MANdatory - why men need (and are needed for) gender equality progress

While much progress has been made towards gender equality, diversity and inclusion in the workplace, education and society, recent years have also revealed continuing challenges that slow or halt this progress. To date, the majority of gender equality action has tended to approach gender equality from one side: being focused on the need to remove barriers for girls and women. We argue that this is only half the battle, and that a focus on men is MANdatory, highlighting three key areas: First, we review men’s privileged status as being potentially threatened by progress in gender equality, and the effects of these threats for how men engage in gender-equality progress. Second, we highlight how men themselves are victims of restrictive gender roles, and the consequences of this for men’s physical and mental health, and for their engagement at work and at home. Third, we review the role of men as allies in the fight for gender equality, and on the factors that impede and may aid in increasing men’s involvement. We end with recommendations for work organizations, educational institutions and society at large to reach and involve men as positive agents of social change

Gendered self-views across 62 countries: A test of competing models

Social role theory posits that binary gender gaps in agency and communion should be larger in less egalitarian countries, reflecting these countries’ more pronounced sex-based power divisions. Conversely, evolutionary and self-construal theorists suggest that gender gaps in agency and communion should be larger in more egalitarian countries, reflecting the greater autonomy support and flexible self-construction processes present in these countries. Using data from 62 countries (N = 28,640), we examine binary gender gaps in agentic and communal self-views as a function of country-level objective gender equality (the Global Gender Gap Index) and subjective distributions of social power (the Power Distance Index). Findings show that in more egalitarian countries, gender gaps in agency are smaller and gender gaps in communality are larger. These patterns are driven primarily by cross-country differences in men’s self-views and by the Power Distance Index (PDI) more robustly than the Global Gender Gap Index (GGGI). We consider possible causes and implications of these findings.info:eu-repo/semantics/acceptedVersio

Introduction to a Culturally Sensitive Measure of Well-Being: Combining Life Satisfaction and Interdependent Happiness Across 49 Different Cultures

How can one conclude that well-being is higher in country A than country B, when well-being is being measured according to the way people in country A think about well-being? We address this issue by proposing a new culturally sensitive method to comparing societal levels of well-being. We support our reasoning with data on life satisfaction and interdependent happiness focusing on individual and family, collected mostly from students, across forty-nine countries. We demonstrate that the relative idealization of the two types of well-being varies across cultural contexts and are associated with culturally different models of selfhood. Furthermore, we show that rankings of societal well-being based on life satisfaction tend to underestimate the contribution from interdependent happiness. We introduce a new culturally sensitive method for calculating societal well-being, and examine its construct validity by testing for associations with the experience of emotions and with individualism-collectivism. This new culturally sensitive approach represents a slight, yet important improvement in measuring well-being

Gender gap in parental leave intentions: Evidence from 37 countries

This is the final version. Available from Wiley via the DOI in this record. Despite global commitments and efforts, a gender-based division of paid and unpaid work persists. To identify how psychological factors, national policies, and the broader sociocultural context contribute to this inequality, we assessed parental-leave intentions in young adults (18–30years old) planning to have children (N = 13,942; 8,880 identified as women; 5,062 identified as men) across 37 countries that varied in parental-leave policies and societal gender equality. In all countries, women intended to take longer leave than men. National parental-leave policies and women’s political representation partially explained cross-national variations in the gender gap. Gender gaps in leave intentions were paradoxically larger in countries with more gender-egalitarian parental-leave policies (i.e., longer leave available to both fathers and mothers). Interestingly, this cross-national variation in the gender gap was driven by cross-national variations in women’s (rather than men’s) leave intentions. Financially generous leave and gender-egalitarian policies (linked to men’s higher uptake in prior research) were not associated with leave intentions in men. Rather, men’s leave intentions were related to their individual gender attitudes. Leave intentions were inversely related to career ambitions. The potential for existing policies to foster gender equality in paid and unpaid work is discussed.SSHRC Insight Development GrantSSHRC Insight GrantEconomic and Social Research CouncilState Research AgencyGuangdong 13th-five Philosophy and Social Science Planning ProjectNational Natural Science Foundation of ChinaSwiss National Science FoundationSwiss National Science FoundationCenter for Social Conflict and Cohesion StudiesCenter for Intercultural and Indigenous ResearchSSHRC Postdoctoral FellowshipSlovak Research and Development AgencySwiss National Science FoundationCanada Research ChairsSocial Sciences and Humanities Research Council of CanadaOntario Ministry of Research and InnovationHSE University, RFFaculty of Arts, Masaryk Universit

