gender roles and gender equality essay

Goal 5: Achieve gender equality and empower all women and girls

Gender equality is not only a fundamental human right, but a necessary foundation for a peaceful, prosperous and sustainable world. There has been progress over the last decades, but the world is not on track to achieve gender equality by 2030.

Women and girls represent half of the world’s population and therefore also half of its potential. But gender inequality persists everywhere and stagnates social progress. On average, women in the labor market still earn 23 percent less than men globally and women spend about three times as many hours in unpaid domestic and care work as men.

Sexual violence and exploitation, the unequal division of unpaid care and domestic work, and discrimination in public office, all remain huge barriers. All these areas of inequality have been exacerbated by the COVID-19 pandemic: there has been a surge in reports of sexual violence, women have taken on more care work due to school closures, and 70% of health and social workers globally are women.

At the current rate, it will take an estimated 300 years to end child marriage, 286 years to close gaps in legal protection and remove discriminatory laws, 140 years for women to be represented equally in positions of power and leadership in the workplace, and 47 years to achieve equal representation in national parliaments.

Political leadership, investments and comprehensive policy reforms are needed to dismantle systemic barriers to achieving Goal 5 Gender equality is a cross-cutting objective and must be a key focus of national policies, budgets and institutions.

How much progress have we made?

International commitments to advance gender equality have brought about improvements in some areas: child marriage and female genital mutilation (FGM) have declined in recent years, and women’s representation in the political arena is higher than ever before. But the promise of a world in which every woman and girl enjoys full gender equality, and where all legal, social and economic barriers to their empowerment have been removed, remains unfulfilled. In fact, that goal is probably even more distant than before, since women and girls are being hit hard by the COVID-19 pandemic.

Are they any other gender-related challenges?

Yes. Worldwide, nearly half of married women lack decision-making power over their sexual and reproductive health and rights. 35 per cent of women between 15-49 years of age have experienced physical and/ or sexual intimate partner violence or non-partner sexual violence.1 in 3 girls aged 15-19 have experienced some form of female genital mutilation/cutting in the 30 countries in Africa and the Middle East, where the harmful practice is most common with a high risk of prolonged bleeding, infection (including HIV), childbirth complications, infertility and death.

This type of violence doesn’t just harm individual women and girls; it also undermines their overall quality of life and hinders their active involvement in society.

Why should gender equality matter to me?

Regardless of where you live in, gender equality is a fundamental human right. Advancing gender equality is critical to all areas of a healthy society, from reducing poverty to promoting the health, education, protection and the well-being of girls and boys.

What can we do?

If you are a girl, you can stay in school, help empower your female classmates to do the same and fight for your right to access sexual and reproductive health services. If you are a woman, you can address unconscious biases and implicit associations that form an unintended and often an invisible barrier to equal opportunity.

If you are a man or a boy, you can work alongside women and girls to achieve gender equality and embrace healthy, respectful relationships.

You can fund education campaigns to curb cultural practices like female genital mutilation and change harmful laws that limit the rights of women and girls and prevent them from achieving their full potential.

The Spotlight Initiative is an EU/UN partnership, and a global, multi-year initiative focused on eliminating all forms of violence against women and girls – the world’s largest targeted effort to end all forms of violence against women and girls.

Facts and figures

Goal 5 targets.

• With only seven years remaining, a mere 15.4 per cent of Goal 5 indicators with data are “on track”, 61.5 per cent are at a moderate distance and 23.1 per cent are far or very far off track from 2030 targets.
• In many areas, progress has been too slow. At the current rate, it will take an estimated 300 years to end child marriage, 286 years to close gaps in legal protection and remove discriminatory laws, 140 years for women to be represented equally in positions of power and leadership in the workplace, and 47 years to achieve equal representation in national parliaments.
• Political leadership, investments and comprehensive policy reforms are needed to dismantle systemic barriers to achieving Goal 5. Gender equality is a cross-cutting objective and must be a key focus of national policies, budgets and institutions.
• Around 2.4 billion women of working age are not afforded equal economic opportunity. Nearly 2.4 Billion Women Globally Don’t Have Same Economic Rights as Men  
• 178 countries maintain legal barriers that prevent women’s full economic participation. Nearly 2.4 Billion Women Globally Don’t Have Same Economic Rights as Men
• In 2019, one in five women, aged 20-24 years, were married before the age of 18. Girls | UN Special Representative of the Secretary-General on Violence Against Children

Source: The Sustainable Development Goals Report 2023

5.1 End all forms of discrimination against all women and girls everywhere

5.2 Eliminate all forms of violence against all women and girls in the public and private spheres, including trafficking and sexual and other types of exploitation

5.3 Eliminate all harmful practices, such as child, early and forced marriage and female genital mutilation

5.4 Recognize and value unpaid care and domestic work through the provision of public services, infrastructure and social protection policies and the promotion of shared responsibility within the household and the family as nationally appropriate

5.5 Ensure women’s full and effective participation and equal opportunities for leadership at all levels of decisionmaking in political, economic and public life

5.6 Ensure universal access to sexual and reproductive health and reproductive rights as agreed in accordance with the Programme of Action of the International Conference on Population and Development and the Beijing Platform for Action and the outcome documents of their review conferences

5.A  Undertake reforms to give women equal rights to economic resources, as well as access to ownership and control over land and other forms of property, financial services, inheritance and natural resources, in accordance with national laws

5.B Enhance the use of enabling technology, in particular information and communications technology, to promote the empowerment of women

5.C Adopt and strengthen sound policies and enforceable legislation for the promotion of gender equality and the empowerment of all women and girls at all levels

He for She campaign

United Secretary-General Campaign UNiTE to End Violence Against Women

Every Woman Every Child Initiative

Spotlight Initiative

United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF)

UN Population Fund: Gender equality

UN Population Fund: Female genital mutilation

UN Population Fund: Child marriage

UN Population Fund: Engaging men & boys

UN Population Fund: Gender-based violence

World Health Organization (WHO)

UN Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights

UN High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR)

UN Education, Scientific and Cultural Organisation (UNESCO)

UN Department of Economic and Social Affairs, Gender Statistics

Fast Facts: Gender Equality

Infographic: Gender Equality

The Initiative is so named as it brings focused attention to this issue, moving it into the spotlight and placing it at the centre of efforts to achieve gender equality and women’s empowerment, in line with the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development.

An initial investment in the order of EUR 500 million will be made, with the EU as the main contributor. Other donors and partners will be invited to join the Initiative to broaden its reach and scope. The modality for the delivery will be a UN multi- stakeholder trust fund, administered by the Multi-Partner Trust Fund Office, with the support of core agencies UNDP, UNFPA and UN Women, and overseen by the Executive Office of the UN Secretary-General.

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Gender Equality Essay for Students and Children

500+ words essay on gender equality essay.

Equality or non-discrimination is that state where every individual gets equal opportunities and rights. Every individual of the society yearns for equal status, opportunity, and rights. However, it is a general observation that there exists lots of discrimination between humans. Discrimination exists because of cultural differences, geographical differences, and gender. Inequality based on gender is a concern that is prevalent in the entire world.  Even in the 21 st century, across globe men and women do not enjoy equal privileges. Gender equality means providing equal opportunities to both men and women in political, economic, education and health aspects.

Importance of Gender Equality

A nation can progress and attain higher development growth only when both men and women are entitled to equal opportunities. Women in the society are often cornered and are refrained from getting equal rights as men to health, education, decision-making and economic independence in terms of wages.

The social structure that prevails since long in such a way that girls do not get equal opportunities as men. Women generally are the caregivers in the family. Because of this, women are mostly involved in household activities. There is lesser participation of women in higher education, decision-making roles, and leadership roles. This gender disparity is a hindrance in the growth rate of a country. When women participate in the workforce increases the economic growth rate of the country increases. Gender equality increases the overall wellbeing of the nation along with economic prosperity .

How is Gender Equality Measured?

Gender equality is an important factor in determining a country’s overall growth. There are several indexes to measure gender equality.

Gender-Related Development Index (GDI) –   GDI is a gender centric measure of Human Development Index. GDI considers parameters like life expectancy, education, and incomes in assessing the gender equality of a country.

Gender Empowerment Measure (GEM) – This measure includes much detail aspects like the proportion of seats than women candidates hold in national parliament, percentage of women at economic decision-making role, the income share of female employees.

Gender Equity Index (GEI) – GEI ranks countries on three parameters of gender inequality, those are education, economic participation, and empowerment. However, GEI ignores the health parameter.

Global Gender Gap Index – The World Economic Forum introduced the Global Gender Gap Index in 2006. This index focuses more on identifying the level of female disadvantage. The four important areas that the index considers are economic participation and opportunity, educational attainment, political empowerment, health, and survival rate.

Get the huge list of more than 500 Essay Topics and Ideas

Gender Inequality in India

As per the World Economic Forum’s gender gap ranking, India stands at rank 108 out of 149 countries. This rank is a major concern as it highlights the immense gap in opportunities in women with comparison to men. In Indian society from a long time back, the social structure has been such that the women are neglected in many areas like education, health, decision-making areas, financial independence, etc.

Another major reason, which contributes to the discriminatory behavior towards women in India, is the dowry system in marriage.  Because of this dowry system, most Indian families consider girls as a burden.  Preference for son still prevails. Girls have refrained from higher education. Women are not entitled to equal job opportunities and wages. In the 21 st century, women are still preferred gender in home managing activities. Many women quit their job and opt-out from leadership roles because of family commitments. However, such actions are very uncommon among men.

For overall wellbeing and growth of a nation, scoring high on gender equality is the most crucial aspect. Countries with less disparity in gender equality have progressed a lot. The government of India has also started taking steps to ensure gender equality. Several laws and policies are prepared to encourage girls. “Beti Bachao, Beti Padhao Yojana ” (Save girl, and make girls educated) campaign is created to spread awareness of the importance of girl child.  Several laws to protect girls are also there. However, we need more awareness of spreading knowledge of women rights . In addition, the government should take initiatives to check the correct and proper implementation of policies.

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70 Argumentative Essay Topics About Gender Equality

Gender equality is an extremely debatable topic. Sooner or later, every group of friends, colleagues, or classmates will touch on this subject. Discussions never stop, and this topic is always relevant.

This is not surprising, as our society hasn’t reached 100% equality yet. Pay gaps, victimization, abortion laws, and other aspects remain painful for millions of women. You should always be ready to structure your thoughts and defend your point of view on this subject. Why not practice with our list of essay topics about gender equality?

Our cheap essay writing service authors prepared 70 original ideas for you. Besides, at the end of our article, you’ll find a list of inspirational sources for your essay.

Argumentative Essay Topics About Gender Equality

• Does society or a person define gender?
• Can culturally sanctioned gender roles hurt adolescents’ mental health?
• Who or what defines the concepts of “masculinity” and “femininity” in modern society?
• Should the rules of etiquette be changed because they’ve been created in the epoch of total patriarchy?
• Why is gender equality higher in developed countries? Is equality the cause or the result of the development?
• Are gender stereotypes based on the difference between men’s and women’s brains justified?
• Would humanity be more developed today if gender stereotypes never exited?
• Can a woman be a good politician? Why or why not?
• What are the main arguments of antifeminists? Are they justified?
• Would our society be better if more women were in power?

Analytical Gender Equality Topics

• How do gender stereotypes in the sports industry influence the careers of athletes?
• Social and psychological foundations of feminism in modern Iranian society: Describe women’s rights movements in Iran and changes in women’s rights.
• Describe the place of women in today’s sports and how this situation looked a hundred years ago.
• What changes have American women made in the social and economic sphere? Describe the creation of a legislative framework for women’s empowerment.
• How can young people fix gender equality issues?
• Why do marketing specialists keep taking advantage of gender stereotypes in advertising?
• How does gender inequality hinder our society from progress?
• What social problems does gender inequality cause?
• How does gender inequality influence the self-image of male adolescents?
• Why is the concept of feminism frequently interpreted negatively?

Argumentative Essay Topics About Gender Equality in Art and Literature

• Theory of gender in literature: do male and female authors see the world differently? Pick one book and analyze it in the context of gender.
• Compare and contrast how gender inequality is described in L. Tolstoy’s novel “Anna Karenina” and G. Flaubert’s novel “Madame Bovary.” Read and analyze the mentioned books, distinguish how gender inequality is described, and how the main characters manage this inequality.
• The artificial gender equality and class inequality in the novel “Brave New World” by Aldous Huxley.
• Do modern romance novels for teenagers help to break gender stereotypes, or do they enforce them?
• Gender equality changes through Disney animation films. Analyze the scenarios of Disney animation films from the very beginning. Describe how the overall mood in relation to female characters and their roles has changed.
• Henrik Ibsen touched on the topic of gender inequality in his play “A Doll’s House.” Why was it shocking for a 19th century audience?
• Concepts of gender inequality through examples of fairy tales. Analyze several fairy tales that contain female characters. What image do they have? Do these fairy tales misrepresent the nature of women? How do fairy tales spoil the world view of young girls?
• Why do female heroes rarely appear in superhero movies?
• Heroines of the movie “Hidden Figures” face both gender and racial inequalities. In your opinion, has the American society solved these issues entirely?
• The problem of gender inequality in the novel “The Color Purple” by Alice Walker.

Gender Equality Essay Ideas: Workplace and Employment

• Dress code in the workplace: Does it help to solve the problem of gender inequality, or is it a detriment?
• What kind of jobs are traditionally associated with men and women? How have these associations changed in the last 50 years?
• The pay gap between men and women: is it real?
• How can HR managers overcome gender stereotypes while hiring a new specialist?
• Analyze the concepts of “glass ceiling” and “glass elevator.” Do these phenomena still exist in our society?

Essay Topics About Gender Equality: Religion

• Gender aspects of Christian virtue and purity in the Bible.
• What does the equality of men and women look like from the perspective of Christianity? Can a woman be a pastor?
• Orthodox Judaism: Women and the transformation of their roles in a religious institute. Describe the change in women’s roles in modern Judaism.
• How can secularism help solve the problem of gender inequality in religious societies?
• Is the problem of gender inequality more serious in religious societies?

Compare and Contrast Essay Topics About Gender Equality

• Compare and contrast the problems men and women experience in managerial positions.
• Compare and contrast what progress has been made on gender equality in the USA and Sweden.
• Compare and contrast the social status of women in ancient Athens and Sparta.
• Conduct a sociological analysis of gender asymmetry in various languages. Compare and contrast the ways of assigning gender in two different languages.
• Compare and contrast the portrayal of female characters in 1960s Hollywood films and in modern cinematography (pick two movies). What has changed?

Gender Equality Topics: Definitions

• Define the term “misandry.” What is the difference between feminism and misandry?
• Define the term “feminology.” How do feminologists help to break down prejudice about the gender role of women?
• Define the term “catcalling.” How is catcalling related to the issue of gender inequality?
• Define the term “femvertising.” How does this advertising phenomenon contribute to the resolution of the gender inequality issue?
• Define the term “misogyny.” What is the difference between “misogyny” and “sexism”?

Gender Equality Essay Ideas: History

• The roles of the mother and father through history.
• Define the most influential event in the history of the feminist movement.
• What ancient societies preached matriarchy?
• How did World War II change the attitude toward women in society?
• Woman and society in the philosophy of feminism of the second wave. Think on works of Simone de Beauvoir and Betty Friedan and define what ideas provoked the second wave.

Essay Topics About Gender Equality in Education

• How do gender stereotypes influence the choice of major among high school students?
• Discuss the problems of female education in the interpretation of Mary Wollstonecraft. Reflect on the thoughts of Mary Wollstonecraft on gender equality and why women should be treated equally to men.
• Self-determination of women in professions: Modern contradictions. Describe the character of a woman’s self-determination as a professional in today’s society.
• Should gender and racial equality be taught in elementary school?
• Will sex education at schools contribute to the development of gender equality?

Gender Equality Topics: Sex and Childbirth

• Sexual violence in conflict situations: The problem of victimization of women.
• The portrayal of menstruation and childbirth in media: Now versus twenty years ago.
• How will the resolution of the gender inequality issue decrease the rate of sexual abuse toward women?
• The attitude toward menstruation in different societies and how it influences the issue of gender equality.
• How does the advertising of sexual character aggravate the problem of gender inequality?
• Should advertising that uses sexual allusion be regulated by the government?
• How has the appearance of various affordable birth control methods contributed to the establishment of gender equality in modern society?
• Do men have the right to give up their parental duties if women refuse to have an abortion?
• Can the child be raised without the influence of gender stereotypes in modern society?
• Did the sexual revolution in the 1960s help the feminist movement?

How do you like our gender equality topics? We’ve tried to make them special for you. When you pick one of these topics, you should start your research. We recommend you to check the books we’ve listed below.

Non-Fiction Books and Articles on Gender Equality Topics

• Beecher, C. “The Peculiar Responsibilities of American Women.”
• Connell, R. (2011). “Confronting Equality: Gender, Knowledge and Global Change.”
• Doris H. Gray. (2013). “Beyond Feminism and Islamism: Gender and Equality in North Africa.”
• Inglehart Ronald, Norris Pippa. (2003). “Rising Tide: Gender Equality and Cultural Change Around the World.”
• Mary Ann Danowitz Sagaria. (2007). “Women, Universities, and Change: Gender Equality in the European Union and the United States (Issues in Higher Education).”
• Merrill, R. (1997). “Good News for Women: A Biblical Picture of Gender Equality.”
• Mir-Hosseini, Z. (2013). “Gender and Equality in Muslim Family Law: Justice and Ethics in the Islamic Legal Process.”
• Raymond F. Gregory. (2003). “Women and Workplace Discrimination: Overcoming Barriers to Gender Equality.”
• Rubery, J., & Koukiadaki, A. (2016). “Closing the Gender Pay Gap: A Review of the Issues, Policy Mechanisms and International Evidence.”
• Sharma, A. (2016). “Managing Diversity and Equality in the Workplace.”
• Sika, N. (2011). “The Millennium Development Goals: Prospects for Gender Equality in the Arab World.”
• Stamarski, C. S., & Son Hing, L. S. (2015). “Gender Inequalities in the Workplace: The Effects of Organizational Structures, Processes, Practices, and Decision Makers’ Sexism.”
• Verniers, C., & Vala, J. (2018). “Justifying Gender Discrimination in the Workplace: The Mediating Role of Motherhood Myths.”
• Williams, C. L., & Dellinger, K. (2010). “Gender and Sexuality in the Workplace.”

Literary Works for Your Gender Equality Essay Ideas

• “A Doll’s House” by Henrik Ibsen
• “A Room of One’s Own” by Virginia Woolf
• “Anna Karenina” by Leo Tolstoy
• “Brave New World” by Aldous Huxley
• “ The Awakening” by Kate Chopin
• “The Color Purple” by Alice Walker
• “The Handmaid’s Tale” by Margaret Atwood
• “The Help” by Kathryn Stockett
• “The Scarlet Letter” by Nathaniel Hawthorne
• “The Second Sex” by Simone de Beauvoir

We’re sure that with all of these argumentative essay topics about gender equality and useful sources, you’ll get a good grade without much effort! If you have any difficulties with your homework, request “ write my essay for cheap ” help and  our expert writers are always ready to help you.

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5 Powerful Essays Advocating for Gender Equality

Gender equality – which becomes reality when all genders are treated fairly and allowed equal opportunities –  is a complicated human rights issue for every country in the world. Recent statistics are sobering. According to the World Economic Forum, it will take 108 years to achieve gender parity . The biggest gaps are found in political empowerment and economics. Also, there are currently just six countries that give women and men equal legal work rights. Generally, women are only given ¾ of the rights given to men. To learn more about how gender equality is measured, how it affects both women and men, and what can be done, here are five essays making a fair point.

Take a free course on Gender Equality offered by top universities!

