Revolutionary Christian Attitudes toward Women and Family in Late Qing and Republican-Era China

In the late 1800s and early 1900s, Chinese Christian familial ideals were traditional and revolutionary at the same time. They were traditional in wanting to preserve some role for parents in forming the marriages of their children and in seeing wives as primarily responsible for the care of children. But Christians were revolutionary in encouraging women to develop their personalities and work outside the home. They advocated women’s education and associated education with women’s empowerment and independence. Christians taught that marriage should be based on love and that daughters were just as important as sons, even if they chose to be single. Singleness, spouse self-selection, prioritizing the husband-wife relationship over the parent-child relationship, and pursuing a companionate model of marriage were all ways that Christians helped revolutionize familial ideals in China.

The Contingent Effects of Sexism in Primary Elections

Although the landscape for female candidates in U.S. politics has improved, research continues to find that many voters possess sexist attitudes. We rely on a standard political communication framework to help reconcile sexism in the electorate with increasingly favorable outcomes for women in primary elections. Based on two national survey experiments, we first demonstrate that in the absence of gendered campaign rhetoric, sexism is a weak predictor of support for female candidates on both sides of the political aisle. We then show, however, that when a male candidate attempts to activate sexism among voters by attacking a female opponent, gender attitudes become more salient—but not to the woman’s disadvantage. In a Democratic primary, gendered attacks backfire and lead to a significant boost in support for the female candidate. On the Republican side, a male candidate does not face the same backlash, but the attacks do very little to depress his female opponent’s support. While the persistence of hostile attitudes toward women has slowed the march toward gender equality in society, our experimental results suggest that sexism exerts only contingent effects in primary elections and not systematically to female candidates’ detriment.

Gender, Education, and Attitudes toward Women’s Leadership in Three East Asian Countries: An Intersectional and Multilevel Approach

Despite their achievements in the past few decades, women remain largely excluded from impactful leadership positions in many countries and fields. In this research, we focus on how gender and education shape public opinions that favor men over women for political and economic leadership in three East Asian countries. Utilizing an intersectional theoretical framework and multilevel methodological approach to analyze the World Value Survey data, we investigate the heterogeneous effects of education on gender attitudes between men and women and how such heterogeneity is conditioned by national contexts. We found that the negative association between higher levels of education and traditional gender attitudes is much stronger among women than among men, especially in Japan. National contexts not only directly shape gender attitudes but also modify the main and interactive effects of gender and education on attitudes toward women leadership. This research contributes to the emergent literature on the contingency of intersectionality and highlights the utility of multilevel analysis in intersectional and/or comparative studies.

Electoral Competition, Voter Bias, and Women in Politics

We quantify the implications of voter bias and electoral competition for politicians’ gender composition. Unfavorable voters’ attitudes toward women and local gender earnings gap correlate negatively with the share of female candidates in Parliamentary elections. Using within-candidate variation across the different polling stations of an electoral district in a given election year, we find that female candidates obtain fewer votes in municipalities with higher gender earnings gaps. We show theoretically that when voters are biased against women, parties facing gender quotas select male candidates in the most contestable districts. We find empirical support for such a strategic party response to voter gender bias. Simulating our calibrated model confirms that competition significantly hinders the effectiveness of gender quotas.

Gender-Equality Concerns and Political Attitudes toward Women in the 2019 Legislative Election: Evidence from Pelalawan

The presence of women in Indonesian politics remains underrepresented whereas cultural and societal aspects pose critical influence in determining voter behavior toward female candidates. The aim of this article is to examine voter behavior regarding female candidates and the probability for them to be elected as members of parliament. We apply quantitative method by developing three models representing three combinations of predictor variables, (i) socio-demography, (ii) gender- equality concern, and (iii) political attitude towards female candidates as determinants towards female candidate electability. The study took place in Pelalawan Regency in Riau Province, by analyzing 400 respondents with equal numbers of men and women from various socio-economic backgrounds through clustered random sampling method. We tested these hypotheses and our three models by utilizing logistic regression analysis. The result shows that political attitude toward female candidates (Model 3) are the strongest coefficient and most significant determinant for female candidate electability. The study also revealed that female candidate’s electability in Pelalawan Regency is lower than male candidate’s electability among male respondents. On the other hand, female candidate’s electability is higher than male candidate’s electability among female respondents. Moreover, we also found that education determines female candidate’s electability where the more educated an individual is, the more he/she tends to vote for female candidates.

