full-time female labor force participation. For men and women in countries with high rates of full-time female labour force participation, the relationship between housework conflict and gender equality is negative. For men and women in countries with limited access to the labour force, the relationship between housework conflict and gender equality is positive. These results suggest a dynamic relationship between country context and individual negotiations over housework. © The Author 2009.

INTRODUCTION TO SPECIAL ISSUE ‘GENDER, CULTURE AND ALCOHOL PROBLEMS: A MULTI-NATIONAL STUDY’

This paper provides an introduction to a series of articles reporting results from the EU concerted action "Gender, Culture and Alcohol Problems: A Multi-national Study" which examined differences in drinking among women and men in 13 European and two non-European countries. The gender gap in alcohol drinking is one of the few universal gender differences in human social behavior. However, the size of these differences varies greatly from one society to another. The papers in this issue examine, across countries, (1) men's and women's drinking patterns, (2) the prevalence of men's and women's experience of alcohol-related problems, (3) gender differences in social inequalities in alcohol use and abuse, (4) gender differences in the influence of combinations of social roles on heavy alcohol use, and (5) how societal-level factors predict women's and men's alcohol use and problems on a regional and global level. Country surveys were independently conducted and then centralized at one institution for further data standardization and processing. Several results indicated that the greater the societal gender equality in a country, the smaller the gender differences in drinking behavior. In most analyses the smallest gender differences in drinking behaviour were found in Nordic countries, followed by western and central European countries, with the largest gender differences in countries with developing economies.