“Countries With Less Gender Equity Have More Women In STEM — Huh?” – Adam Mastroianni and Dakota McCoy

This essay from two Harvard PhD candidates (Mastroianni in psychology and McCoy in biology) takes a closer look at a recent study that showed that in countries with lower gender equity, more women are in STEM. The study’s researchers suggested that this is because women are actually especially interested in STEM fields, and because they are given more choice in Western countries, they go with different careers. Mastroianni and McCoy disagree.

They argue the research actually shows that cultural attitudes and discrimination are impacting women’s interests, and that bias and discrimination is present even in countries with better gender equality. The problem may lie in the Gender Gap Index (GGI), which tracks factors like wage disparity and government representation. To learn why there’s more women in STEM from countries with less gender equality, a more nuanced and complex approach is needed.

“Men’s health is better, too, in countries with more gender equality” – Liz Plank

When it comes to discussions about gender equality, it isn’t uncommon for someone in the room to say, “What about the men?” Achieving gender equality has been difficult because of the underlying belief that giving women more rights and freedom somehow takes rights away from men. The reality, however, is that gender equality is good for everyone. In Liz Plank’s essay, which is an adaption from her book For the Love of Men: A Vision for Mindful Masculinity, she explores how in Iceland, the #1 ranked country for gender equality, men live longer. Plank lays out the research for why this is, revealing that men who hold “traditional” ideas about masculinity are more likely to die by suicide and suffer worse health. Anxiety about being the only financial provider plays a big role in this, so in countries where women are allowed education and equal earning power, men don’t shoulder the burden alone.

Liz Plank is an author and award-winning journalist with Vox, where she works as a senior producer and political correspondent. In 2015, Forbes named her one of their “30 Under 30” in the Media category. She’s focused on feminist issues throughout her career.

“China’s #MeToo Moment” –  Jiayang Fan

Some of the most visible examples of gender inequality and discrimination comes from “Me Too” stories. Women are coming forward in huge numbers relating how they’ve been harassed and abused by men who have power over them. Most of the time, established systems protect these men from accountability. In this article from Jiayang Fan, a New Yorker staff writer, we get a look at what’s happening in China.

The essay opens with a story from a PhD student inspired by the United States’ Me Too movement to open up about her experience with an academic adviser. Her story led to more accusations against the adviser, and he was eventually dismissed. This is a rare victory, because as Fan says, China employs a more rigid system of patriarchy and hierarchy. There aren’t clear definitions or laws surrounding sexual harassment. Activists are charting unfamiliar territory, which this essay explores.

“Men built this system. No wonder gender equality remains as far off as ever.” – Ellie Mae O’Hagan

Freelance journalist Ellie Mae O’Hagan (whose book The New Normal is scheduled for a May 2020 release) is discouraged that gender equality is so many years away. She argues that it’s because the global system of power at its core is broken.  Even when women are in power, which is proportionally rare on a global scale, they deal with a system built by the patriarchy. O’Hagan’s essay lays out ideas for how to fix what’s fundamentally flawed, so gender equality can become a reality.

Ideas include investing in welfare; reducing gender-based violence (which is mostly men committing violence against women); and strengthening trade unions and improving work conditions. With a system that’s not designed to put women down, the world can finally achieve gender equality.

“Invisibility of Race in Gender Pay Gap Discussions” – Bonnie Chu

The gender pay gap has been a pressing issue for many years in the United States, but most discussions miss the factor of race. In this concise essay, Senior Contributor Bonnie Chu examines the reality, writing that within the gender pay gap, there’s other gaps when it comes to black, Native American, and Latina women. Asian-American women, on the other hand, are paid 85 cents for every dollar. This data is extremely important and should be present in discussions about the gender pay gap. It reminds us that when it comes to gender equality, there’s other factors at play, like racism.

Bonnie Chu is a gender equality advocate and a Forbes 30 Under 30 social entrepreneur. She’s the founder and CEO of Lensational, which empowers women through photography, and the Managing Director of The Social Investment Consultancy.

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About the author, emmaline soken-huberty.

Emmaline Soken-Huberty is a freelance writer based in Portland, Oregon. She started to become interested in human rights while attending college, eventually getting a concentration in human rights and humanitarianism. LGBTQ+ rights, women’s rights, and climate change are of special concern to her. In her spare time, she can be found reading or enjoying Oregon’s natural beauty with her husband and dog.

82 Gender Equality Essay Topic Ideas & Examples

🏆 best gender equality topic ideas & essay examples, 💡 most interesting gender equality topics to write about, ❓ gender equality essay questions.

• Gender Equality in Higher Education: The Underrepresentation of Women in Educational Leadership A prime example of gender inequality is the underrepresentation of women in educational leadership, and this problem is going to be considered here in detail.
• Gender Inequality in Workplace Gender is the main reason for inequalities in the workplace; this is because nowadays there is a steady increase in the number of women in workplaces in the world.
• Sociological perspectives of Gender Inequality The events taking place in the modern world and the occurrence of the feminist movements during the past few decades can be used to offer a deeper understanding on the subject of gender inequality and […]
• SDGs – Equality Education and Gender Equality The quality of education for girls can affect their employment and their ability to support themselves financially. With a good education, women have a larger range of jobs to choose from and the opportunity to […]
• The Progress of Gender Equality The key achievements have been the removal of all forms of discrimination against women, the promotion of legal literacy, education, and the general protection of the rights of women.
• Gender Equality in the Laing O’Rourke Company The construction industry in the UK has been in a steady decline for from 2011 to 2016, with its fall culminating in autumn, when Carillion, one of the largest construction company in the region, disintegrated.
• Gender Equality and Development Despite the progress of the last century on ensuring the equal rights for both genders, there are still issues that have to be addressed by the global society.
• Gender Equality and Title IX The function of Title IX is to guarantee gender equality in college sports and it has supported the development of female sports.
• The Discussion of Concepts of Gender Equality In the article, the author presents such concepts as violence, harm, empowerment, freedom, and universal care from the point of view of capitalism, liberalism, and feminism to reach the point of gender equality.
• Gender Equality in Children’s Perception Despite the variety of achievements made on the subject in different parts of the world, the general tendency leads society toward accepting the idea of equality between men and women.
• Title IX: Gender Equality in Education Education provides opportunities for developing the abilities of girls and boys, women and men to participate in the social, economic, and political life of the state and is the basis for the development of a […]
• Gender Equality as Target of Social Work As far as health care is concerned, the primary issue of gender inequality addresses the issue of access to the services and the quality of care provided.
• Naomi Osaka’s Case of Gender Equality in Sports The recent case of retirement by Naomi Osaka is a prime example of how gender roles and racism in sports can affect even the best athletes making sports an important discussion in the context of […]
• Creating a Culture of Gender Equality in the Workplace This proposal will consider the existing gender inequality within the field of architecture and propose several changes an architecture firm should undertake to create a culture of gender equality.
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Open Access

Peer-reviewed

Research Article

Twenty years of gender equality research: A scoping review based on a new semantic indicator

Contributed equally to this work with: Paola Belingheri, Filippo Chiarello, Andrea Fronzetti Colladon, Paola Rovelli

Roles Conceptualization, Formal analysis, Funding acquisition, Visualization, Writing – original draft, Writing – review & editing

Affiliation Dipartimento di Ingegneria dell’Energia, dei Sistemi, del Territorio e delle Costruzioni, Università degli Studi di Pisa, Largo L. Lazzarino, Pisa, Italy

Roles Conceptualization, Data curation, Formal analysis, Funding acquisition, Methodology, Visualization, Writing – original draft, Writing – review & editing

Roles Conceptualization, Data curation, Formal analysis, Funding acquisition, Methodology, Software, Visualization, Writing – original draft, Writing – review & editing

* E-mail: [email protected]

Affiliations Department of Engineering, University of Perugia, Perugia, Italy, Department of Management, Kozminski University, Warsaw, Poland

Roles Conceptualization, Formal analysis, Funding acquisition, Writing – original draft, Writing – review & editing

Affiliation Faculty of Economics and Management, Centre for Family Business Management, Free University of Bozen-Bolzano, Bozen-Bolzano, Italy

• Paola Belingheri, 
• Filippo Chiarello, 
• Andrea Fronzetti Colladon, 
• Paola Rovelli

• Published: September 21, 2021
• https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0256474
• Reader Comments

9 Nov 2021: The PLOS ONE Staff (2021) Correction: Twenty years of gender equality research: A scoping review based on a new semantic indicator. PLOS ONE 16(11): e0259930. https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0259930 View correction

Gender equality is a major problem that places women at a disadvantage thereby stymieing economic growth and societal advancement. In the last two decades, extensive research has been conducted on gender related issues, studying both their antecedents and consequences. However, existing literature reviews fail to provide a comprehensive and clear picture of what has been studied so far, which could guide scholars in their future research. Our paper offers a scoping review of a large portion of the research that has been published over the last 22 years, on gender equality and related issues, with a specific focus on business and economics studies. Combining innovative methods drawn from both network analysis and text mining, we provide a synthesis of 15,465 scientific articles. We identify 27 main research topics, we measure their relevance from a semantic point of view and the relationships among them, highlighting the importance of each topic in the overall gender discourse. We find that prominent research topics mostly relate to women in the workforce–e.g., concerning compensation, role, education, decision-making and career progression. However, some of them are losing momentum, and some other research trends–for example related to female entrepreneurship, leadership and participation in the board of directors–are on the rise. Besides introducing a novel methodology to review broad literature streams, our paper offers a map of the main gender-research trends and presents the most popular and the emerging themes, as well as their intersections, outlining important avenues for future research.

Citation: Belingheri P, Chiarello F, Fronzetti Colladon A, Rovelli P (2021) Twenty years of gender equality research: A scoping review based on a new semantic indicator. PLoS ONE 16(9): e0256474. https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0256474

Editor: Elisa Ughetto, Politecnico di Torino, ITALY

Received: June 25, 2021; Accepted: August 6, 2021; Published: September 21, 2021

Copyright: © 2021 Belingheri et al. This is an open access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License , which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited.

Data Availability: All relevant data are within the manuscript and its supporting information files. The only exception is the text of the abstracts (over 15,000) that we have downloaded from Scopus. These abstracts can be retrieved from Scopus, but we do not have permission to redistribute them.

Funding: P.B and F.C.: Grant of the Department of Energy, Systems, Territory and Construction of the University of Pisa (DESTEC) for the project “Measuring Gender Bias with Semantic Analysis: The Development of an Assessment Tool and its Application in the European Space Industry. P.B., F.C., A.F.C., P.R.: Grant of the Italian Association of Management Engineering (AiIG), “Misure di sostegno ai soci giovani AiIG” 2020, for the project “Gender Equality Through Data Intelligence (GEDI)”. F.C.: EU project ASSETs+ Project (Alliance for Strategic Skills addressing Emerging Technologies in Defence) EAC/A03/2018 - Erasmus+ programme, Sector Skills Alliances, Lot 3: Sector Skills Alliance for implementing a new strategic approach (Blueprint) to sectoral cooperation on skills G.A. NUMBER: 612678-EPP-1-2019-1-IT-EPPKA2-SSA-B.

Competing interests: The authors have declared that no competing interests exist.

Introduction

The persistent gender inequalities that currently exist across the developed and developing world are receiving increasing attention from economists, policymakers, and the general public [e.g., 1 – 3 ]. Economic studies have indicated that women’s education and entry into the workforce contributes to social and economic well-being [e.g., 4 , 5 ], while their exclusion from the labor market and from managerial positions has an impact on overall labor productivity and income per capita [ 6 , 7 ]. The United Nations selected gender equality, with an emphasis on female education, as part of the Millennium Development Goals [ 8 ], and gender equality at-large as one of the 17 Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) to be achieved by 2030 [ 9 ]. These latter objectives involve not only developing nations, but rather all countries, to achieve economic, social and environmental well-being.

As is the case with many SDGs, gender equality is still far from being achieved and persists across education, access to opportunities, or presence in decision-making positions [ 7 , 10 , 11 ]. As we enter the last decade for the SDGs’ implementation, and while we are battling a global health pandemic, effective and efficient action becomes paramount to reach this ambitious goal.

Scholars have dedicated a massive effort towards understanding gender equality, its determinants, its consequences for women and society, and the appropriate actions and policies to advance women’s equality. Many topics have been covered, ranging from women’s education and human capital [ 12 , 13 ] and their role in society [e.g., 14 , 15 ], to their appointment in firms’ top ranked positions [e.g., 16 , 17 ] and performance implications [e.g., 18 , 19 ]. Despite some attempts, extant literature reviews provide a narrow view on these issues, restricted to specific topics–e.g., female students’ presence in STEM fields [ 20 ], educational gender inequality [ 5 ], the gender pay gap [ 21 ], the glass ceiling effect [ 22 ], leadership [ 23 ], entrepreneurship [ 24 ], women’s presence on the board of directors [ 25 , 26 ], diversity management [ 27 ], gender stereotypes in advertisement [ 28 ], or specific professions [ 29 ]. A comprehensive view on gender-related research, taking stock of key findings and under-studied topics is thus lacking.

Extant literature has also highlighted that gender issues, and their economic and social ramifications, are complex topics that involve a large number of possible antecedents and outcomes [ 7 ]. Indeed, gender equality actions are most effective when implemented in unison with other SDGs (e.g., with SDG 8, see [ 30 ]) in a synergetic perspective [ 10 ]. Many bodies of literature (e.g., business, economics, development studies, sociology and psychology) approach the problem of achieving gender equality from different perspectives–often addressing specific and narrow aspects. This sometimes leads to a lack of clarity about how different issues, circumstances, and solutions may be related in precipitating or mitigating gender inequality or its effects. As the number of papers grows at an increasing pace, this issue is exacerbated and there is a need to step back and survey the body of gender equality literature as a whole. There is also a need to examine synergies between different topics and approaches, as well as gaps in our understanding of how different problems and solutions work together. Considering the important topic of women’s economic and social empowerment, this paper aims to fill this gap by answering the following research question: what are the most relevant findings in the literature on gender equality and how do they relate to each other ?

To do so, we conduct a scoping review [ 31 ], providing a synthesis of 15,465 articles dealing with gender equity related issues published in the last twenty-two years, covering both the periods of the MDGs and the SDGs (i.e., 2000 to mid 2021) in all the journals indexed in the Academic Journal Guide’s 2018 ranking of business and economics journals. Given the huge amount of research conducted on the topic, we adopt an innovative methodology, which relies on social network analysis and text mining. These techniques are increasingly adopted when surveying large bodies of text. Recently, they were applied to perform analysis of online gender communication differences [ 32 ] and gender behaviors in online technology communities [ 33 ], to identify and classify sexual harassment instances in academia [ 34 ], and to evaluate the gender inclusivity of disaster management policies [ 35 ].

Applied to the title, abstracts and keywords of the articles in our sample, this methodology allows us to identify a set of 27 recurrent topics within which we automatically classify the papers. Introducing additional novelty, by means of the Semantic Brand Score (SBS) indicator [ 36 ] and the SBS BI app [ 37 ], we assess the importance of each topic in the overall gender equality discourse and its relationships with the other topics, as well as trends over time, with a more accurate description than that offered by traditional literature reviews relying solely on the number of papers presented in each topic.

This methodology, applied to gender equality research spanning the past twenty-two years, enables two key contributions. First, we extract the main message that each document is conveying and how this is connected to other themes in literature, providing a rich picture of the topics that are at the center of the discourse, as well as of the emerging topics. Second, by examining the semantic relationship between topics and how tightly their discourses are linked, we can identify the key relationships and connections between different topics. This semi-automatic methodology is also highly reproducible with minimum effort.

This literature review is organized as follows. In the next section, we present how we selected relevant papers and how we analyzed them through text mining and social network analysis. We then illustrate the importance of 27 selected research topics, measured by means of the SBS indicator. In the results section, we present an overview of the literature based on the SBS results–followed by an in-depth narrative analysis of the top 10 topics (i.e., those with the highest SBS) and their connections. Subsequently, we highlight a series of under-studied connections between the topics where there is potential for future research. Through this analysis, we build a map of the main gender-research trends in the last twenty-two years–presenting the most popular themes. We conclude by highlighting key areas on which research should focused in the future.

Our aim is to map a broad topic, gender equality research, that has been approached through a host of different angles and through different disciplines. Scoping reviews are the most appropriate as they provide the freedom to map different themes and identify literature gaps, thereby guiding the recommendation of new research agendas [ 38 ].

Several practical approaches have been proposed to identify and assess the underlying topics of a specific field using big data [ 39 – 41 ], but many of them fail without proper paper retrieval and text preprocessing. This is specifically true for a research field such as the gender-related one, which comprises the work of scholars from different backgrounds. In this section, we illustrate a novel approach for the analysis of scientific (gender-related) papers that relies on methods and tools of social network analysis and text mining. Our procedure has four main steps: (1) data collection, (2) text preprocessing, (3) keywords extraction and classification, and (4) evaluation of semantic importance and image.

Data collection

In this study, we analyze 22 years of literature on gender-related research. Following established practice for scoping reviews [ 42 ], our data collection consisted of two main steps, which we summarize here below.

Firstly, we retrieved from the Scopus database all the articles written in English that contained the term “gender” in their title, abstract or keywords and were published in a journal listed in the Academic Journal Guide 2018 ranking of the Chartered Association of Business Schools (CABS) ( https://charteredabs.org/wp-content/uploads/2018/03/AJG2018-Methodology.pdf ), considering the time period from Jan 2000 to May 2021. We used this information considering that abstracts, titles and keywords represent the most informative part of a paper, while using the full-text would increase the signal-to-noise ratio for information extraction. Indeed, these textual elements already demonstrated to be reliable sources of information for the task of domain lexicon extraction [ 43 , 44 ]. We chose Scopus as source of literature because of its popularity, its update rate, and because it offers an API to ease the querying process. Indeed, while it does not allow to retrieve the full text of scientific articles, the Scopus API offers access to titles, abstracts, citation information and metadata for all its indexed scholarly journals. Moreover, we decided to focus on the journals listed in the AJG 2018 ranking because we were interested in reviewing business and economics related gender studies only. The AJG is indeed widely used by universities and business schools as a reference point for journal and research rigor and quality. This first step, executed in June 2021, returned more than 55,000 papers.

In the second step–because a look at the papers showed very sparse results, many of which were not in line with the topic of this literature review (e.g., papers dealing with health care or medical issues, where the word gender indicates the gender of the patients)–we applied further inclusion criteria to make the sample more focused on the topic of this literature review (i.e., women’s gender equality issues). Specifically, we only retained those papers mentioning, in their title and/or abstract, both gender-related keywords (e.g., daughter, female, mother) and keywords referring to bias and equality issues (e.g., equality, bias, diversity, inclusion). After text pre-processing (see next section), keywords were first identified from a frequency-weighted list of words found in the titles, abstracts and keywords in the initial list of papers, extracted through text mining (following the same approach as [ 43 ]). They were selected by two of the co-authors independently, following respectively a bottom up and a top-down approach. The bottom-up approach consisted of examining the words found in the frequency-weighted list and classifying those related to gender and equality. The top-down approach consisted in searching in the word list for notable gender and equality-related words. Table 1 reports the sets of keywords we considered, together with some examples of words that were used to search for their presence in the dataset (a full list is provided in the S1 Text ). At end of this second step, we obtained a final sample of 15,465 relevant papers.

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https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0256474.t001

Text processing and keyword extraction

Text preprocessing aims at structuring text into a form that can be analyzed by statistical models. In the present section, we describe the preprocessing steps we applied to paper titles and abstracts, which, as explained below, partially follow a standard text preprocessing pipeline [ 45 ]. These activities have been performed using the R package udpipe [ 46 ].