Guy Talk: A Gender-Specific Sexual Education Program to Reduce Sexual Risk Behaviors With High School Males

Purpose The purpose of this study was to investigate the feasibility and effectiveness of a gender-specific intervention targeted to adolescent males to reduce sexual risks. Method This study used a randomized clinical trial comparing a broad-based male empowerment curriculum with a no-treatment control group. The sample ( N = 580) was recruited from schools and was implemented in community-based settings mostly in an after-school context. Assessments were conducted at baseline, postintervention, and 3 months follow-up time periods. Results There were significant differences between the two groups favoring the intervention group on several of the outcome indicators, including condom technical skills, attitudes toward women, social skills, peer assertiveness, and attitudes toward consent. Quality of implementation was rated high, and qualitative data suggest themes that reflect key lessons emphasized in the curriculum. Conclusions Gender-specific programs for adolescent males can help reduce indicators that are related to sexual risk reduction. More long-term follow-up is needed to assess impact on sexual behaviors. Efforts directed at male populations should continue to be researched for potential in reducing sexual risks.

The Impact of Sexualized Video Game Content and Cognitive Load on State Rape Myth Acceptance

The potential negative impact of sexualized video games on attitudes toward women is an important issue. Studies that have examined this issue are rare and contain a number of limitations. Therefore, it largely remains unclear whether sexualized video games can have an impact on attitudes toward women. This study examined the consequences of sexualized video game content and cognitive load (moderator) on rape victim blame and rape perpetrator blame (used as a proxy of rape myth acceptance), and whether the degree of humanness of the victim and of the perpetrator mediated these effects. Participants (N = 142) played a video game using sexualized or non-sexualized female characters. Cognitive load was manipulated by setting the difficulty level of the game to low or high. After gameplay, participants read a rape date story, and were then asked to judge the victim’s and the perpetrator’s degree of responsibility and humanness. Based on the General Aggression Model (GAM), it was hypothesized that playing the video game with a sexualized content would increase the responsibility assigned to the victim and diminish the responsibility assigned to the perpetrator. Further, degree of humanness of the victim and the perpetrator was expected to mediate this relation. The results were partially consistent with these predictions: Playing a video game containing sexualized female characters increased rape victim blame when cognitive load was high, but did not predict degree of humanness accorded to the victim. Concerning the perpetrator, video game sexualization did not influence responsibility, but partly influenced humanness. This study concludes that video games impact on attitudes toward women and this, in part, due to its interactive nature.

“I learned that sports teaches rape culture”: Assessing Sexual Violence Prevention Education for Intercollegiate Athletes

In fall 2018, 81 intercollegiate athletes participated in Fair Play: Sexual Violence Prevention for Athletes. This study aimed to assess the efficacy of the Fair Play curriculum and facilitation, specifically learning if athletes’ attitudes toward women and/or rape myth acceptance changed as a result of their participation in Fair Play. Athletes completed pre- and post-test surveys to measure perceptions of sexual assault/rape myth acceptance (Gerger, Kley, Bohner, & Siebler, 2007) and gender roles (Spence, Helmreich, & Stapp, 1973). In addition, 20 athletes participated in semi-structured qualitative interviews to further explain their knowledge of sexual violence after completing Fair Play. Survey results showed significant differences for pre- and post-test scores on rape myth acceptance, but not for attitudes toward women. Interview results showed that Fair Play participants could articulate a raised awareness of sexual violence, appropriately define sexual violence and consent, and a rejection of rape myths. Implications include further understanding of effective rape prevention education.