Most studies of gender differences in social dominance orientation (SDO) have investigated settings more or less hierarchy-enhancing. The aim of this study was to explore gender differences in SDO (1) within social structures varying in equality-enhancement, i.e., communities differing in political equality between men and women, and (2) settings where equality was maximized and held constant, i.e., democratic, voluntary associations, but varying in gender composition, using survey data from a random sample of 831 Swedish adults (median age= 47 years). There was a significant interaction effect between gender and membership in voluntary associations dominated by women, with men and women displaying equally low levels of SDO. In all other instances the main effect of gender remained statistically significant.
This study tested predictions regarding ambivalent sexism, previously studied cross-culturally, here "within-culturally", between groups from different organizational settings. Based on three samples (334 adults in general, 744 industrial employees, and 189 high school students), completing a Swedish version of the Ambivalent Sexism Inventory (ASI), the results revealed that men scored higher on hostile and benevolent sexism than women, and high school students scored higher than both adult samples on both forms of sexism. The results generally confirmed the predictions; the gender gap in benevolent sexism decreased as a function of increasing levels of general sexism and the correlation between hostile and benevolent sexism decreased with higher levels of general sexism. In fact, the groups scoring highest on general sexism displayed significant negative correlations indicating a polarized ideology of women among these groups. Implications, both theoretical and practical, derived from these results are discussed.
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