The first step is n-gram extraction (i.e., a sequence of words from a given text sample) to identify which n-grams are important in the analysis, since domain-specific lexicons are often composed by bi-grams and tri-grams [ 47 ]. Multi-word extraction is usually implemented with statistics and linguistic rules, thus using the statistical properties of n-grams or machine learning approaches [ 48 ]. However, for the present paper, we used Scopus metadata in order to have a more effective and efficient n-grams collection approach [ 49 ]. We used the keywords of each paper in order to tag n-grams with their associated keywords automatically. Using this greedy approach, it was possible to collect all the keywords listed by the authors of the papers. From this list, we extracted only keywords composed by two, three and four words, we removed all the acronyms and rare keywords (i.e., appearing in less than 1% of papers), and we clustered keywords showing a high orthographic similarity–measured using a Levenshtein distance [ 50 ] lower than 2, considering these groups of keywords as representing same concepts, but expressed with different spelling. After tagging the n-grams in the abstracts, we followed a common data preparation pipeline that consists of the following steps: (i) tokenization, that splits the text into tokens (i.e., single words and previously tagged multi-words); (ii) removal of stop-words (i.e. those words that add little meaning to the text, usually being very common and short functional words–such as “and”, “or”, or “of”); (iii) parts-of-speech tagging, that is providing information concerning the morphological role of a word and its morphosyntactic context (e.g., if the token is a determiner, the next token is a noun or an adjective with very high confidence, [ 51 ]); and (iv) lemmatization, which consists in substituting each word with its dictionary form (or lemma). The output of the latter step allows grouping together the inflected forms of a word. For example, the verbs “am”, “are”, and “is” have the shared lemma “be”, or the nouns “cat” and “cats” both share the lemma “cat”. We preferred lemmatization over stemming [ 52 ] in order to obtain more interpretable results.

In addition, we identified a further set of keywords (with respect to those listed in the “keywords” field) by applying a series of automatic words unification and removal steps, as suggested in past research [ 53 , 54 ]. We removed: sparse terms (i.e., occurring in less than 0.1% of all documents), common terms (i.e., occurring in more than 10% of all documents) and retained only nouns and adjectives. It is relevant to notice that no document was lost due to these steps. We then used the TF-IDF function [ 55 ] to produce a new list of keywords. We additionally tested other approaches for the identification and clustering of keywords–such as TextRank [ 56 ] or Latent Dirichlet Allocation [ 57 ]–without obtaining more informative results.

Classification of research topics

To guide the literature analysis, two experts met regularly to examine the sample of collected papers and to identify the main topics and trends in gender research. Initially, they conducted brainstorming sessions on the topics they expected to find, due to their knowledge of the literature. This led to an initial list of topics. Subsequently, the experts worked independently, also supported by the keywords in paper titles and abstracts extracted with the procedure described above.

Considering all this information, each expert identified and clustered relevant keywords into topics. At the end of the process, the two assignments were compared and exhibited a 92% agreement. Another meeting was held to discuss discordant cases and reach a consensus. This resulted in a list of 27 topics, briefly introduced in Table 2 and subsequently detailed in the following sections.

https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0256474.t002

Evaluation of semantic importance

Working on the lemmatized corpus of the 15,465 papers included in our sample, we proceeded with the evaluation of semantic importance trends for each topic and with the analysis of their connections and prevalent textual associations. To this aim, we used the Semantic Brand Score indicator [ 36 ], calculated through the SBS BI webapp [ 37 ] that also produced a brand image report for each topic. For this study we relied on the computing resources of the ENEA/CRESCO infrastructure [ 58 ].

The Semantic Brand Score (SBS) is a measure of semantic importance that combines methods of social network analysis and text mining. It is usually applied for the analysis of (big) textual data to evaluate the importance of one or more brands, names, words, or sets of keywords [ 36 ]. Indeed, the concept of “brand” is intended in a flexible way and goes beyond products or commercial brands. In this study, we evaluate the SBS time-trends of the keywords defining the research topics discussed in the previous section. Semantic importance comprises the three dimensions of topic prevalence, diversity and connectivity. Prevalence measures how frequently a research topic is used in the discourse. The more a topic is mentioned by scientific articles, the more the research community will be aware of it, with possible increase of future studies; this construct is partly related to that of brand awareness [ 59 ]. This effect is even stronger, considering that we are analyzing the title, abstract and keywords of the papers, i.e. the parts that have the highest visibility. A very important characteristic of the SBS is that it considers the relationships among words in a text. Topic importance is not just a matter of how frequently a topic is mentioned, but also of the associations a topic has in the text. Specifically, texts are transformed into networks of co-occurring words, and relationships are studied through social network analysis [ 60 ]. This step is necessary to calculate the other two dimensions of our semantic importance indicator. Accordingly, a social network of words is generated for each time period considered in the analysis–i.e., a graph made of n nodes (words) and E edges weighted by co-occurrence frequency, with W being the set of edge weights. The keywords representing each topic were clustered into single nodes.

The construct of diversity relates to that of brand image [ 59 ], in the sense that it considers the richness and distinctiveness of textual (topic) associations. Considering the above-mentioned networks, we calculated diversity using the distinctiveness centrality metric–as in the formula presented by Fronzetti Colladon and Naldi [ 61 ].

Lastly, connectivity was measured as the weighted betweenness centrality [ 62 , 63 ] of each research topic node. We used the formula presented by Wasserman and Faust [ 60 ]. The dimension of connectivity represents the “brokerage power” of each research topic–i.e., how much it can serve as a bridge to connect other terms (and ultimately topics) in the discourse [ 36 ].

The SBS is the final composite indicator obtained by summing the standardized scores of prevalence, diversity and connectivity. Standardization was carried out considering all the words in the corpus, for each specific timeframe.

This methodology, applied to a large and heterogeneous body of text, enables to automatically identify two important sets of information that add value to the literature review. Firstly, the relevance of each topic in literature is measured through a composite indicator of semantic importance, rather than simply looking at word frequencies. This provides a much richer picture of the topics that are at the center of the discourse, as well as of the topics that are emerging in the literature. Secondly, it enables to examine the extent of the semantic relationship between topics, looking at how tightly their discourses are linked. In a field such as gender equality, where many topics are closely linked to each other and present overlaps in issues and solutions, this methodology offers a novel perspective with respect to traditional literature reviews. In addition, it ensures reproducibility over time and the possibility to semi-automatically update the analysis, as new papers become available.

Overview of main topics

In terms of descriptive textual statistics, our corpus is made of 15,465 text documents, consisting of a total of 2,685,893 lemmatized tokens (words) and 32,279 types. As a result, the type-token ratio is 1.2%. The number of hapaxes is 12,141, with a hapax-token ratio of 37.61%.

Fig 1 shows the list of 27 topics by decreasing SBS. The most researched topic is compensation , exceeding all others in prevalence, diversity, and connectivity. This means it is not only mentioned more often than other topics, but it is also connected to a greater number of other topics and is central to the discourse on gender equality. The next four topics are, in order of SBS, role , education , decision-making , and career progression . These topics, except for education , all concern women in the workforce. Between these first five topics and the following ones there is a clear drop in SBS scores. In particular, the topics that follow have a lower connectivity than the first five. They are hiring , performance , behavior , organization , and human capital . Again, except for behavior and human capital , the other three topics are purely related to women in the workforce. After another drop-off, the following topics deal prevalently with women in society. This trend highlights that research on gender in business journals has so far mainly paid attention to the conditions that women experience in business contexts, while also devoting some attention to women in society.

https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0256474.g001

Fig 2 shows the SBS time series of the top 10 topics. While there has been a general increase in the number of Scopus-indexed publications in the last decade, we notice that some SBS trends remain steady, or even decrease. In particular, we observe that the main topic of the last twenty-two years, compensation , is losing momentum. Since 2016, it has been surpassed by decision-making , education and role , which may indicate that literature is increasingly attempting to identify root causes of compensation inequalities. Moreover, in the last two years, the topics of hiring , performance , and organization are experiencing the largest importance increase.

https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0256474.g002

Fig 3 shows the SBS time trends of the remaining 17 topics (i.e., those not in the top 10). As we can see from the graph, there are some that maintain a steady trend–such as reputation , management , networks and governance , which also seem to have little importance. More relevant topics with average stationary trends (except for the last two years) are culture , family , and parenting . The feminine topic is among the most important here, and one of those that exhibit the larger variations over time (similarly to leadership ). On the other hand, the are some topics that, even if not among the most important, show increasing SBS trends; therefore, they could be considered as emerging topics and could become popular in the near future. These are entrepreneurship , leadership , board of directors , and sustainability . These emerging topics are also interesting to anticipate future trends in gender equality research that are conducive to overall equality in society.

https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0256474.g003

In addition to the SBS score of the different topics, the network of terms they are associated to enables to gauge the extent to which their images (textual associations) overlap or differ ( Fig 4 ).

https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0256474.g004

There is a central cluster of topics with high similarity, which are all connected with women in the workforce. The cluster includes topics such as organization , decision-making , performance , hiring , human capital , education and compensation . In addition, the topic of well-being is found within this cluster, suggesting that women’s equality in the workforce is associated to well-being considerations. The emerging topics of entrepreneurship and leadership are also closely connected with each other, possibly implying that leadership is a much-researched quality in female entrepreneurship. Topics that are relatively more distant include personality , politics , feminine , empowerment , management , board of directors , reputation , governance , parenting , masculine and network .

The following sections describe the top 10 topics and their main associations in literature (see Table 3 ), while providing a brief overview of the emerging topics.

https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0256474.t003

Compensation.

The topic of compensation is related to the topics of role , hiring , education and career progression , however, also sees a very high association with the words gap and inequality . Indeed, a well-known debate in degrowth economics centers around whether and how to adequately compensate women for their childbearing, childrearing, caregiver and household work [e.g., 30 ].

Even in paid work, women continue being offered lower compensations than their male counterparts who have the same job or cover the same role [ 64 – 67 ]. This severe inequality has been widely studied by scholars over the last twenty-two years. Dealing with this topic, some specific roles have been addressed. Specifically, research highlighted differences in compensation between female and male CEOs [e.g., 68 ], top executives [e.g., 69 ], and boards’ directors [e.g., 70 ]. Scholars investigated the determinants of these gaps, such as the gender composition of the board [e.g., 71 – 73 ] or women’s individual characteristics [e.g., 71 , 74 ].

Among these individual characteristics, education plays a relevant role [ 75 ]. Education is indeed presented as the solution for women, not only to achieve top executive roles, but also to reduce wage inequality [e.g., 76 , 77 ]. Past research has highlighted education influences on gender wage gaps, specifically referring to gender differences in skills [e.g., 78 ], college majors [e.g., 79 ], and college selectivity [e.g., 80 ].

Finally, the wage gap issue is strictly interrelated with hiring –e.g., looking at whether being a mother affects hiring and compensation [e.g., 65 , 81 ] or relating compensation to unemployment [e.g., 82 ]–and career progression –for instance looking at meritocracy [ 83 , 84 ] or the characteristics of the boss for whom women work [e.g., 85 ].

The roles covered by women have been deeply investigated. Scholars have focused on the role of women in their families and the society as a whole [e.g., 14 , 15 ], and, more widely, in business contexts [e.g., 18 , 81 ]. Indeed, despite still lagging behind their male counterparts [e.g., 86 , 87 ], in the last decade there has been an increase in top ranked positions achieved by women [e.g., 88 , 89 ]. Following this phenomenon, scholars have posed greater attention towards the presence of women in the board of directors [e.g., 16 , 18 , 90 , 91 ], given the increasing pressure to appoint female directors that firms, especially listed ones, have experienced. Other scholars have focused on the presence of women covering the role of CEO [e.g., 17 , 92 ] or being part of the top management team [e.g., 93 ]. Irrespectively of the level of analysis, all these studies tried to uncover the antecedents of women’s presence among top managers [e.g., 92 , 94 ] and the consequences of having a them involved in the firm’s decision-making –e.g., on performance [e.g., 19 , 95 , 96 ], risk [e.g., 97 , 98 ], and corporate social responsibility [e.g., 99 , 100 ].

Besides studying the difficulties and discriminations faced by women in getting a job [ 81 , 101 ], and, more specifically in the hiring , appointment, or career progression to these apical roles [e.g., 70 , 83 ], the majority of research of women’s roles dealt with compensation issues. Specifically, scholars highlight the pay-gap that still exists between women and men, both in general [e.g., 64 , 65 ], as well as referring to boards’ directors [e.g., 70 , 102 ], CEOs and executives [e.g., 69 , 103 , 104 ].

Finally, other scholars focused on the behavior of women when dealing with business. In this sense, particular attention has been paid to leadership and entrepreneurial behaviors. The former quite overlaps with dealing with the roles mentioned above, but also includes aspects such as leaders being stereotyped as masculine [e.g., 105 ], the need for greater exposure to female leaders to reduce biases [e.g., 106 ], or female leaders acting as queen bees [e.g., 107 ]. Regarding entrepreneurship , scholars mainly investigated women’s entrepreneurial entry [e.g., 108 , 109 ], differences between female and male entrepreneurs in the evaluations and funding received from investors [e.g., 110 , 111 ], and their performance gap [e.g., 112 , 113 ].

Education has long been recognized as key to social advancement and economic stability [ 114 ], for job progression and also a barrier to gender equality, especially in STEM-related fields. Research on education and gender equality is mostly linked with the topics of compensation , human capital , career progression , hiring , parenting and decision-making .

Education contributes to a higher human capital [ 115 ] and constitutes an investment on the part of women towards their future. In this context, literature points to the gender gap in educational attainment, and the consequences for women from a social, economic, personal and professional standpoint. Women are found to have less access to formal education and information, especially in emerging countries, which in turn may cause them to lose social and economic opportunities [e.g., 12 , 116 – 119 ]. Education in local and rural communities is also paramount to communicate the benefits of female empowerment , contributing to overall societal well-being [e.g., 120 ].

Once women access education, the image they have of the world and their place in society (i.e., habitus) affects their education performance [ 13 ] and is passed on to their children. These situations reinforce gender stereotypes, which become self-fulfilling prophecies that may negatively affect female students’ performance by lowering their confidence and heightening their anxiety [ 121 , 122 ]. Besides formal education, also the information that women are exposed to on a daily basis contributes to their human capital . Digital inequalities, for instance, stems from men spending more time online and acquiring higher digital skills than women [ 123 ].

Education is also a factor that should boost employability of candidates and thus hiring , career progression and compensation , however the relationship between these factors is not straightforward [ 115 ]. First, educational choices ( decision-making ) are influenced by variables such as self-efficacy and the presence of barriers, irrespectively of the career opportunities they offer, especially in STEM [ 124 ]. This brings additional difficulties to women’s enrollment and persistence in scientific and technical fields of study due to stereotypes and biases [ 125 , 126 ]. Moreover, access to education does not automatically translate into job opportunities for women and minority groups [ 127 , 128 ] or into female access to managerial positions [ 129 ].

Finally, parenting is reported as an antecedent of education [e.g., 130 ], with much of the literature focusing on the role of parents’ education on the opportunities afforded to children to enroll in education [ 131 – 134 ] and the role of parenting in their offspring’s perception of study fields and attitudes towards learning [ 135 – 138 ]. Parental education is also a predictor of the other related topics, namely human capital and compensation [ 139 ].

Decision-making.

This literature mainly points to the fact that women are thought to make decisions differently than men. Women have indeed different priorities, such as they care more about people’s well-being, working with people or helping others, rather than maximizing their personal (or their firm’s) gain [ 140 ]. In other words, women typically present more communal than agentic behaviors, which are instead more frequent among men [ 141 ]. These different attitude, behavior and preferences in turn affect the decisions they make [e.g., 142 ] and the decision-making of the firm in which they work [e.g., 143 ].

At the individual level, gender affects, for instance, career aspirations [e.g., 144 ] and choices [e.g., 142 , 145 ], or the decision of creating a venture [e.g., 108 , 109 , 146 ]. Moreover, in everyday life, women and men make different decisions regarding partners [e.g., 147 ], childcare [e.g., 148 ], education [e.g., 149 ], attention to the environment [e.g., 150 ] and politics [e.g., 151 ].

At the firm level, scholars highlighted, for example, how the presence of women in the board affects corporate decisions [e.g., 152 , 153 ], that female CEOs are more conservative in accounting decisions [e.g., 154 ], or that female CFOs tend to make more conservative decisions regarding the firm’s financial reporting [e.g., 155 ]. Nevertheless, firm level research also investigated decisions that, influenced by gender bias, affect women, such as those pertaining hiring [e.g., 156 , 157 ], compensation [e.g., 73 , 158 ], or the empowerment of women once appointed [ 159 ].

Career progression.

Once women have entered the workforce, the key aspect to achieve gender equality becomes career progression , including efforts toward overcoming the glass ceiling. Indeed, according to the SBS analysis, career progression is highly related to words such as work, social issues and equality. The topic with which it has the highest semantic overlap is role , followed by decision-making , hiring , education , compensation , leadership , human capital , and family .

Career progression implies an advancement in the hierarchical ladder of the firm, assigning managerial roles to women. Coherently, much of the literature has focused on identifying rationales for a greater female participation in the top management team and board of directors [e.g., 95 ] as well as the best criteria to ensure that the decision-makers promote the most valuable employees irrespectively of their individual characteristics, such as gender [e.g., 84 ]. The link between career progression , role and compensation is often provided in practice by performance appraisal exercises, frequently rooted in a culture of meritocracy that guides bonuses, salary increases and promotions. However, performance appraisals can actually mask gender-biased decisions where women are held to higher standards than their male colleagues [e.g., 83 , 84 , 95 , 160 , 161 ]. Women often have less opportunities to gain leadership experience and are less visible than their male colleagues, which constitute barriers to career advancement [e.g., 162 ]. Therefore, transparency and accountability, together with procedures that discourage discretionary choices, are paramount to achieve a fair career progression [e.g., 84 ], together with the relaxation of strict job boundaries in favor of cross-functional and self-directed tasks [e.g., 163 ].

In addition, a series of stereotypes about the type of leadership characteristics that are required for top management positions, which fit better with typical male and agentic attributes, are another key barrier to career advancement for women [e.g., 92 , 160 ].

Hiring is the entrance gateway for women into the workforce. Therefore, it is related to other workforce topics such as compensation , role , career progression , decision-making , human capital , performance , organization and education .

A first stream of literature focuses on the process leading up to candidates’ job applications, demonstrating that bias exists before positions are even opened, and it is perpetuated both by men and women through networking and gatekeeping practices [e.g., 164 , 165 ].

The hiring process itself is also subject to biases [ 166 ], for example gender-congruity bias that leads to men being preferred candidates in male-dominated sectors [e.g., 167 ], women being hired in positions with higher risk of failure [e.g., 168 ] and limited transparency and accountability afforded by written processes and procedures [e.g., 164 ] that all contribute to ascriptive inequality. In addition, providing incentives for evaluators to hire women may actually work to this end; however, this is not the case when supporting female candidates endangers higher-ranking male ones [ 169 ].

Another interesting perspective, instead, looks at top management teams’ composition and the effects on hiring practices, indicating that firms with more women in top management are less likely to lay off staff [e.g., 152 ].

Performance.

Several scholars posed their attention towards women’s performance, its consequences [e.g., 170 , 171 ] and the implications of having women in decision-making positions [e.g., 18 , 19 ].

