Predictors of Public Support for Gender-Related Affirmative Action

Abstract

Drawing on data from the General Social Survey during the period from 1996 through 2006, we explore predictors of support for gender-related affirmative action in the United States. Following the literature on race-based affirmative action, we identify three main domains of predictors, each of which also resonates well with themes within scholarship on gender: interests; gender-related attitudes; and general stratification beliefs. In multivariate analyses, at least some predictors within each domain are significant. We conclude that like support for race-based affirmative action, support for gender-based affirmative action is based on a combination of interests, gender attitudes, and general stratification beliefs, but that gender attitudes are less important in shaping such support than racial beliefs are in shaping support for race-based affirmative action. The implications of these findings for the literature on race-related affirmative action as well as for the literature on gender-related attitudes are considered.