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Portrait of Erik Wengström. Photo.

Erik Wengström

Professor, Director of Doctoral studies, Department of Economics

Portrait of Erik Wengström. Photo.

Personality Traits and the Gender Gap in Ideology

Author

  • Rebecca Morton
  • Jean-Robert Tyran
  • Erik Wengström

Editor

  • Maria Gallego
  • Norman Schofield

Summary, in English

What explains the gender gap in ideology, i.e. the observation that women tend to be more leftist than men? We provide new evidence showing that personality traits play a key role. Using a novel high-quality data set, we show that the mediating (i.e. indirect) effects of gender operating through personality traits by far dominate the direct effects of gender. They also dominate other potential differences between the sexes like income or education as explanatory factors. Our findings suggest that women tend to be more leftist than men mainly because they have different personalities, which, in turn, shape their expressed ideology. Taking such mediating effects of personality traits into account explains over three quarters of the observed gender gap in general ideological preferences.

Department/s

  • Department of Economics

Publishing year

2016

Language

English

Pages

153-185

Publication/Series

Studies in Political Economy

Document type

Book chapter

Publisher

Springer

Topic

  • Gender Studies
  • Economics

Status

Published

ISBN/ISSN/Other

  • ISSN: 2364-5903
  • ISBN: 978-3-319-40118-8
  • ISBN: 978-3-319-40116-4