At the individual level, research focused on differences in educational and academic performance between women and men, especially referring to the gender gap in STEM fields [e.g., 171 ]. The presence of stereotype threats–that is the expectation that the members of a social group (e.g., women) “must deal with the possibility of being judged or treated stereotypically, or of doing something that would confirm the stereotype” [ 172 ]–affects women’s interested in STEM [e.g., 173 ], as well as their cognitive ability tests, penalizing them [e.g., 174 ]. A stronger gender identification enhances this gap [e.g., 175 ], whereas mentoring and role models can be used as solutions to this problem [e.g., 121 ]. Despite the negative effect of stereotype threats on girls’ performance [ 176 ], female and male students perform equally in mathematics and related subjects [e.g., 177 ]. Moreover, while individuals’ performance at school and university generally affects their achievements and the field in which they end up working, evidence reveals that performance in math or other scientific subjects does not explain why fewer women enter STEM working fields; rather this gap depends on other aspects, such as culture, past working experiences, or self-efficacy [e.g., 170 ]. Finally, scholars have highlighted the penalization that women face for their positive performance, for instance when they succeed in traditionally male areas [e.g., 178 ]. This penalization is explained by the violation of gender-stereotypic prescriptions [e.g., 179 , 180 ], that is having women well performing in agentic areas, which are typical associated to men. Performance penalization can thus be overcome by clearly conveying communal characteristics and behaviors [ 178 ].

Evidence has been provided on how the involvement of women in boards of directors and decision-making positions affects firms’ performance. Nevertheless, results are mixed, with some studies showing positive effects on financial [ 19 , 181 , 182 ] and corporate social performance [ 99 , 182 , 183 ]. Other studies maintain a negative association [e.g., 18 ], and other again mixed [e.g., 184 ] or non-significant association [e.g., 185 ]. Also with respect to the presence of a female CEO, mixed results emerged so far, with some researches demonstrating a positive effect on firm’s performance [e.g., 96 , 186 ], while other obtaining only a limited evidence of this relationship [e.g., 103 ] or a negative one [e.g., 187 ].

Finally, some studies have investigated whether and how women’s performance affects their hiring [e.g., 101 ] and career progression [e.g., 83 , 160 ]. For instance, academic performance leads to different returns in hiring for women and men. Specifically, high-achieving men are called back significantly more often than high-achieving women, which are penalized when they have a major in mathematics; this result depends on employers’ gendered standards for applicants [e.g., 101 ]. Once appointed, performance ratings are more strongly related to promotions for women than men, and promoted women typically show higher past performance ratings than those of promoted men. This suggesting that women are subject to stricter standards for promotion [e.g., 160 ].

Behavioral aspects related to gender follow two main streams of literature. The first examines female personality and behavior in the workplace, and their alignment with cultural expectations or stereotypes [e.g., 188 ] as well as their impacts on equality. There is a common bias that depicts women as less agentic than males. Certain characteristics, such as those more congruent with male behaviors–e.g., self-promotion [e.g., 189 ], negotiation skills [e.g., 190 ] and general agentic behavior [e.g., 191 ]–, are less accepted in women. However, characteristics such as individualism in women have been found to promote greater gender equality in society [ 192 ]. In addition, behaviors such as display of emotions [e.g., 193 ], which are stereotypically female, work against women’s acceptance in the workplace, requiring women to carefully moderate their behavior to avoid exclusion. A counter-intuitive result is that women and minorities, which are more marginalized in the workplace, tend to be better problem-solvers in innovation competitions due to their different knowledge bases [ 194 ].

The other side of the coin is examined in a parallel literature stream on behavior towards women in the workplace. As a result of biases, prejudices and stereotypes, women may experience adverse behavior from their colleagues, such as incivility and harassment, which undermine their well-being [e.g., 195 , 196 ]. Biases that go beyond gender, such as for overweight people, are also more strongly applied to women [ 197 ].

Organization.

The role of women and gender bias in organizations has been studied from different perspectives, which mirror those presented in detail in the following sections. Specifically, most research highlighted the stereotypical view of leaders [e.g., 105 ] and the roles played by women within firms, for instance referring to presence in the board of directors [e.g., 18 , 90 , 91 ], appointment as CEOs [e.g., 16 ], or top executives [e.g., 93 ].

Scholars have investigated antecedents and consequences of the presence of women in these apical roles. On the one side they looked at hiring and career progression [e.g., 83 , 92 , 160 , 168 , 198 ], finding women typically disadvantaged with respect to their male counterparts. On the other side, they studied women’s leadership styles and influence on the firm’s decision-making [e.g., 152 , 154 , 155 , 199 ], with implications for performance [e.g., 18 , 19 , 96 ].

Human capital.

Human capital is a transverse topic that touches upon many different aspects of female gender equality. As such, it has the most associations with other topics, starting with education as mentioned above, with career-related topics such as role , decision-making , hiring , career progression , performance , compensation , leadership and organization . Another topic with which there is a close connection is behavior . In general, human capital is approached both from the education standpoint but also from the perspective of social capital.

The behavioral aspect in human capital comprises research related to gender differences for example in cultural and religious beliefs that influence women’s attitudes and perceptions towards STEM subjects [ 142 , 200 – 202 ], towards employment [ 203 ] or towards environmental issues [ 150 , 204 ]. These cultural differences also emerge in the context of globalization which may accelerate gender equality in the workforce [ 205 , 206 ]. Gender differences also appear in behaviors such as motivation [ 207 ], and in negotiation [ 190 ], and have repercussions on women’s decision-making related to their careers. The so-called gender equality paradox sees women in countries with lower gender equality more likely to pursue studies and careers in STEM fields, whereas the gap in STEM enrollment widens as countries achieve greater equality in society [ 171 ].

Career progression is modeled by literature as a choice-process where personal preferences, culture and decision-making affect the chosen path and the outcomes. Some literature highlights how women tend to self-select into different professions than men, often due to stereotypes rather than actual ability to perform in these professions [ 142 , 144 ]. These stereotypes also affect the perceptions of female performance or the amount of human capital required to equal male performance [ 110 , 193 , 208 ], particularly for mothers [ 81 ]. It is therefore often assumed that women are better suited to less visible and less leadership -oriented roles [ 209 ]. Women also express differing preferences towards work-family balance, which affect whether and how they pursue human capital gains [ 210 ], and ultimately their career progression and salary .

On the other hand, men are often unaware of gendered processes and behaviors that they carry forward in their interactions and decision-making [ 211 , 212 ]. Therefore, initiatives aimed at increasing managers’ human capital –by raising awareness of gender disparities in their organizations and engaging them in diversity promotion–are essential steps to counter gender bias and segregation [ 213 ].

Emerging topics: Leadership and entrepreneurship

Among the emerging topics, the most pervasive one is women reaching leadership positions in the workforce and in society. This is still a rare occurrence for two main types of factors, on the one hand, bias and discrimination make it harder for women to access leadership positions [e.g., 214 – 216 ], on the other hand, the competitive nature and high pressure associated with leadership positions, coupled with the lack of women currently represented, reduce women’s desire to achieve them [e.g., 209 , 217 ]. Women are more effective leaders when they have access to education, resources and a diverse environment with representation [e.g., 218 , 219 ].

One sector where there is potential for women to carve out a leadership role is entrepreneurship . Although at the start of the millennium the discourse on entrepreneurship was found to be “discriminatory, gender-biased, ethnocentrically determined and ideologically controlled” [ 220 ], an increasing body of literature is studying how to stimulate female entrepreneurship as an alternative pathway to wealth, leadership and empowerment [e.g., 221 ]. Many barriers exist for women to access entrepreneurship, including the institutional and legal environment, social and cultural factors, access to knowledge and resources, and individual behavior [e.g., 222 , 223 ]. Education has been found to raise women’s entrepreneurial intentions [e.g., 224 ], although this effect is smaller than for men [e.g., 109 ]. In addition, increasing self-efficacy and risk-taking behavior constitute important success factors [e.g., 225 ].

Finally, the topic of sustainability is worth mentioning, as it is the primary objective of the SDGs and is closely associated with societal well-being. As society grapples with the effects of climate change and increasing depletion of natural resources, a narrative has emerged on women and their greater link to the environment [ 226 ]. Studies in developed countries have found some support for women leaders’ attention to sustainability issues in firms [e.g., 227 – 229 ], and smaller resource consumption by women [ 230 ]. At the same time, women will likely be more affected by the consequences of climate change [e.g., 230 ] but often lack the decision-making power to influence local decision-making on resource management and environmental policies [e.g., 231 ].

Research gaps and conclusions

Research on gender equality has advanced rapidly in the past decades, with a steady increase in publications, both in mainstream topics related to women in education and the workforce, and in emerging topics. Through a novel approach combining methods of text mining and social network analysis, we examined a comprehensive body of literature comprising 15,465 papers published between 2000 and mid 2021 on topics related to gender equality. We identified a set of 27 topics addressed by the literature and examined their connections.

At the highest level of abstraction, it is worth noting that papers abound on the identification of issues related to gender inequalities and imbalances in the workforce and in society. Literature has thoroughly examined the (unconscious) biases, barriers, stereotypes, and discriminatory behaviors that women are facing as a result of their gender. Instead, there are much fewer papers that discuss or demonstrate effective solutions to overcome gender bias [e.g., 121 , 143 , 145 , 163 , 194 , 213 , 232 ]. This is partly due to the relative ease in studying the status quo, as opposed to studying changes in the status quo. However, we observed a shift in the more recent years towards solution seeking in this domain, which we strongly encourage future researchers to focus on. In the future, we may focus on collecting and mapping pro-active contributions to gender studies, using additional Natural Language Processing techniques, able to measure the sentiment of scientific papers [ 43 ].

All of the mainstream topics identified in our literature review are closely related, and there is a wealth of insights looking at the intersection between issues such as education and career progression or human capital and role . However, emerging topics are worthy of being furtherly explored. It would be interesting to see more work on the topic of female entrepreneurship , exploring aspects such as education , personality , governance , management and leadership . For instance, how can education support female entrepreneurship? How can self-efficacy and risk-taking behaviors be taught or enhanced? What are the differences in managerial and governance styles of female entrepreneurs? Which personality traits are associated with successful entrepreneurs? Which traits are preferred by venture capitalists and funding bodies?

The emerging topic of sustainability also deserves further attention, as our society struggles with climate change and its consequences. It would be interesting to see more research on the intersection between sustainability and entrepreneurship , looking at how female entrepreneurs are tackling sustainability issues, examining both their business models and their company governance . In addition, scholars are suggested to dig deeper into the relationship between family values and behaviors.

Moreover, it would be relevant to understand how women’s networks (social capital), or the composition and structure of social networks involving both women and men, enable them to increase their remuneration and reach top corporate positions, participate in key decision-making bodies, and have a voice in communities. Furthermore, the achievement of gender equality might significantly change firm networks and ecosystems, with important implications for their performance and survival.

Similarly, research at the nexus of (corporate) governance , career progression , compensation and female empowerment could yield useful insights–for example discussing how enterprises, institutions and countries are managed and the impact for women and other minorities. Are there specific governance structures that favor diversity and inclusion?

Lastly, we foresee an emerging stream of research pertaining how the spread of the COVID-19 pandemic challenged women, especially in the workforce, by making gender biases more evident.

For our analysis, we considered a set of 15,465 articles downloaded from the Scopus database (which is the largest abstract and citation database of peer-reviewed literature). As we were interested in reviewing business and economics related gender studies, we only considered those papers published in journals listed in the Academic Journal Guide (AJG) 2018 ranking of the Chartered Association of Business Schools (CABS). All the journals listed in this ranking are also indexed by Scopus. Therefore, looking at a single database (i.e., Scopus) should not be considered a limitation of our study. However, future research could consider different databases and inclusion criteria.

With our literature review, we offer researchers a comprehensive map of major gender-related research trends over the past twenty-two years. This can serve as a lens to look to the future, contributing to the achievement of SDG5. Researchers may use our study as a starting point to identify key themes addressed in the literature. In addition, our methodological approach–based on the use of the Semantic Brand Score and its webapp–could support scholars interested in reviewing other areas of research.

Supporting information

S1 text. keywords used for paper selection..

https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0256474.s001

Acknowledgments

The computing resources and the related technical support used for this work have been provided by CRESCO/ENEAGRID High Performance Computing infrastructure and its staff. CRESCO/ENEAGRID High Performance Computing infrastructure is funded by ENEA, the Italian National Agency for New Technologies, Energy and Sustainable Economic Development and by Italian and European research programmes (see http://www.cresco.enea.it/english for information).

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Gender Equality Essay

Everyone should live as they want in society, and there should be no discrimination. Equality in society is achieved when all people, regardless of their caste, gender, colour, profession, and status rank, are considered equal. Another way to describe equality is that everyone gets the same rights and opportunities to develop and progress forward. Here are a few sample essays on ‘Gender Equality’.

100 Words Essay On Gender Equality

Gender equality is the belief that men and women should be treated and perceived as equals in society, including all areas such as education, employment, and in decision-making positions. It is a fundamental human right and a necessary foundation for a peaceful, prosperous, and sustainable world.

Despite significant progress in advancing gender equality, women and girls continue to face barriers and discrimination in many areas of society. This includes the gender pay gap, difficult access to education and employment opportunities, and limited representation in leadership positions. Creating a more equal society benefits everyone, as it leads to greater prosperity and happiness for all. It is important for individuals, communities, and governments to work towards achieving gender equality and empowering women and girls to reach their full potential.

200 Words Essay On Gender Equality

Gender equality is the equal treatment and perception of individuals of all genders in society.

Importance Of Gender Equality

Gender equality is important because it is a fundamental human right and is necessary for a peaceful, prosperous, and sustainable society. When everyone, regardless of their gender, is treated fairly and has equal opportunities, it can lead to greater prosperity and happiness for all.

Additionally, gender equality can have a positive impact on economic growth and development. When women and girls are able to fully participate and get proper education and employment opportunities, it can lead to increased productivity and innovation. It can also contribute to more balanced and representative decision-making, which can lead to more effective and fair policies and practices.

Furthermore, gender equality is essential for promoting social justice and fairness. When women and girls are marginalized and discriminated against, it can lead to a range of negative outcomes, including poverty, poor health, and reduced opportunities for personal and professional development. Overall, the promotion of gender equality is important for creating a more equal, fair, and just society for all.

Encouraging Gender Equality

Efforts to promote gender equality must involve the active participation and engagement of both men and women. This includes challenging and changing harmful gender norms and stereotypes, and promoting policies and laws that protect and advance the rights of women and girls.

500 Words Essay On Gender Equality

Everyone in the country has the same fundamental freedom to pursue happiness whichever way they see fit. It's possible if people of various backgrounds (race, ethnicity, religion, socioeconomic class, gender) are treated with respect and dignity. Gender disparity is the most noticeable kind of prejudice. Gender discrimination persists even in many modern nations and calls for immediate action. When men and women are given the same opportunities, we will achieve gender equality. Furthermore, this essay will outline the many issues women encounter due to gender discrimination.

Prevalence Of Gender Inequality

Gender inequality is prevalent in many sectors and areas of society. Some examples include:

Education: Women and girls may face barriers to accessing education, such as lack of resources, cultural or societal barriers, and discrimination.

Employment: Women and girls may face discrimination in the workplace, including lower pay for the same work as men, lack of promotion opportunities, and limited representation in leadership positions.

Health care: Women and girls may face discrimination and inadequate access to quality health care, particularly in areas related to reproductive and sexual health.

Political representation: Women are often underrepresented in political leadership positions and decision-making processes.

Domestic violence: Women and girls may face higher rates of domestic violence and abuse, and may lack adequate protection and support from the justice system.

Media and advertising: Women and girls are often portrayed in stereotypical and objectifying ways in the media and advertising, which can reinforce harmful gender norms and stereotypes.

Gender inequality is a widespread issue that affects many areas of society, and it is important to work towards promoting gender equality in all sectors.

How India Can Achieve Gender Equality

Achieving gender equality in India will require a multi-faceted approach that involves addressing social norms and stereotypes, strengthening laws and policies, increasing women's representation in leadership positions, promoting women's economic empowerment, and improving access to health care.

Address social norms and stereotypes: It is important to challenge and change harmful gender norms and stereotypes that contribute to gender inequality. This can be done through education campaigns and programs that promote gender equality and challenge traditional gender roles.

Strengthen laws and policies: India can work to strengthen laws and policies that protect and advance the rights of women and girls, such as laws against domestic violence and discrimination, and policies that promote equal pay for equal work and access to education and employment.

Increase women's representation in leadership positions: India can work to increase the representation of women in leadership positions, including in politics, business, and other sectors, to ensure that women have a stronger voice in decision-making processes.

Promote women's economic empowerment: Providing women with access to education, employment, and financial resources can help to empower them and enable them to fully participate in society.

Improve access to health care: Ensuring that women and girls have access to quality health care, including reproductive and sexual health care, is essential for promoting gender equality.

My Experience

I remember one time when I was working as an intern at a small consulting firm. At the end of my internship, I was offered a full-time position. However, when I received the offer letter, I noticed that my male colleagues who were also being offered full-time positions had been offered a higher salary than me, even though we had all performed the same job duties during our internships.

I was frustrated and felt that I was being treated unfairly because of my gender. I decided to bring this issue to the attention of my supervisor, and after some negotiation, I was able to secure a salary that was equal to that of my male colleagues.

This experience taught me the importance of advocating for myself and not accepting inequality, and it also made me more aware of the ways in which gender bias can manifest in the workplace. I believe that it is important for individuals to speak up and take action when they see instances of gender inequality, and for organizations to make a conscious effort to promote gender equality and fairness in all aspects of their operations.

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Sample essay on gender equality

Sample gender equality question, ielts model essay on gender equality, ielts writing task 2 gender topic common questions.

Don't worry about accuracy with places and exact dates, the important thing is your ideas, and if you need to give examples, you can mention different countries. That will be fine. Essay writing on gender equality is not the same as submitting a research paper, you only need to set out your arguments, not reference everything.

Other possibilities include questions about women in developed countries and whether they have similar rights to men. If so, the vocabulary in the sample answer above will ensure that you are well-prepared to speak about equal opportunity!

More help for IELTS exam

Gender Equality Essay: How to Inspire Action and Awareness

Writing about the importance of gender equality is crucial in shedding light on the inequalities and disparities that persist between men and women. These essays are like windows into our society, showing us the good and the bad. They're not just for school – they're about real people's lives. When we read and write about gender parity, we're shining a light on issues like discrimination and stereotypes, and we're saying, "Hey, this isn't right!" In this article, we will show you how to write an essay about gender equality to encourage your peers to think about making things more fair for everyone and standing up for what's right, making the world a better place for everyone.

Tips for Writing an Argumentative Essay About Gender Equality

First, let’s answer the question of what is gender equality essay? By definition, it is a written composition that investigates and discusses the concept of gender fairness, aiming to highlight the importance of fair treatment and opportunities for individuals regardless of gender. These essays typically explore historical contexts, societal norms, and contemporary disparities-related challenges, offering insights into how stereotypes, discrimination, and cultural expectations affect people based on gender. Moreover, such assignments seek to raise awareness and foster understanding, prompting readers to critically examine the necessity of creating a society where everyone, regardless of gender, enjoys equal rights, opportunities, and dignity.

At this point, we should write a gender equality essay thesis statement that will serve as the anchor, encapsulating the core argument and purpose of the essay. The thesis is a concise declaration that outlines the writer's stance on the topic and provides a roadmap for the essay's content. An effective thesis statement for a gender parity essay might assert the fundamental principle of equal rights and opportunities for all genders, emphasizing the need to challenge and dismantle societal norms perpetuating discrimination. For instance, a thesis statement could assert that achieving true balance requires dismantling stereotypes, promoting equal access to education and employment, and fostering a cultural shift toward recognizing the inherent value of every individual, irrespective of gender. The thesis statement acts as a guiding beacon, steering the essay in the direction of a comprehensive exploration of the chosen perspective on evenness. Suddenly forgot your task is due tomorrow? Don’t strain yourself, and use our argumentative essay service to achieve the best outcome fast.

Brainstorming Gender Equality Essay Topics

When looking for argumentative essay topics about gender equality, you can find inspiration in various places. Keep an eye on the news, social media discussions, and academic research to see what issues are currently being debated. Personal stories from people who've faced gender-related challenges or your own experiences can be powerful starting points. Understand how past events shaped gender dynamics or analyze how it is portrayed in literature and media. For your gender roles essay, you can analyze global perspectives, legal frameworks, and social movements for additional insights. By drawing from these diverse sources, you can brainstorm compelling arguments that not only tackle the complexities of gender equality but also connect with your audience on a personal and societal level. For your inspiration, we’ve prepared some peculiar ideas for gender equality in society essay, so check them out!

