Change in Beliefs or Change in Populations? A Decomposition of Cross-National Trends in Beliefs about Gender Equality.

Shawn F. Dorius, Pennsylvania State University

Using linear regression decomposition, this research documents cross-national change in beliefs about gender equality. The data suggest that change in gender ideology is far from uniform for the cross section of countries included in this analysis and the major world cleavage lies between highly developed western countries, where beliefs about gender equality are the highest and rising, and the rest of the world, where means are lower and, in many cases, decreasing. Beliefs about gender equality in areas such as employment, higher education, and political representation are at best flat among highly populous and rapidly growing countries, and in a number of countries, egalitarian beliefs are on the declining. Decomposition of change into its proximate sources (within and between cohorts) suggest that in many cases, period and cohort effects are offsetting. In nearly all countries, cohort replacement contributed to more egalitarian beliefs, while period effects are negative for many countries.