Gendered self-views across 62 countries: a test of competing models

Social role theory posits that binary gender gaps in agency and communion should be larger in less egalitarian countries, reflecting these countries’ more pronounced sex-based power divisions. Conversely, evolutionary and self-construal theorists suggest that gender gaps in agency and communion should be larger in more egalitarian countries, reflecting the greater autonomy support and flexible self-construction processes present in these countries. Using data from 62 countries (N = 28,640), we examine binary gender gaps in agentic and communal self-views as a function of country-level objective gender equality (the Global Gender Gap Index) and subjective distributions of social power (the Power Distance Index). Findings show that in more egalitarian countries, gender gaps in agency are smaller and gender gaps in communality are larger. These patterns are driven primarily by cross-country differences in men’s self-views and by the Power Distance Index (PDI) more robustly than the Global Gender Gap Index (GGGI). We consider possible causes and implications of these findings

Gendered Self-Views Across 62 Countries: A Test of Competing Models

Social role theory posits that binary gender gaps in agency and communion should be larger in less egalitarian countries, reflecting these countries’ more pronounced sex-based power divisions. Conversely, evolutionary and self-construal theorists suggest that gender gaps in agency and communion should be larger in more egalitarian countries, reflecting the greater autonomy support and flexible self-construction processes present in these countries. Using data from 62 countries (N = 28,640), we examine binary gender gaps in agentic and communal self-views as a function of country-level objective gender equality (the Global Gender Gap Index) and subjective distributions of social power (the Power Distance Index). Findings show that in more egalitarian countries, gender gaps in agency are smaller and gender gaps in communality are larger. These patterns are driven primarily by cross-country differences in men’s self-views and by the Power Distance Index (PDI) more robustly than the Global Gender Gap Index (GGGI). We consider possible causes and implications of these findings. © The Author(s) 2022

Gendered self-views across 62 countries: A test of competing models

Social role theory posits that binary gender gaps in agency and communion should be larger in less egalitarian countries, reflecting these countries' more pronounced sex-based power divisions. Conversely, evolutionary and self-construal theorists suggest that gender gaps in agency and communion should be larger in more egalitarian countries, reflecting the greater autonomy support and flexible self-construction processes present in these countries. Using data from 62 countries (N = 28,640), we examine binary gender gaps in agentic and communal self-views as a function of country-level objective gender equality (the Global Gender Gap Index) and subjective distributions of social power (the Power Distance Index). Findings show that in more egalitarian countries, gender gaps in agency are smaller and gender gaps in communality are larger. These patterns are driven primarily by cross-country differences in men's self-views and by the Power Distance Index (PDI) more robustly than the Global Gender Gap Index (GGGI). We consider possible causes and implications of these findings

Variation in Masculinities and Fathering Behaviors: A Cross-National Comparison of the United States and Canada

Research continues to examine the barriers to and facilitators of positive fathering behaviors. One area recently addressed by researchers focuses on the relationship between masculine norm adherence and father involvement. Yet, little work has examined cross-national variability in this relationship—despite differences in gender norms, fathering expectations, and social policies across countries. The present study considers possible differences in the relationship between masculine norm adherence and fathering behaviors in the United States and Canada—two rich, multiethnic countries with many similarities but some distinct policy and family support differences. Using data from fathers in Canada (n = 2057) and the United States (n = 2207), our results show that fathers in Canada are warmer, more involved, provide more care, and use harsh discipline less than their American counterparts. Furthermore, the negative association between masculine norm adherence and positive fathering behaviors is stronger among American fathers than Canadian fathers. Overall, our findings indicate the importance of social context for understanding how gender norms shape men’s parenting, given that the association between masculine norms and fathering varies in two culturally similar countries with different social policies around family life. Implications for social policy in the two countries and within institutional contexts are discussed