• Workplace fairness for men and women.
• Breaking boys and girls stereotypes in children's books.
• The impact of inequality on mental health stigma.
• Challenges faced by women entrepreneurs.
• Addressing gender bias in healthcare.
• The role of men in feminist movements.
• Promoting inclusivity in sports teams.
• Gender-neutral language in education.
• Breaking the glass ceiling in corporate leadership.
• Tackling gender-based violence in schools.

Gender Equality Essay Outline

Choosing a good title for a gender equality essay involves capturing the essay's main ideas and sparking interest. You can include keywords like "equality" or "empowerment" and use phrasing that makes readers think. For the gender equality essay thesis statement, keep it concise and clear. An example could be: "To achieve real fairness, we need to challenge stereotypes, ensure equal opportunities in education and work, and transform our culture to value everyone's contribution. Only through these comprehensive efforts can we create a society where everyone has a fair shot." Before we proceed to the essay’s outline, revise how many paragraphs in an argumentative essay and its length.

Gender Equality Essay Introduction

To kick off your gender equality introduction essay effectively, start with something that grabs your reader's attention, like a quote, a surprising fact, or a relatable scenario. Next, give a quick background on what gender equality means today or historically, keeping it concise. Then, smoothly transition to your thesis statement – the main point you will argue in your essay. For example, you might say that real parity requires us to challenge stereotypes, make sure everyone has equal chances in education and work, and change our culture to value everyone's contributions. This approach helps your reader understand why the topic is important and what your essay is all about.

For the main body of a future gender equality essay, think about what could be coming up. Consider how new technology, like artificial intelligence, might affect how we see male and female roles. Talk about whether it might help break stereotypes or create new challenges. Give real examples or discuss policies that encourage women to take on roles in fields like technology.

Then, look into how work is changing and what that means for equality. Explore the idea of remote work, flexible schedules, and gig jobs and how they might create more equal opportunities. Discuss how companies or governments are making policies to support work-life balance and equal chances for leadership roles. Use examples to show where these progressive work practices are already happening and how they could impact equivalence in the future. Keep it real and forward-thinking, looking at the positives and potential challenges.

Gender Equality Essay Conclusion

To wrap up your essay, start by briefly restating your main point or thesis. Summarize the key ideas discussed in the essay's body, highlighting their importance in the context of gender equality. Don't bring in new information; instead, emphasize the connections between your arguments and the main point. Finish your gender equality conclusion essay on a strong note by inspiring your reader to consider the broader implications and take action toward achieving genuine parity in society. Keep it clear, concise, and impactful, leaving a lasting impression on your audience.

Essay Revision

To edit and proofread your gender equality essay introduction body and conclusion, start by reviewing the introduction to ensure clarity and conciseness. Verify that your thesis statement is strong and effectively communicates the main argument. Check the hook for its impact on grabbing the reader's attention. Moving to the body, focus on the logical flow of ideas between paragraphs. Confirm that each paragraph has a clear topic sentence, supporting evidence, and a smooth transition to the next. Pay attention to the coherence of your arguments and ensure they align with the overall thesis. Lastly, in the conclusion, restate the thesis, summarize key points, and end with a compelling call to action. Throughout the essay, check for grammar, punctuation, and spelling errors with the help of our paper writer , ensuring a polished and error-free final draft.

Gender Equality Essay Example

Please review our example of argumentative essay about gender equality to get inspired to produce your own brilliant essay. Remember that these two gender equality essay examples are not for submission because this will be considered plagarism. If you want equally engaging and insightful work, please say, ‘ write my essay ,’ so our experts can procure a new essay for you from scratch to avoid affecting your academic integrity.

Empowering Equality: Breaking Barriers and Building Bridges

Gender equality stands as a fundamental principle for building a just and inclusive society. In recent years, progress has been made, but challenges persist. This essay delves into the multifaceted landscape of fairness, examining the importance of dismantling stereotypes, promoting equal opportunities, and fostering a cultural shift. As we navigate the complexities of the 21st century, the pursuit of genuine equality emerges not only as a moral imperative but also as a critical driver of social and economic progress.

To achieve true equality, the first step involves challenging ingrained stereotypes that limit individuals based on their gender. Stereotypes perpetuate biased expectations, restricting both men and women to predefined roles. For instance, the persistent notion that certain professions are exclusively suited for one gender perpetuates inequality in the workplace. Initiatives promoting diverse role models, debunking myths, and redefining societal norms contribute to dismantling these stereotypes.

Ensuring equal opportunities in education and employment forms the cornerstone of equality. Educational institutions and workplaces must adopt policies that eliminate barriers and provide a level playing field. This involves addressing disparities in STEM education, encouraging girls to pursue careers in traditionally male-dominated fields, and advocating for fair hiring practices. Achieving balance in educational and professional spheres fosters an environment where talent and capability, rather than gender, determine success.

A genuine cultural shift is imperative for achieving lasting equality. Cultural norms often perpetuate inequality, shaping attitudes and behaviors. Encouraging open conversations about gender, challenging discriminatory practices, and promoting inclusivity in all aspects of life contribute to this transformation. It requires collective efforts from communities, media, and policymakers to create a culture that respects and values individuals irrespective of their gender.

In conclusion, the journey toward gender fairness is a dynamic process that involves dismantling stereotypes, ensuring equal opportunities, and fostering cultural transformation. By challenging societal norms and advocating for inclusive policies, we can pave the way for a future where every individual has the opportunity to thrive, unbound by gender-based constraints. Empowering equality not only aligns with the principles of justice and fairness but also propels societies toward greater prosperity and harmony.

Breaking Chains: The Unfinished Journey Towards Gender Equality"

Gender equality, a beacon of progress in contemporary societies, still faces significant challenges, with deeply rooted stereotypes and systemic barriers hindering its realization. This essay embarks on an exploration of the persistent issues surrounding evenness, emphasizing the imperative to dismantle stereotypes, advocate for equal opportunities, and drive transformative change. As we confront the complexities of the 21st century, the pursuit of authentic equality emerges as not only a societal responsibility but also as an essential catalyst for fostering diversity, inclusivity, and social prosperity.

The journey toward true gender parity necessitates a concerted effort to challenge and dismantle age-old stereotypes that confine individuals within rigid male and female roles. These stereotypes perpetuate harmful biases, limiting opportunities for personal and professional growth. A critical focus should be on dispelling myths surrounding gendered expectations, such as the notion that certain professions are exclusively for one gender. Initiatives promoting diverse role models and challenging societal norms are pivotal in dismantling these restrictive stereotypes.

An indispensable component of achieving gender equality lies in advocating for equal opportunities in education. Educational institutions should implement policies that eradicate barriers and promote inclusivity. This involves addressing gender disparities in STEM fields, encouraging girls to pursue careers in traditionally male-dominated sectors, and ensuring fair and unbiased educational environments. By cultivating an educational landscape that values competence over gender, societies can lay the foundation for a more equitable future.

Achieving genuine gender equality requires a holistic approach that includes systemic change at various levels of society. This involves not only addressing individual attitudes but also transforming institutional practices. Policies promoting equal pay, parental leave, and unbiased hiring practices contribute to dismantling systemic barriers. Additionally, fostering workplace cultures that prioritize diversity and inclusivity plays a crucial role in creating environments where all individuals, regardless of gender, can thrive.

In conclusion, the journey toward gender equality is an ongoing struggle that demands persistent efforts to dismantle stereotypes, advocate for equal opportunities, and drive systemic change. By challenging societal norms and fostering inclusive policies, societies can move closer to realizing the promise of a future where gender does not dictate one's opportunities or potential. Breaking the chains of ingrained biases is not just a societal obligation; it is a transformative endeavor that paves the way for a more just, inclusive, and harmonious world.

When students are assigned to write about gender equality, it isn't just about getting a grade. It's a valuable way to get young minds thinking and talking about how fairness and evenness play out in our world. By putting their thoughts into words, students not only practice expressing themselves but also become part of a bigger conversation about treating everyone fairly. Use this opportunity to challenge stereotypes, call for equal rights, and be a voice for positive change. To succeed, you can buy essay online from our competent writers, who will make sure your teacher will be pleased.

Frequently asked questions

Why is gender equality essay important, how to promote gender equality essay, how to choose the best gender equality essay title.

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Gender Roles in Society Essay

This essay will discuss the evolution and current state of gender roles in society. It will examine how gender roles are socially constructed, their impact on individuals and communities, and the progress towards gender equality. The piece will analyze the influence of culture, media, and education on gender roles. At PapersOwl too, you can discover numerous free essay illustrations related to Gender.

How it works

Gender is a critical aspect of social inequality. Gender has been defined as a means to “serve to reduce assumed parallels between biological and psychological sex or at least make explicit any assumptions of such parallels (Unger 1976, p. 1086). Gender inequality is a prevalent issue in society as a whole, and America is no exception. It is a sociological construct which carves the path in which men and women will live their lives, affecting a broad range of choices and availability of resources (Macionis, 2018).

Gender inequality exists due to the fact that women and men are clearly defined as distinctive types of people (Macionis, 2018).

Gender inequality primarily impacts women. For instance, women often encounter a “glass ceiling” which defines the maximum potential for promotions in their often male dominated professions. Alison Bechdel demonstrated gender inequality in the form of a simple cartoon which depicted a test where a movie passed if it met this criteria: there are at least two female characters with names, those characters interact with one another, and their discussions include something other than men (Macionis, 2018). Applying this test to recent films, analysts claim that around half do not pass this test (Macionis, 2018). This simple test depicts the way in which men dominate society, and while some women do rise above, many hit the “glass ceiling.” In fact, due to the presence of several forms of gender inequalities, the workplace has been claimed at times to be inhospitable for women (Abrams, 1991).

Additionally, books and media influence children by presenting stereotypical roles of men and women, with women lacking representation in traditionally male roles (Purcell and Stuart 1990). More over, these influences continue later in life and spread to other means, such as video games, social media and celebrities. Even advertisements perpetuate gender bias and reinforce gender norms, with men in advertisements shown to focus on the product they’re representing, while women focus on the men (Goffman, 1979). In fact, gender is instilled into children even before they are born by parents carefully selecting gender appropriate clothing, such as pink for newborn girls and blue for newborn boys (Zosuls et al., 2001).

Why is it that gender exists at all? In earlier times, the use of gender and the roles each sex played were more abundant than in today’s time. The differences in biological make up that each sex carried were far more important (Macionis, 2018). For instance, in the time of hunters and gatherers, there was no means of controlling pregnancy and reproduction, which burdened women as being caretakers of their many children (Macionis, 2018). Because women were bound to their homes and their children, women were forced to construct their roles around the home (Macionis, 2018). Thus, women often took on such jobs as planting and gathering vegetation to provide food for themselves and their family (Macionis, 2018). Men, on the other hand, boasting their stronger and larger size due to the biological differences in their genetic make up, often took on the role of hunting or warfare, which left the women, again, with no choice but to be bound to their homes (Macionis, 2018).

As time continued on, gender roles became less and less fundamental. When the Industrial Revolution took place, there were effective means of preventing pregnancy (Macionis, 2018). The ability to decide when and if to get pregnant gave women more of a choice in their home-maker status. Additionally, the Industrial Revolution developed more advanced technology that diminished the need for physical strength in the workplace and for economic production as a whole (Macionis, 2018). Many advances in technology and changes to society that have followed in the time after the Industrial Revolution have led to gender roles becoming less and less of a determinant for what kind of job one may possess.

With the need for gender to exist diminishing more and more with each step society and technology takes, what is it that makes gender still relevant? One may turn to sociological perspectives in order to gain insight on such a question. According to the structural-functional theory, gender is “society’s recognition that women and men differ in some respects” (Macionis, 2018, p. 118). Gender is viewed as complementarity, meaning the differences between men and women are limited but important (Macionis, 2018). Gender, according to the structural-functional approach, defines the different obligations each sex is required to perform (Macionis, 2018). Due to these differences, the genders are complementary in the way in which both sexes rely on one another to perform their duties, which is said to bring unity to families and in a broader sense, communities as a whole (Macionis, 2018).

Talcott Parsons, who was born in 1902 and passed away in 1979, was an American sociologist. Parsons developed the most well known theory of gender in the realm of structural functional outlooks (Macionis, 2018). According to Parsons, the differences in gender continue to grow smaller as time moves forward, yet are still encouraged by modern societies as they are a useful integration tool and encourage the sexes to work together (Macionis, 2018). The main point of specification of this is that gender is defined in a complementary way that encourages both men and women to rely on one another and see one another as an asset (Macionis, 2018). For example, women are child bearers, and the biological drive in men to produce offspring brings the two genders together. Due to this reliance, both genders see benefits in forming a relationship and, more importantly, a family (Macionis, 2018).

Despite the diminishing differences in women and men, women are traditionally still deemed as the primary caretaker of the household, while men are seen as the primary wealth holder and are deemed responsible for the economic advancement of the family (Macionis, 2018). In order to achieve a society in which the genders work complementarily, gender differences are engrained into a person starting from a young age (Macionis, 2018). For example, masculinity is an “instrumental orientation, emphasizing rationality, competition, and a focus on goals” (Macionis, 2018, p. 118). Femininity, on the other hand, involves “an opposing expressive orientation: emotional responsiveness, cooperation, and concern for other people and relationships” (Macionis, 2018, p. 118). These inherent differences in upbringing result in women smiling more, and maintaining politeness in situations where they would rather not. Societies pressures to fill these gender roles lead to disapproval of those who go against their gender norms, who often find loss of sex appeal amongst the disapproval (Macionis, 2018).

Today, the structural-functional theory is seen as less influential than when it was initially introduced fifty years ago (Macionis, 2018). This is partly due to the theories approach in reinforcing and rationalizing traditional gender roles, with some seeing complementary roles as a weakly disguised vail for male domination (Macionis, 2018). Additionally, the approach does not fully explain all roles that genders take and ignores those that do not fit into a clear cutting block. For instance, women and men do not need to see value in their gender differences to interact with one another. Moreover, their interactions may not fit into the traditional gender norm laid out by Parsons, as work roles (instrumental) are often not the same role one takes on in a relationship (expressive) (Macionis, 2018). Finally, the theory is said to ignore the issues caused by gender roles and norms, which falls heavily on the shoulders of those who stray from traditional roles in their lives. This fault has been made apparent in recent years as transgender or non-binary individuals continue to suffer from the insensitivities of persons who see gender roles as unchanging.

The social-conflict theory is another tool for analyzing gender in society. Rather than view genders as being complementary, the theory views the issue of gender inequality “vertically” (Macionis, 2018). The social-conflict theory asserts that gender is a divisive part of society, rather than a means of unification like the structural functional approach suggests. Friedrech Engels, who was born in 1820 and passed away in 1895, was a friend of Karl Marx and thus was very familiar with Marx’s thinking (Macionis, 2018). Engels believed capitalism to lead to the dominant position men hold over women, and the basis of this assertion is laid out by examining the evolution of society from hunting and gathering, to capitalism (Macionis, 2018).

Looking back at the time of hunters and gatherers, the social-conflict theory asserts that while men and women took on different roles, both roles were necessary and vital (Macionis, 2018). For instance, women played just as crucial a role by providing vegetation as men did when they were hunting (Macionis, 2018). Due to the necessity and importance of both roles, the social-conflict theory claims that simple societies such as those of the hunter-gatherers were close to achieving gender equality.

However, as time passed and industrial advancements were made (such as raising livestock and gardening), the availability of goods rose and some individuals or families were able to obtain a surplus of goods (Macionis, 2018). This addition of surplus goods led to the rise of social classes, with those enjoying the majority of the surplus becoming wealthy (Macionis, 2018). With the formation of social classes came the idea of private property, which was used as a means of the wealthy retaining their surplus of goods (Macionis, 2018). The idea of private property then led to the dominance of men over women, as men wished to carry on their legacies through their sons, rather than their partners (Macionis, 2018). Again, women were soon seen as their beneficial role being that of the caretaker of their homes and children.

As time passed on and technological advancements grew, capitalism came to rise and so did the male-dominated capitalist class (Macionis, 2018, p. 120). In order to continue the patriarchal society formed with capitalism, women were led to discover happiness in the form of male partnership, and domestic life and duties, while men were driven to factories to work long hours (Macionis, 2018). Women were taught to seek a man in order to prosper and survive, rather than forming their own financial independence by obtaining jobs. Both gender norms coincided to reinforce the ideal that women were responsible for the entirety of the housework, again reinforcing gender inequality.

However, the social- conflict theory is not without its own critics. Critics assert that families, despite being patriarchal, are still a necessity as they provide a means of both having and raising children (Macionis, 2018). Additionally, the theory fails to account for the fact that not all differences between men and women are seen as unjust (Macionis, 2018). For example, even in today’s society there are many people of both genders who are happy to take on the role of caregiver to their children while their partner provides economically. Finally, critics point out that Engels assertion of capitalism as the route of gender stratification does not hold true in the world today, as many socialist nations still have patriarchal societies (Macionis, 2018).

As previously asserted, gender does in fact impact society and furthermore the lives that make up such a society. Gender typically is connected to varying levels of power, with men often enjoying more freedom to behave in different ways (Macionis, 2018). For example, men in Hollywood often still portray sexier roles on screen as they age and society accepts this, even if their counterpart in the illustrious relationship is far younger. However, as women age in Hollywood we do not see the same hold true for them. Furthermore, women are judged more harshly for traits like assertiveness, and more often take on softer traits that rely on politeness (Smith-Lovin & Brody, 1989). The symbolic-interaction theory investigates gender roles in a smaller lens than that of the structural function approach, focusing on these daily interactions in everyday life (Macionis, 2018).

The symbolic-interaction theory asserts that gender norms are engrained into our society by the means that we use it every day, and thus is a vital part of our society. For example, gender influences the relative freedom one may feel to make certain decisions, facial expressions, or clothing choices. Women are judged more heavily on their facial expressions, and the desire to be polite has led them to smile more (Macionis, 2018). Additionally, women typically are judged more harshly for taking up more space, as “daintiness” is seen as a feminine trait, while men are more likely to be seen as masculine for taking up more space (Macionis, 2018). It is also generally expected in society that a woman will take a mans last name when married (Macionis, 2018). While the symbolic-interaction theory allows insight into the daily ways in which gender influences society, it fails to account for a broader stance on how gender actually shapes society as a whole (Macionis, 2018).

It is unlikely that the source of gender inequality will ever be agreed upon. However, it is abundantly clear the gender does perform a role in society. As society continues to advance, it is likely the world will continue to see gender roles redefined. With the emergence of new genders, and sexual orientations, gender roles will continue to change. In fact, there are already notable differences in gender traits (masculinity, femininity) in those of straight white women versus their counterparts of other sexual orientations (Kachel, Steffens, & Niedlich, 2016).

What is not apparent, is whether or not gender equality will be reached. Today, women are still viewed as being primarily responsible for routine housework, while men are expected to do non-routine chores (Geist, 2018). This is in part due to the fact that women can produce children, and the role of becoming a mother often leads to women falling behind men in their careers, contributing to the gender wage gap (Slaughter, 2012).

What remains unclear is whether or not gender equality will be achieved, and if it is, will everyone agree on it? The social-conflict theory claims gender equality was close to being achieved at the time of hunter-gatherers, however, whether men and women felt that way at the time is debatable. The structural functional approach claims that gender roles are necessary for unification between men and women, and while this may hold some merit, in a broader sense this ideal is flawed for not recognizing the inequality in value held for both necessary roles (male and female). For society to unlearn the societal norms that have led to the clear division between men and women gender roles will take a notable effort from society as a whole, as well as vast amounts of time.    

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Understanding Gender Roles and Their Effect On Our Relationships

Sarah Fielding is a freelance writer covering a range of topics with a focus on mental health and women's issues.

Ivy Kwong, LMFT, is a psychotherapist specializing in relationships, love and intimacy, trauma and codependency, and AAPI mental health.  

While they ought to be outdated, there are certain molds that men and women are traditionally taught and pressured to fit into: A man is strong and takes financial care of the family, while a woman is nurturing and takes  emotional care  of everyone.

Men take out the trash, and women do the dishes. Men pay for dinner, and women take care of the children. Men make straightforward, unemotional decisions, and women fret and follow along.

These are but a few of the many gender roles that perpetuate in society, forcing people into small boxes and frustrating dynamics. These ideals of how a person should behave based on their gender can harm an individual’s mental health and relationships as a whole. 

“Gender roles can have a significant impact on our relationships by creating power imbalances and limiting our ability to express ourselves authentically,” says Satadeepa Som , a psychologist and sexual wellness therapist at Allo Health , India’s first dedicated sexual health clinic. “When we internalize traditional gender roles, we may feel pressure to conform to certain expectations of how men and women should behave in relationships. This can lead to frustration, resentment, and a lack of intimacy.” 

Identifying, understanding, and challenging gender roles aids in dismantling their power and removing their limitations from existing and future relationships. To that end, here’s what you need to know about gender roles, how they limit people, and the importance of breaking them down. 

What are gender roles?

“Gender roles are not biologically determined,” says Som. “Gender roles are socially constructed and can vary widely between different societies and cultures.”

At their core, gender roles are an arbitrary set of characteristics society believes each person should embody based on their gender. For men, this often means foregoing emotion in favor of a big wallet and a strong presence. Women are supposed to be subdued, emotional, and caring, with an underlying subservience to the men in their lives. 

Gender roles based in patriarchy, a system of social, legal, economic, political, and cultural practices that position men as the dominant social group, have been shaped and further emphasized in a myriad of places around the world.

Cultural beliefs throughout time have reinforced the part of men as the provider and women as the homemaker in spaces such as religious and educational institutions and in government bodies, says Som.

Societal norms have reflected the teachings of these establishments, with families, peers, and the media following “unwritten rules about what is considered acceptable behavior for men and women in a particular society or culture.” Everything, from television to magazines, has also helped curate how women and men “should” each act. 

Traditional ideology separates men’s and women’s tasks as they have historically been treated—men are the breadwinner, and women are the caregiver. An egalitarian stance, on the other hand, seeks to remove gender as any determination of who takes on what tasks. In the middle, where much of society, consciously or unconsciously lives, is something known as transitional ideology, the man is the breadwinner, but he also supports the woman in household tasks.  

How gender roles are limiting

Feminist movements throughout the 20th century fought for gender equality and women's rights. Feminists call attention to and address a number of issues affecting women and girls around the world and advocate ending sexism, sexist exploitation, and oppression to achieve full gender equality in law and practice.

This resulted in significant and important changes.White women were granted the right to vote in 1920, Black women gained the right to vote in 1965, and women began wearing pants, getting graduate degrees, holding full-time jobs, and, overall, becoming more independent with greater freedom, choices, and opportunities.

Over the past two decades, activists have continued to push for an extinction of gender roles and a society in which people are defined by who they are, not the gender they are. Progress exists but is still slow, with many people inclined to default to and protect gender roles and keep people in small boxes. 

To this day, the ways in which gender roles can impact people are endless. Regardless of if a person thinks these stereotypes are helping them or making them look tough or caring, being forced into a box based on your gender is incredibly limiting and can cause a range of repercussions.

According to Rebecca Minor , LICSW, a gender specialist and part-time faculty at Boston University specializing in the intersection of gender and sexuality, three major areas where this is the case are job choices, emotional expression, and household responsibilities.

There are certainly many men who love finance and many women who want to be a teacher or an artist. But there are also lots of women who love math and men who want to instill lessons into young minds.

It’s not wrong for a person to want a job that falls within their traditional gender role, as long as they have the option to do any they please—and get paid equally for it. Without that opportunity, a person can get stuck in a job their entire life that is in no way related to their passions. 

Emotionally, men are told that they shouldn’t dare have any sensitive emotions, and if they do, they better bottle them up quickly. Women can be emotional and nurturing, but they’re not allowed to be strong or powerful. “These expectations can hinder individuals from expressing their emotions authentically, leading to emotional suppression and strained relationships,” says Minor. 

Regardless of if women work, household tasks and child caring are often left to them. If the man makes more money (which is not always the case and ignores the pay gap), why should they help out at home? If they do, some people still view it as demeaning or unusual. 

Gender roles can also have a tremendously negative impact on a person’s mental health. “Oppressive gender roles and stereotypes can have a negative impact on mental health by creating feelings of shame, self-doubt, and low self-esteem,” says Som. “When individuals are unable to meet society’s expectations of how they should behave based on their gender, they may feel isolated, misunderstood, and even punished.” As a result, individuals might develop a sense of failure, anxiety, stress, or depression. 

Breaking down gender norms for healthier relationships

Dating and relationships often prove to be the ultimate test for gender roles. They create this idea that there is a “right” and “wrong” way for each person to behave in a relationship when all that matters is their character and compatibility. “Traditional gender roles can also limit our ability to express ourselves authentically in relationships,” says Som.

Not only are gender roles in relationships archaic, but many people are not even in a monogamous, heterosexual relationship. “Gender roles can reinforce stereotypes and lead to discrimination and oppression,” says Som. “For example, LGBTQ+ individuals may face discrimination in relationships and society based on their gender identity or sexual orientation. This can create feelings of isolation and impact mental health.”

When we let go of these unnecessary ideas of how a person should act in a relationship, it creates space for a healthy, supportive relationship. “Breaking down gender roles allows individuals to communicate openly and honestly about their needs, desires, and emotions without fear of judgment or reprisal,” says Minor.

“This leads to more effective and empathetic communication, fostering greater understanding and connection between partners.” It also provides space for people to pursue their interests, work on power imbalances generated by society, and create an intimate, healthy space for the relationship to grow. 

Somech, A., & Drach-Zahavy, A. (2016). Gender role ideology. In A. Wong, M. Wickramasinghe, renee hoogland, & N. A. Naples (Eds.),  The Wiley Blackwell Encyclopedia of Gender and Sexuality Studies  (pp. 1–3). John Wiley & Sons, Ltd. https://doi.org/10.1002/9781118663219.wbegss205

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• Gender Equality Essay

Introduction to Gender Equality

In a society, everyone has the right to lead his/her life accordingly without any discrimination. When this state is achieved where all individuals are considered to be equal irrespective of their caste, gender, colour, profession, and status, we call it equality. Equality can also be defined as the situation where every individual has the same rights and equal opportunity to grow and prosper. 

Every individual of society dreams for equal rights and access to resources available at their disposal, but there is a lot of discrimination. This discrimination can be due to cultural differences, geographical differences, the colour of the individual, social status and even gender. The most prevalent discrimination is gender inequality. It is not a localised issue and is limited to only certain spheres of life but is prevalent across the globe. Even in progressive societies and top organisations, we can see many examples of gender bias. 

Gender equality can only be achieved when both male and female individuals are treated similarly. But discrimination is a social menace that creates division. We stop being together and stand together to tackle our problems. This social stigma has been creeping into the underbelly of all of society for many centuries. This has also been witnessed in gender-based cases. Gender inequality is the thing of the past as both men and women are creating history in all segments together.

Gender Equality builds a Nation

In this century, women and men enjoy the same privileges. The perception is changing slowly but steadily. People are now becoming more aware of their rights and what they can do in a free society. It has been found that when women and men hold the same position and participate equally, society progresses exclusively and creates a landmark. When a community reaches gender equality, everyone enjoys the same privileges and gets similar scopes in education, health, occupation, and political aspect. Even in the family, when both male and female members are treated in the same way, it is the best place to grow, learn, and add great value.

A nation needs to value every gender equally to progress at the right place. A society attains better development in all aspects when both genders are entitled to similar opportunities. Equal rights in decision making, health, politics, infrastructure, profession, etc will surely advance our society to a new level. The social stigma of women staying inside the house has changed. Nowadays, girls are equally competing with boys in school. They are also creating landmark development in their respective profession. Women are now seeking economic independence before they get married. It gives them the confidence to stand against oppression and make better decisions for themselves.

The age-old social structure dictated that women need to stay inside the home taking care of all when men go out to earn bread and butter. This has been practised for ages when the world outside was not safe. Now that the time has changed and we have successfully made our environment quite safer, women can step forward, get educated, pursue their passion, bring economic balance in their families, and share the weight of a family with men. This, in a cumulative way, will also make a country’s economy progress faster and better.

Methods to measure Gender Equality

Gender equality can be measured and a country’s growth can be traced by using the following methods.

Gender Development Index (GDI) is a gender-based calculation done similar to the Human Development Index. 

Gender Empowerment Measure (GEM) is a detailed calculation method of the percentage of female members in decision-making roles. 

Gender Equity Index (GEI) considers economic participation, education, and empowerment.

Global Gender Gap Index assesses the level of gender inequality present on the basis of four criteria: economic participation and opportunity, educational attainment, political empowerment, health and survival .

According to the Gender Gap Index (GGI), India ranks 140 among 156 participating countries. This denotes that the performance of India has fallen from the previous years, denoting negative growth in terms of closing the gender gap. In the current environment where equality and equal opportunities are considered supreme, this makes India be at a significant disadvantage.

Roadblocks to Gender Equality  

Indian society is still wrecked by such stigmas that dictate that women are meant to manage the home and stay indoors. This is being done for ages, leading to neglect of women in areas like education, health, wealth, and socio-economic fields. 

In addition to that, the dowry system is further crippling society. This ill practice had led to numerous female feticides. It has created a notion that girls are a burden on a family, which is one of the primary reasons a girl child cannot continue her education. Even if they excel in education and become independent, most of them are forced to quit their job as their income is considered a backup source, which is not fair. New-age women are not only independent, but they are confident too. The only thing they demand from society is support, which we should provide them.  

Along with dowry, there is one more burning issue that has a profound impact on women's growth. It is prevalent in all kinds of society and is known as violence. Violence against women is present in one or another form in public and private spaces. Sometimes, violence is accompanied by other burning issues such as exploitation, harassment, and trafficking, making the world unsafe for women. We must take steps to stop this and ensure a safe and healthy place for women.  

Poverty is also one of the major roadblocks towards gender equality. It has led to other malpractices such as child marriage, sale of children, trafficking and child labour, to name a few. Providing equal job opportunities and upliftment of people below the poverty line can help bring some checks onto this.

Initiative Towards Gender Equality

Any kind of discrimination acts as a roadblock in any nation’s growth, and a nation can only prosper when all its citizens have equal rights. Most of the developed countries has comparatively less gender discrimination and provide equal opportunity to both genders. Even the Indian government is taking multiple initiatives to cut down gender discrimination. 

They have initiated a social campaign called “Beti Bachao, Beti Padhao Yojana” to encourage the education of girl children. Besides this, the government runs multiple other schemes, such as the Women Helpline Scheme, UJJAWALA, National Mission for Empowerment of Women, etc., to generate awareness among the people. Moreover, as responsible citizens, it is our responsibility to spread knowledge on gender discrimination to create a beautiful world for wome n [1] [2] .

FAQs on Gender Equality Essay

1. What Makes Women Unequal to Men?

The social stigmas and beliefs that have been running deeply in the veins of all families make women unequal to men. Women are considered to be a burden by many families and are not provided with the same rights men enjoy in society. We are ill-informed regarding women’s rights and tend to continue age-old practices. This is made worse with social menaces such as the dowry system, child labor, child marriage, etc. Women can gather knowledge, get educated, and compete with men. This is sometimes quite threatening to the false patriarchal society.

2. How can We Promote Gender Equality?

Education is the prime measure to be taken to make society free from such menaces. When we teach our new generation regarding the best social practices and gender equal rights, we can eradicate such menaces aptly. Our society is ill-informed regarding gender equality and rights. Many policies have been designed and implemented by the government. As our country holds the second position in terms of population, it is hard to tackle these gender-based problems. It can only be erased from the deepest point by using education as the prime weapon.

3. Why should Women be Equal to Men?

Women might not be similar to men in terms of physical strength and physiological traits. Both are differently built biologically but they have the same brain and organs to function. Women these days are creating milestones that are changing society. They have traveled to space, running companies, creating history, and making everyone proud. Women are showing their capabilities in every phase and hence, they should be equal to men in all aspects.

4. Mention a few initiatives started by the Indian Government to enable gender equality.

The Indian government has initiated a social campaign called “Beti Bachao, Beti Padhao Yojana” to encourage girls’ education. Besides this, the government runs multiple other schemes, such as the  Women Helpline Scheme, UJJAWALA, National Mission for Empowerment of Women, etc., to generate awareness among the people.

• DOI: 10.25336/P6131Q
• Corpus ID: 53546546

Gender Roles, Gender (In)equality and Fertility: An Empirical Test of Five Gender Equity Indices

• Published 31 December 2010
• Canadian Studies in Population

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Gender Inequality in Household Chores and Work-Family Conflict

Javier cerrato.

1 Department of Social Psychology, Faculty of Labour Relations and Social Work, Universidad del País Vasco (UPV/EHU), Bilbao, Spain

2 Department of Developmental, Educational and Social Psychology and Methodology, Universitat Jaume I, Castellón de la Plana, Spain

The fact that the permeability between family and work scopes produces work-family conflict (WFC) is well established. As such, this research aims to check whether the unequal involvement in household chores between men and women is associated with increased WFC in women and men, interpreting the results also from the knowledge that arise from gender studies. A correlational study was carried out by means a questionnaire applied to 515 subjects (63% men) of two independent samples of Spanish men and women without emotional relationship, who lived with their heterosexual partner. As expected, results firstly show unequal involvement in household chores by women and men as it is higher in women that in men, and the perception of partner involvement is lower in women that in men. Secondly, those unequal involvements relate differently to men and women on different ways of work-family interaction. They do not increase WFC in women comparing to men, although there are tangentially significant differences in work conflict (WC) and statistically significant in family conflict (FC). However, perception of partner involvement on household chores increases WFC both in men and in women but not WC nor FC. Nevertheless, increase on marital conflict (MC) by domestic tasks neither affect in a significant way WFC in women nor in men, but increase WC in both women and men and FC only in women. Results also confirm that subject involvement on household chores is not a significant predictor of WFC in women nor in men, and that MC by domestic tasks is a statistically significant predictor in women of WFC and FC, but not in men. Thus, results show that traditional gender roles still affect the way men and women manage the work and family interaction, although the increased WFC due to involvement in housework is not exclusive to women, but also occurs in men. Personal and institutional recommendations are made on the basis of these results to cope with these conflicts.

Introduction

Occupational health psychology promotes labor risk prevention intervening both on the organization and on the person, but also on work-family interface. It seeks the goodness-of-fit among these dimensions in order to reduce psychosocial risks on occupational health and concurrently to improve organizational efficacy. The effect of psychosocial stressors at work does not remain within the working sphere as it extends also to personal life. This permeability between family and work scopes has produced work-family conflict (WFC) to be one of the psychosocial risks receiving more attention during the past years ( Eby et al., 2005 ; Ammons and Kelly, 2015 ; French et al., 2017 ; Lapierre et al., 2017 ; Wayne et al., 2017 ; Carvalho et al., 2018 ). WFC negatively affects both health and general life such as work performance and work satisfaction within the organizational context, but it also increases conflict rates and decreases family satisfaction. From this perspective, and within a context of a more technological and digitalized society, gender equality at work is a matter of paramount importance, which must start with a gender equality at home. The aim of this study is to check whether the unequal involvement in household chores between men and women is associated with increased WFC in women, and explain it in terms integrating the knowledge of gender studies.

Work-Home Conflict and Gender

Individuals may experience conflict between their work and home roles due to limited time, high levels of stress, and competing behavioral expectations ( Greenhaus and Beutell, 1985 ). Although most of the work-home research has focused on how work variables affect home from the point of view of the conflict between the two spheres ( Major and Cleveland, 2005 ), organizational psychology also begins to study how family variables affect job performance and satisfaction.

In the psychosocial scientific literature, there is a wide tradition on the work and home interface studies (i.e., Kopelmanś et al., 1983 ; Edwards and Rothbard, 2000 ; Pitt-Catsouphes et al., 2006 ; Mills, 2015 ; Paulin et al., 2017 ). Two primary perspectives have been offered in this literature based on the incompatibility between individuals’ work and home domains ( Michel and Hargis, 2008 ). One perspective focuses on the mechanisms that generate conflict between both domains. The other perspective focuses on the segmentation mechanisms between the work and the family domains. In this study, we adopt the conflict model in examining the influence of home roles (differential involvement of men and women on household chores), on work roles.

Some research has shown that role pressure in work and home domains generates negative consequences on the other one bidirectionally. So the degree of participation in the home role will create difficulties for participation in work, resulting in the home-work conflict (HWC); conversely, the degree of participation in the work domain can hinder performance on the family role, producing an increase of strain-based, time-based or behavior-based work-home conflict (WHC) ( Huang et al., 2004 ).

Gender roles are essential for understanding the work-home interface. They are shared beliefs that apply to individuals on the basis of their socially identified sex which are the basis of the division of labor in most societies ( Wood and Eagly, 2010 ). In Western societies, the home sphere, and the household chores as part of this sphere, it is assumed to be in charge of women, which could in turn affect more highly the home to work conflict of women than of men. However, to our knowledge, this has not been checked empirically. In this study we will focus on the effect of the relationship between gender and dedication to household chores on WFC among women.

Different meta-analyses ( Byron, 2005 ; Eby et al., 2005 ) have demonstrated the key role played by gender, but how it relates to work-family constructs is still both theoretically and empirically debated ( Shockley et al., 2017 ). Research has found differences in work-home conflict repeatedly, ranging from differences in the experience of WFC to the existence of different work and home backgrounds to women and men. However, most studies in the field of work-home interface do not consider gender as a variable, identifying at most correlates and differential associations for men and women ( Martínez and Paterna, 2009 ). Thus, we posit that work-home interface studies should include gender as key variable due to the influence of gender ideology and gender-role orientation might have on the work-home relationship from a cultural point of view.

From a cultural and discursive perspective ( Gerstel and Sarkisian, 2006 ), gender ideology, defined as beliefs and values maintained about what is right for men and women, determines the patterns by which a particular society judges or evaluates the proper conduct of a man or a woman.

This gender ideology is also reflected in the social discourse, as frequently the couple recreates the dominant social discourse in which is referred the essential characteristics in which men and women differ ignoring the sociopolitical context. This discourse states that the differences between men and women in relation to home and work are the result of personal choice, that there are differences in innate abilities of men and women for household chores and work outside the home, and that these differences guide the choice for certain jobs and even that preference for home toward work is a free choice in the case of women ( Martínez and Paterna, 2009 ; Kuo et al., 2018 ). Linked to this ideology, the traditional gender role model prescribes that work domain and instrumentality are more important for men than for women, whereas the home domain and expressiveness is more important for women. The traditional gender role model has a biosocial and cultural origin, and was described by Parsons and Bales (1955) in their delineation of instrumental (men) and expressive (women) roles. This model arbitrarily assumes that expressiveness and instrumentality are separate dimensions, and that expressiveness is always women gender role whereas instrumentality is that of men. Work and family interactions are embedded in the broader cultural, institutional and economic context in which individuals reside ( Ollier-Malaterre and Foucreault, 2017 ). Of particular relevance to gender differences in WFC are cultural differences in gender egalitarianism, or belief or attitudes about de equality of the sexes within de culture ( House et al., 2004 ; Lucas-Thompson and Goldberg, 2015 ).

As Martínez and Paterna (2009) indicate, gender ideology seems to determine the percentage of tasks considered traditionally feminine by members of the couple, such as washing, ironing, shopping, cooking, or cleaning. It also generates a differential meaning about household chores for men and women. Also, recent studies have shown that there is still a division of house chores by gender, depending on the gender role nuclei: instrumentality inside and outside home for men; expressiveness and instrumentality inside home for women ( Fernández et al., 2016 ). All this rationale, leads us to formulate hypothesis 1:

• simple  H1: There will be a division of household chores between men and women based on traditional gender roles. Women will spend more time than men in traditionally female household chores and men in traditionally male ones.

Both men and women similarly perceive a lack of parity in performing household chores, but perceive greater equality in the care of daughters and sons ( Yago and Martínez, 2009 ). This leads us to propose hypothesis 2:

• simple  H2 : Women will perceive their partners much less involved in household chores and only focus on household chores traditionally considered masculine. Men will perceive their female partners more involved in traditionally female household chores, especially in those traditionally considered feminine.

Implication in Household Chores and Work-Family Conflict (WFC)

Time required for household chores and caring for the family is one of the most important factors in the conflict coming from the family sphere, especially in families with children. So, the dual-income couples with children tend to have a greater number of conflicts between the partners and a higher level of stress than their counterparts without children ( Michel and Hargis, 2008 ). From this point of view, the gender roles model assumes that the nature of the role demands differs in men and women, and these roles act as moderators of WFC ( Barnett et al., 1995 ).

The highest level of family to work interference in women comes from the different implication of women and men in household chores, including the care of children. This different implication has been proven by various studies and research ( Bianchi et al., 2000 ; Korabik, 2015 ; Borelli et al., 2017 ) and still persists in society as has been found in different surveys ( Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development [OECD], 2014 ; Eurobarometer, 2015 ). In concrete, this model keeps very persistent in Spain, where women spend almost double the amount of time on unpaid work as men National Institute of Statistics (INE), 2018 ). This time is spent on activities such as caring for children (38 h a week women versus 23 men) or family members (20 h women versus 14 men) or household chores (20 h women versus 11 men). So although women have begun to strongly form part of the labor force and to spend more time with their children taking care of them, they neither assume a decrease in their salary as much as women do for work interruptions due to family issues nor stay at home to take care of their children ( Gerstel and Sarkisian, 2006 ). Most men still maintain full involvement in their work because their feminine couple assume the responsibility for caring their children. Thus, we can deduce that women will suffer more by the interference of the family at work, because their greater involvement in the family will can subtract them time, strength and dedication to their work; however, men will suffer more by the interference of work in the family. In fact, a high implication in the family sphere has been shown linked to a higher family-to-work interference only in women ( Hammer et al., 1997 ).

Moreover, men do not feel an obligation when they are involved in the home as women do, as they perceive it more as a hobby or a free choice. Also, those house chores that keep the home every day (shopping, cooking, washing dishes, washing clothes, and cleaning the house) are considered feminine, while those considered male or neutral tasks (paying bills, taking care of the car or home maintenance) do not involve daily devotion. Some cultural interpretation argue that women are more involved in house chores and do not want to fully share because of the belief that this is central to their gender identity and a source of power in the family, whereas husbands, whose gender identity has traditionally been marked by paid work, would not object to do less household chores than their wives ( Martínez and Paterna, 2009 ).

Besides, a crossover effect must be included: to the greater involvement of women in the family and household chores must be added the greatest involvement of men in the workplace ( Bakker et al., 2008 ), which supposes an increased family burden for women. As husbands are not available for household chores, wives suffer overload by household chores and emotional demands related to children caregiving, which will increase still more women stress and family to work interference ( Frone, 2003 ).

In short, the lesser involvement of men in household chores and greater transfer of stress from work to family causes increased domestic workload on women and marital conflict (MC), thus increasing the tension transfer from family environment to worksite in women. All this rationale, leads us to formulate hypothesis 3:

• simple  H3: The greater involvement of women in household chores and the perception of the lesser involvement of their men partners is linked to an increased family to work conflict (FWC) in women.

Marital Conflict and Household Chores

This greater involvement of women in household chorus and increased family to work conflict may lead to an increase of MC. In this line, Pittman et al. (1996) provide evidence for this idea by showing that the contribution of women to household chores is higher on the days when their husbands express higher levels of work stress; in these cases, women must subtract energy and time from work due to their husbands’ increased work stress. However, men do not adjust their contribution to household chores when their wives bring their work stress home. Research on family processes shows that stressed couples show a high level of negative interactions and conflicts. Thus, increased stress associated with WFC and its correlative frustration, leads individuals to initiate or exacerbate their sequence of negative interaction with the partner ( Westman and Etzion, 2005 ; Huffman et al., 2017 ). This negative interaction may be understood as product both of social undermining which consist in behaviors that involve rejection, criticism and negative attitude toward the couple ( Vinokur and Van Ryn, 1993 ) and hostile marital interactions ( Matthews et al., 1996 ), which aims to express hostility toward the partner or MCs.

Focusing on the conflict between the partners and their relationship with household chores, it has shown how increasing distress and frustration generated by the WFC tends to impair the interaction with the partner ( Westman and Etzion, 2005 ). This can result in increased tension between the partners due to the transfer of stress from work to family by men and their lesser involvement in household chores, which would generate an increase in MC and, therefore, an increase of conflict in the family especially in women due to unequal distribution of household chores. This leads us to propose hypothesis 4:

• simple  H4: The conflict between the partners due to unequal distribution of household chores generates an increase of more family to work conflict (FWC) in women than in men because of their greater involvement at home.

Materials and Methods

Participants and procedure.

A correlational study was carried out by means of a questionnaire applied by professional surveyors during 2014. They selected a segmented sample of men and women working in public and private organizations from different productive sectors (teaching, services, and manufacturing sectors). The final sample consisted of 515 subjects, mostly (63%) were men, with an average age of 40 years old; all of them were married or living with a heterosexual partner, and they had children. Samples of men and women were independent from each other, without emotional/marital relationship between them. Regarding the organizational setting, 21% were working in public organizations and 79% in private ones.

• simple • Work-Family Conflict (WFC), Family Conflict (FC), and Work Conflict (WC) based on time and strain were measured through the Spanish version ( Martínez-Pérez and Osca, 2001 ) of the Kopelmanś et al. (1983) scale. This scale applies the role conflict concept of Kahn et al. (1964) to study work and family scopes first separately and then together, based on the idea that WC and FC might act as antecedents of WFC. Each of these subscales consists of eight items on a Likert scale ranging from 1 (total disagree) to 5 (total agree). An example of a WFC subscale item is My work timetable is often incompatible with my family life ; an example of an item from the FC subscale is My family dislikes doing some activities I would like to do; and an example of an item from the WF subscale is At work I can’t be myself, or be the way I really am.
• simple • Subject involvement with household chores scale. This is a 10-item self-constructed scale that measures subjects’ self-perception about different tasks related to household chores, family management, and child care and education. Subjects respond to each item using a dichotomous yes/no format. The final scale score is the total number of family tasks they do. Examples of these items are Do you take the children to school every day? and Do you clean your house in your everyday life? This scale only includes the most common household chores of a standard Spanish couple with children of school age, not including others that may be less frequent in this culture (i.e., cutting the grass).
• simple • Partner involvement in household chores perception scale . This self-constructed scale is similar to the one above, but in this case it measures the subjects’ perception of their partners’ involvement in all the household chores. Subjects respond to each item using a dichotomous yes/no format about their perception of their partner’s involvement in different family tasks. The final scale score is the total number of tasks they perceive that their partners dedicate to family tasks. An example of these items is Does your partner take the children to school in everyday life?
• simple • Marital conflict about household chores was measured with the single question How many times do you and your partner argue about who must do the household chore s and when ? Subjects respond to this item on a Likert scale ranging from 1 (never) to 5 (every day).

We also measured socio-demographic (sex and age) and socio-familiar (family status, number of children) variables for the sample description.

Data Analyses

First, we performed skewness and kurtosis analyses to check normality among variables. Second, we calculated internal consistencies (Cronbach’s α), descriptive analyses and correlations between conflict scales and subject/partner perceived involvement on household chores scales. Third, we computed Analyses of Variance (ANOVAs) in order to test whether there was any statistically significant difference between-group regarding gender for subject’s involvement in household chores scale, and subject’s perception of partner’s involvement in household scale, and Kruskal–Wallis non-parametrical tests for item to item analysis due to its dichotomous level of response (Hypothesis 1 and 2). After that, we computed new ANOVAs and Regression Analyses to check gender, household chores, partner’s implication and conflict on WFC, WC, and FC (Hypothesis 3 and 4). All data analyses were carried out using SPSS 21.0.

Table ​ Table1 1 shows skewness and kurtosis statistics. As expected, all scales show values equal or below 0.5 and −0.5 in both or at least at one of them. So we assume a normal distribution of the scores of these scales. However, item by item of subject’s and partner’s involvement in household chores scales do not follow that normal distribution, due to its dichotomical nature.

Skewness and Kurtosis analysis of variables distribution.

Table ​ Table2 2 shows the descriptive analyses and Cronbach’s alpha of the variables for both samples. The alpha values meet the criterion of 0.70 ( Nunnally and Bernstein, 1994 ), except in the case of the perception of partner’s involvement in household chores, which was above 0.60. As expected, the pattern of correlations shows that WFC, work conflict and FC are positively and significantly related in both samples. However, WFC is more related to conflict at work in women and to conflict in the family in men.

Cronbach’s alpha, means ( M ), standard deviation ( SD ), and intercorrelations by gender ( N = 515).

Marital conflict is only highly and positively related to WFC, work conflict and FC in women, but not in men. This could indicate that women assimilate the conflict with the partner into conflicts in the family, i.e., women integrate the couple into the family concept, while men consider them to be different.

Subject’s involvement in household chores correlates significant and negatively with WFC in both men and women, but only with work conflict in men. Then, for both men and women, the higher their involvement is in household chores, the lower their WFC; moreover, the higher the work conflict is, the lower the men’s involvement in household chores.

Finally, the correlation between the subject’s and the perception of the partner’s involvement in household chores is only highly, significantly and negatively related in women. However, the perception of the partner’s involvement in household chores is only highly, significantly and positively related to WFC in men. Thus, women decrease their involvement in household chores when their male partners increase their involvement; on the other hand, in the case of men, the greater the involvement of the partner (women) in the household chores, the higher the WFC is.

ANOVA results confirm these differences and inequality about men’s and women’s involvement in household chores. Women’s involvement in household chores is more than twice that of men (4.0 and 1.7, respectively; F = 82.60; p ≤ 001). Consistently, women perceive lower involvement of their partner (men) in household chores than men do (1.8 and 2.8, respectively; F = 22.70; p ≤ 001).

Kruskal–Wallis tests also confirm that women are significantly more involved than men in seven of eleven household chores (see Table ​ Table3 3 ). These seven tasks are traditionally considered feminine: home shopping, house cleaning, free-time family management, taking children from home to school and from school to home, children’s care, helping children with homework, and playing with them. Men only score higher than women on one task traditionally considered masculine: house repairs. There are no differences in family management. These results confirm Hypothesis 1.

Kruskal–Wallis test of subject involvement on household chores and perception of partner involvement on household chores by gender (item to item) ( N = 515).

Symmetrically, Kruskal–Wallis tests also show that these results are confirmed by the perception that men and women have of their partner’s involvement in household chores: men consider that their partners (women) are mainly involved in traditionally feminine household chores: home shopping, house cleaning, free-time family management, taking children from home to school and school to home, taking care of the children, and helping children with homework, whereas women consider that their partners (men) are involved in typically masculine household chores: house repairs and family management. There are no differences in the perception of playing with the children. On the whole, these results confirm Hypothesis 2.

To test the hypothesis 3 (the effect of the greater involvement of women in household chores and perception of lesser involvement of male partners in the increase in the WFC among women compared to men), and hypothesis 4 (the effect of MC in the increased level of WFC in women relative to men), we performed three separate ANOVAs ( Table ​ Table4 4 ), complemented by multiple regression analysis ( Table ​ Table5 5 ).

Analysis of variance of work-family conflict, work conflict and family conflict by subject involvement on household chores and subject perception of partner involvement on household chores and marital conflict by gender ( N = 515).

Regression analyses predicting work conflict, family conflict and work-family conflict (dependent variables) in women and men by involvement on household chores, subject perception of partner involvement on household chores and level of marital conflict (independent variables).

ANOVAs results confirm partially hypothesis 3 since greater involvement of women in household chores do not generate a statistically significant increase in WFC comparing to men. There are gender differences in the extent to which this differential involvement in domestic tasks affects FC and (in a tangentially significant way) WC that point to a gender effect. On one hand, in the case of women, when their involvement in household chores is high, their FC and WC levels are similar; however, when their involvement is low, FC decreases and WC increases. On the other hand, in the case of men, the WC is always greater than the FC regardless of their degree of involvement in household chores. That is, in the case of women when there is a lower involvement in household chores the FC is also lower, but increases the WC.

There are no gender differences regarding the WFC according to the perception of their partners: it increases significantly in both men and women when the involvement in household chores of the partner is high or low, being always higher among women than among men regardless of the involvement of the partner with household chores is high or low, which completely rejects hypothesis 3.

It is noteworthy that the effect of the perception of involvement of the partner in household chores by gender does not affect WC or FC in a gender-specific way, but it affects the WFC globally statistically significantly, although these differences were not gender effects manifest. This indicates that the WFC is affected by the involvement of the partner in household chores, but not for the involvement of the subject in them, which segmentally would affect the FC and WC.

Regarding hypothesis 4, the increase of conflict by domestic tasks among the partners does not affect the WFC in a statistically significant way in women nor in men, but it does on WC and FC: when MC is high WC increase both in women and men, but FC increase only in women.

As a confirmation of this results, regarding the relationship between the subject’s and partner’s involvement in household chores and the different conflicts, regression analyses (see Table ​ Table5 5 ) show, first, that subject involvement on household chores does not predict WFC in women nor men, but only WC in men in a negative way. Moreover, the perception of the partner’s involvement in household chores and MC is a predictor of women’s WC and men’s WFC. Again these results do not confirm hypothesis 3.

Nevertheless, regarding hypothesis 4, as a difference of the ANOVA results, the increase of conflict by domestic tasks among the partners predict the WFC, WC, and FC in a statistically significant way in women but not in men. So results show that MC in women predicts WFC. This result fully support hypothesis 4. In addition to this, the MC is the only variable of those studied that affects the FC in the case of women, whereas involvement in housework does in the case of men, supporting also hypothesis 4.

In the case of men, the perception of the partner’s (women) involvement in household chores is a predictor of WFC. Results also show that men’s involvement in household chores is a negative statistically significant predictor FC as their beta coefficient is negative. That is, it seems that when the involvement of men in housework increases, the conflict in the family decreases; but when the perception of involvement of their female partners is high, it increases in them the WFC. However, MC does not predict this FC in men, so the FC does not increase by the conflict with the partner for housework but by their low involvement in them.

Home-work interaction has been the focus of a wide range of scientific literature during the past decades. It is generally accepted that both the family and the work scope affect each other in a different way. However, it was not studied in which degree the own and the partner’s involvement in family issues affect different kind of work-home conflict from a gender point of view. Thus, the aim of this study was to check whether the unequal involvement in household chores between men and women is associated with increased WFC in women, and explain it in terms integrating the knowledge of gender studies.

First, results confirm inequality because it indicates that the involvement of women in household chores is, on average, more than double the involvement of their male partners. In addition, men are more involved in traditionally masculine household chores (i.e., home repairs and family management), and women are more involved in traditionally feminine chores (i.e., childcare or shopping). Symmetrically, the subject’s perception of the partner implication confirms this difference: women perception of their men partner involvement in household chores much less than men perception of their woman partner involvement. Therefore, hypotheses 1 and 2 of our study are confirmed.

Secondly, we checked if those unequal involvements relate differently to men and women on different ways of WF interaction. We found that the greater involvement of women in household chores does not affect the level of WFC differentially in men and women, so hypothesis 3 is not met. This gender inequality in the distribution of household chores and child care does not imply a higher level of WFC in women compared to men. Rather the opposite happens: when more involved are both men and women in household chores, lower is the WFC. Although the hypothesis 3 is not corroborated, it should be noted that when the involvement of women in household chores is high, their level of FC increases; when men’s involvement increases, their level of WC increases, which in some way supports hypothesis 3. That is, the high involvement in household chores has negative consequences in the family sphere for women and in the workplace for men, possibly because of the greater respective importance that women give to family and men to work, as it poses the traditional gender role model.

In addition to this, results show that when the involvement of women in household chores is high, their levels of WC and FC are similar, i.e., it equally affects both areas. When this involvement is low, FC is lower than the WC. However, among men, WC is always greater than the WC regardless of their involvement in household chores. Furthermore, when the conflict with the partner for household chores is high, women report a higher FC but not a higher WC, whereas in man this conflict does not affect neither the FC nor the WC.

However, in the case of women, MC affects conflict related WC and FC and WFC, so hypothesis 4 is fully corroborated. This is very interesting because although hypothesis 3 is not met, however, the conflict with the partner due to this inequality in the distribution of housework seems to generate this WFC. That is, it would not be the greatest involvement in household chores itself that might cause and increase WFC in women, but the conflict with their partner which might produce it.

These results may be related to the absence of perception of injustice in the relationships regarding to inequality in the distribution of domestic and family responsibilities between men and women, so that in many cases women neither do perceive injustice in their relationships nor are dissatisfied. Following the review of Yago and Martínez (2009) , it has repeatedly shown that the perception of an unequal distribution of housework between men and women does not necessarily lead to a perception of unfairness. This perception of justice on the division of domestic work and the ideology of traditional gender that supports it explain why gender inequalities remain in the family sphere mediating the relationship between the perception of injustice and perceived quality the relationship. In fact, when women are more socially and emotionally independent from their partners, they are more likely to consider unfair the inequality in the distribution of household chores.

The perception of injustice is a mediating factor between an unequal distribution of domestic work and the perceived quality of the relationship; the relationship may be perceived as satisfactory although the sharing of responsibilities is not equal, if it is not perceived unfair ( Yago and Martínez, 2009 ). However, these results were mediated by gender ideology so this inequal distribution do not generate distress in the more traditional women whereas it does in women with an equal gender ideology.

In this line a study of Ogolsky et al. (2014) shows that the discrepancies at a cognitive level between men and women with regard to equality in household chores affects the quality of the relationship in the sphere of the couple in greater way to women than in men. However, when this inequality is manifested in a behavioral level, it does not seem to affect the quality of the relationship in women. That is, the real inequality does not affect the quality of the relationship in women, but it does at the cognitive level.

The involvement of the couple in household chores is related to an increased WFC, although it does not affect the WC or the FC separately by gender, but affects the WFC globally: it increases similarly in men and women when the couple’s involvement is high. This indicates that the WFC is affected by the involvement of the partner in household chores, but not for the involvement of the subject in them, which would affect to a segmented FC and WC. These results do not prove the hypothesis 3, but can indicate that the model of traditional gender roles does not serve to satisfactorily explain the influence of the division of household tasks and the effect of gender inequality in the WFC, as both in the case of men and women more involved in household chores generate that their female and male partners feel an increased WFC.

Men’s and women’s perceptions of their partners’ involvement in household chores contribute significantly to the perception of WFC; their own involvement also contributes significantly to FC, but negatively, which means that the more involved their partner is in the household chores, the greater their WFC.

Although our study seems to show that gender is an important variable in the involvement in household chores, and that gender inequality and the model of traditional gender roles is still valid in our western society, it also seems to suggest that increased WFC due to a high involvement in household chores is not exclusive to men but also occurs in women. This could be an indicator of a change in the model of traditional gender roles that began in the 80s, where new generations equate the importance of work and family spheres in the cases of both men and women.

In fact, results of some recent research ( Shockley et al., 2017 ) indicate that men and women appear to be more similar than different in their WFC experiences; gender differences in WFC appear to generally be small, regardless of which specific subgroups are examined, and when there is meaningful variation in the magnitude of gender differences in WFC the key factors that determine this variation is currently not well understood.

From this point of view, several alternative models other than the conflict perspective might explain these results. This tis the case of models such as the synergy between work and family, positive balance, work-family facilitation, or work-family enrichment ( Beutell and Wittig-Berman, 2008 ; Lapierre et al., 2017 ), which would better understand the effect of gender on the individual’s relationship between work and family.

The use of this new model integrative approach is justified by the social changes that characterize the values of the new generations, Gen Xers (born between 80 and 2000 population). They seem to consider that both work and family are equally important in their life, and try to find the most appropriate way to reconcile both aspects ( Beutell and Wittig-Berman, 2008 ), giving less importance to presentism at work and being supporters of flexibility. This understanding of the work is based, in addition to the facilities provided the digital revolution and technologies for work, making workers less dependent of a particular physical space and a fixed schedule to perform their work, together with the values of personal autonomy and responsibility that are shared by this new generation. This facilitates that people can now have more time to devote to other areas of their life within the scope of non-work such as family or leisure, with a progressively greater importance in their social identity.

From this point of view, research on work and family interaction has evolved from the study of isolated variables within the conflict and segmentation models toward more complex models that try to understand from the boundary theory, and the models of facilitation and synergy, how transitions are made from one scope to the other, and how they integrate with each other. They do not consider them as separate domains but as something unitary and unbreakable within the life of people. In the same way, an approach that takes into account the gender ideology is progressively being imposed, since it is inseparable from the relationship between work and the family from a cultural point of view.

Study Limitations

This study focuses on the effect of different kinds of conflict related to the home and work settings. However, due the lack of clear differences in results regarding WFC in men and women when partners’ implication in household chorus is high, it would be necessary to include facilitation and synergy models that would make it easier to understand the work-family relationship in all its facets, including the role played by gender and gender inequality. Research on the positive reciprocal effects of work and family is fundamental to understanding the complexity of the work-family interaction.

In addition, this study has other methodological limitations. First, we studied the effect of gender and involvement in household chores on the work-family relationship using independent samples of men and women, without collecting data from their partners. However, we analyzed the perceptions of these people (men and women) about their own involvement and their partner’s involvement, and this perception was shown to be significant. Nevertheless, it would be interesting to include the whole couple as a unit in future studies to increase the reliability of the proposed model.

Second, this study is based only on quantitative analyses. It would be interesting to support these results with qualitative studies (through interviews or focus groups) that would help us to interpret the analyses of the results framed in both the traditional gender roles and cross-effect theories, but also in people’s interpretations, increasing the model’s validity. They would also allow us to understand the gender role in the direction of the cross-effects of work stress from men to women, or from women to men, as our results only partially support this cross-effect, contrary to previous results ( Bakker et al., 2008 ). In any case, the quantitative methodology used in this study allowed us to detect, in a relatively simple way, the existence of changes in the relationship between gender and the traditional division of roles as a first step.

Also, the household chores used are those that might be generalized to mostly couples with children at school age. However, we have not considered specific situations (i.e., living in their house, living in a large or in a small town, grandparents support in caring children, age of the children) that might have help us to better describe the sample and interpret our results. Future studies could include this kind of sociodemographic variables.

In addition, may be other methodological limitations that may have conditioned the results. One of them is the imbalance in the percentage of men (63%) regarding women (37%). However, this limitation is assumable given the correlational nature of the study and the breadth of the sample. Finally, the reliably of the involvement of the partner in household chores is not too high (Cronbach’s alpha 0.62) which could raise doubts about its effect as an independent variable in the WFC in men and WC among women. Nevertheless, it met widely accepted criteria to assume its reliably (over 0.60).

Practical Implications

These results raise a number of practical implications for equality between men and women in terms of gender issues in the effective management of organizations in order to establish social integration and equality policies in both family and work settings ( Wharton, 2015 ). The management of work and working time within organizations must take into account the social changes occurring in gender roles, and start to consider that both men and women gradually tend to give the same importance to their work and family environments ( Kuo et al., 2018 ), with the accompanying increase in WFC and stress in both partners. Thus, although in many cases traditional gender roles are still valid (the family sphere continues to be more important for women than for men), it is necessary to consider the vision and specific attitudes that both workers have about their involvement in work and family, and establish organizational policies that help to reconcile both spheres in both genders ( Lucas-Thompson and Goldberg, 2015 ).

Moreover, public and social institutions specializing in family matters should incorporate these progressive changes in traditional gender roles into their strategies, in order to facilitate the homogenization of women’s and men’s roles within the family and workplace. For instance, they can design family counseling and couple training campaigns that help them to discover how to best coordinate their dedication to the family in a way that will reduce stress and conflict, and how to minimize WFC, even translating it into work-family synergy.

But also organizations might participate in this social change. They might contribute for instance through the inclusion of family friendly politics to support the search for home-work balance of their workers, men and women ( Sprung et al., 2015 ; Lin et al., 2017 ; Matias et al., 2017 ). It would mean a way to improve the quality of working life of their workers and, at the same time, a return of investment (ROI) both for the organization ( Dowd et al., 2017 ) and for our, hopefully, every time more equitable society.

Ethics Statement

All participants provided written informed consents before to complete the survey, in accordance with the Declaration of Helsinki, and researchers guaranteed the anonymity of data. This study was approved by the institutional review board of the Faculty of Labour Relations and Social Work of the University of Basque Country.

Author Contributions

JC has been the director of review of the scientific literature, theoretical justification, methodology design, data collection, statistical analyses, and results description. EC has coordinated the improvement of the whole design and redaction paper, including conclusions and research limitations.

Conflict of Interest Statement

The authors declare that the research was conducted in the absence of any commercial or financial relationships that could be construed as a potential conflict of interest.

Funding. The authors gratefully thank the financial support provided by Generalitat Valenciana (Grant AICO/2017/073).

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Women Healers: Gender, Authority, and Medicine in Early Philadelphia

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Mazie Hough, Women Healers: Gender, Authority, and Medicine in Early Philadelphia, Journal of American History , Volume 111, Issue 1, June 2024, Page 139, https://doi.org/10.1093/jahist/jaae016

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Susan H. Brandt combines a wide-angle lens and a close reading of sources to uncover the diverse histories of women healers who practiced in Philadelphia between the arrival of William Penn Jr. in 1702 and the creation of the Pennsylvania Medical College for Women in 1850. In contrast to “standard historical narratives” she asserts,

women were not inflexible traditional practitioners destined to fall victim to Enlightenment science, capitalism, and medical professionalization. Instead, women practitioners adapted their practices as they found new sources of health care authority. (p. 4)

Brandt demonstrates how Philadelphia “provided women healers with a nurturing environment enriched by diverse healing cultures and Quaker values of gender equality and women's education” (p. 220). Diverse healing cultures and Quaker values are both central to her story. Many women took advantage of the Quakers' support of unconventional gender roles to assert their right to participate in the public realm, but it is the network of women healers—across generations and cultures—that Brandt emphasizes. Behind every individual healer were numerous other women.

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Paradoxical gender effects in meat consumption across cultures

• Christopher J. Hopwood 1 ,
• Jahn N. Zizer 1 ,
• Adam T. Nissen 2 ,
• Courtney Dillard 3 ,
• Andie M. Thompkins 3 ,
• Joāo Graça 4 ,
• Daniela Romero Waldhorn 5 &
• Wiebke Bleidorn 1  

Scientific Reports volume  14 , Article number:  13033 ( 2024 ) Cite this article

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• Environmental social sciences
• Human behaviour

Men tend to eat more meat than women, but it is not clear why. We tested three hypotheses in a cross-cultural design (20,802 individuals in 23 countries across four continents): that gender differences are (a) universal, (b) related to gender roles and thus weaker in countries with higher gender equality and human development, or (c) related to opportunities to express gender roles and thus stronger in countries with higher gender equality and human development. Across all countries, men tended to consume more meat than women. However, this difference increased significantly in countries with greater human development and gender equality. The paradoxical gender gap in meat consumption aligns with previous research that suggests greater differences in behavior across genders in contexts that are more developed and gender equal. We discuss implications for theories of culture and gender as well as practical implications for global meat reduction.

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Introduction.

Meat consumption represents a significant threat to environmental sustainability via its impact on climate change, human health via its association with risk for disease, and social justice via its impact on animal welfare worldwide 1 , 2 , 3 , 4 , 5 . Meat consumption is reliably higher among men than women in North American and European samples 6 , 7 , 8 , 9 , but reasons for this difference remain unclear. Understanding this difference can shed light on how gender interacts with culture and may pave ways to reduce meat consumption and its negative impacts. We used data from 23 countries from four continents to test three competing hypotheses about gender differences in meat consumption.

The first hypothesis is that gender differences in meat consumption frequency are universal. Universalism is typically tied to arguments related to biological sex differences in dietary needs that operate independent of culture and context 10 . For instance, Fessler 11 argued that women experience hormonally-mediated immunosuppression during menstruation and pregnancy that leads them to avoid meat consumption. Other theorists have speculated about differential evolutionary pressures 12 . For instance, it has been hypothesized that mean prefer meat because they are more likely to behave in a way that risks injury 13 , and the profile of amino acids provided by animal flesh promotes muscle and bone strength that protects against injury 14 . Similarly, evolved social norms in which men tend to be rewarded for being good hunters 15 could have contributed to its being more valued, both in terms of taste and social status, among men.

Indeed, cultural and economic dynamics have played an important role in meat consumption throughout history 16 . In many cultures, meat consumption is linked to masculinity and masculine identity 9 , 17 , 18 , 19 . There is evidence that vegetarian men are viewed as less attractive than omnivorous men in some cultures 20 , demonstrating that cultural differences connect gender norms with masculinity-linked behaviors. Thus, a second hypothesis is that meat consumption frequency is influenced by cultural norms that associate meat consumption with positive traits, such as masculinity and virility for men, and thus would be higher in countries with stronger gender role norms.

The third hypothesis is less intuitive. Previous research has identified paradoxical gender effects, such that gender differences in certain psychological variables such as personality traits 21 , 22 , interests 23 , and self-esteem 24 are actually greater in countries with greater gender equality. Two possible explanations have been offered for this paradoxical gender effect. First, it has been suggested that gender equality, being associated with greater wealth and increased purchasing power 25 , 26 , 27 , provides opportunities for natural expression of certain behaviors 22 , 28 . In this case, gender differences in meat consumption frequency would be greater in countries with greater gender equality, to the extent that there are universal differences in meat consumption preferences across genders.

A second possible explanation involves reference group effects 29 . In countries with higher gender equality, people responding to questions about themselves may be more likely to compare themselves to the general population, whereas in countries with lower gender equality, respondents may be more likely to compare themselves to others of their same gender 30 . This would have the effect of obscuring actual gender differences in less gender-equal countries. Given that the frequency of meat consumption is a more behavioral criterion than those for which paradoxical gender effects have been observed, such as self-reported personality traits, interests, or self-esteem, comparisons of meat consumption rates across cultures should be less prone to reference group effects.

Understanding cross-cultural differences in the meat consumption gender gap may provide insights regarding the role of culture in gender differences and test the limits of paradoxical gender effects that have been observed for other psychological variables. It may also provide clues about how to reduce meat consumption globally. If gender differences in meat consumption are universal, strategies designed to reduce meat consumption may vary across genders 31 , but the gender-specificity of such strategies would not depend on culture. Finding that gender differences in meat consumption were stronger in countries with lower gender equality would highlight the role of masculinity and related stereotypes in reducing meat consumption among men 20 . A paradoxical gender effect in which gender differences in meat consumption are higher in more developed countries would suggest that meat consumption is a function of social opportunity and highlight the potential effectiveness of different kinds of strategies in different cultural contexts. We note that gender equality and human development are different in many ways, but they are related empirically and intertwined in terms of our hypotheses. Gender equality is generally afforded by aspects of human development, so to the extent that gender differences in meat consumption are moderated by one of these factors they would likely be moderated by both. However, the use of both indexes allows us to begin to examine the specificity of gender equality relative to human development more generally. At the same time, it must be acknowledged that with the modest number of countries included in this study, a test of the differences in effects between these variables is quite preliminary.

In summary, the purpose of this study was to use cross-cultural data to examine gender differences in meat consumption frequency. We expected men to consume more meat than women, on average, across all countries, and people in more developed and gender-equal countries to eat more meat. Our primary focus was on testing whether gender differences across countries would (a) not differ across countries, (b) be weaker in countries with higher gender equality and human development, or (c) be stronger in countries with higher gender equality and human development.

All methods were performed in accordance with the relevant ethical guidelines and regulations. Participants from 23 countries on four continents (see Table 1 for list of included countries) were recruited in 2021 using a stratified sampling approach created by the survey platform Cint. We recruited 1000 participants per country such that participants from each country were representative of the nation in terms of gender and age. Among the 28,229 participants who provided any data, the research team excluded participants who did not correctly respond to validity checks (e.g., not selecting the option ‘apple’ after being instructed to do so), provided nonsense responses to open-ended questions, or did not complete the survey (n = 7263). We then reopened the survey to more potential participants in an effort to get as close as possible to our target of 1000 participants per country, although our success was variable (see country-level sample sizes in Table 1 ). We also removed participants who did not identify as a man or woman (n = 164) for this study. This resulted in a sample of 20,802 participants. For more information about the CINT survey platform, the measures included in this study, and other unrelated tasks that were completed by the participants, see https://osf.io/tx3u9/?view_only=07504017687249d3bb05d93db9c83914 .

Respondents rated the frequency of their consumption of various classes of food from " 1  =  Never" to " 11  =  Two or more times per day". We calculated land animal consumption by averaging scores for the categories "Cow/beef", "Pig/Pork", "Chicken or other fowl", and "Other land animals". As the items measure frequency within a category rather than portion size, we assumed that they represent the amount of meat eaten without being greatly influenced by gender differences in general caloric intake.

We used the Human Development Index (HDI), a multi-scale measure of human development that is published by the United Nations 32 , to rank countries according to their level of development on three dimensions: health (as measured by life expectancy at birth), education (as measured by the years of schooling and the expected years of schooling), and standard of living (as measured by gross national income per capita). This index is viewed as superior to the Global Domestic Product (GDP) as a measure of development as it, unlike the latter, represents not only average growth in income but also considers health and education as the key components of human development 33 . The data were derived manually from the website of the United Nations Development Program in January of 2023, where the data from 2021 were freely available.

We used the Global Gender Gap Index (GGGI), a multi-scale measure of gender equality that is published by the World Economic Forum 34 , to assess national differences in gender equality. The score is calculated based on four indicators: economic participation and opportunity, educational attainment, health and survival, and political empowerment. The data from 2021 were derived from the Global Gender Gap Report 2021, which was published by the World Economic Forum in 2021.

We first examined mean levels of study variables across countries to provide an initial indication of overall levels of meat consumption frequency and gender differences across countries. We then tested hypotheses using multi-level intercept-and-slopes-as-outcome models with level 1 individual- and level 2 country-level predictors. We constructed increasingly complex models, starting with an intercept-only model and ending with a cross-level interaction model. All our models were constructed to be nested within less complex ones, giving us the ability to statistically compare the variance explained by the more complex models. In the first step, an intercept-only model was constructed to investigate the ratio of the variance of meat consumption frequency that the country levels alone explain and to test whether our multi-level approach was necessary and justified. This model was specified as:

with Y ij representing the combined meat consumption score for each individual i in each nation j , which is composed of γ 00 , the average standardized meat consumption score across the population of all countries j (i.e., the overall mean), μ 0j , the individual deviation of each country j form this mean, and each Individual i 's deviation from these means, r ij .

In the next step, we added the Level 1 predictors of binary gender, linear age, and quadratic age, to compose a random intercept model predicting meat consumption. We included age because of research indicating that meat consumption varies across age, peaking at age 20–49 with lower consumption at younger and older ages 8 . The random intercept model was specified as:

with γ 10 being added to the equation as the regression slopes for gender across countries, and γ 20 and γ 30 as the regression slopes for age and quadratic age across countries. In this model, intercepts can vary randomly, with slopes remaining constant across countries.

Next, we tested a random coefficients model, for which we added the random coefficients for the slopes of gender, age, and the quadratic term of age. As described below, the age slopes did not explain additional variance. The resulting random coefficients model was specified as:

with μ 1j added as the varying slope of gender in each country j , representing how the extent of gender effects varies across countries.

In a final step, we added the human development and gender equality indices as moderators of the gender effect into the equation to create an intercepts-and-slopes-as-outcome model with a cross-level-interaction. These variables correlated r . = 63 in our data. We added them as variables in separate models to avoid multicollinearity.

The final models were specified as:

with moderator representing HDI for the model containing human development, GGGI for the model containing gender equality, γ 01 representing the effects of development/equality across countries, and γ 11 for the effect of the cross-level-interaction of development/equality and gender across countries and individuals.

This study was deemed exempt from formal review according to the criteria of the University of Zurich Faculty of Arts and Sciences Ethics Commission. All participants provided informed consent to participate.

Table 1 shows the sample sizes, gender proportions, scores on human development and gender equality variables, and meat consumption frequency levels by men and women across countries. With regard to meat consumption, this table shows that, with three exceptions (China, Indonesia, and India), men eat meat more often than women. Significant positive effect sizes ranged from d  = 0.17 (Malaysia) to 0.58 (Germany). Overall levels and gender differences in meat consumption frequency across countries are depicted in Fig.  1 , and overall differences in meat consumption frequency across gender are depicted in Fig.  2 .

Overall levels ( A ) and gender differences ( B ) in meat consumption frequency across sampled countries. For gender differences, redder color indicates higher levels of consumption frequency for men. ( A ) Overall Standardized Levels of Meat Consumption Frequency. ( B ) Gender Differences (in Cohen’s d) in Meat Consumption Frequency.

Overall differences in meat consumption frequency across genders.

The intercept-only model explained 11% of the total variance in meat consumption frequency. The random-intercept model explained significantly more variance than the intercept-only model (χ 2  = 561, p  < 0.001), justifying the inclusion of gender, age, and age squared as predictors. Age had significant linear ( r  = − 0.07, t  = − 9.95, p  < 0.001) and quadratic ( b  = − 0.02, t  = − 3.77, p  < 0.001) effects in our preliminary analyses and final models ( p  < 0.001) and thus was retained throughout our model building process. In the model with random coefficients for the slopes of gender, age, and the quadratic age term, including random age effects resulted in model convergence issues. We therefore concluded that the slopes of the age effects did not differ across countries. However, the model that included only the gender slope explained significantly more variance than the random intercept model (χ 2  = 53.1, p  < 0.001).

Models that included level 2 variables for gender equality and human development as well as cross-level interactions between gender with human development and gender equality explained significantly more variance than the simpler nested random coefficients model (χ 2  = 10.6, p  < 0.005 and χ 2  = 15.3, p  < 0.001, respectively). Coefficients for these models can be found in Table 2 . Main effects were as expected. Parameter estimates indicated that men consume meat significantly more often than women, meat consumption generally decreases with age but is highest in young to middle-aged adults (the highest average level across all countries was for age 32), and that human development and gender equality are both positively related to meat consumption.

Cross-level interactions indicated that gender differences in meat consumption are larger in countries with greater human development and gender equality, consistent with the gender paradox hypothesis. These interactions are depicted in Fig.  3 . In supplemental analyses with separate models for each gender group, men’s meat consumption frequency increases significantly with higher gender equality and human development, whereas women’s does not (this is also apparent in Fig.  3 ).

Gender differences in meat consumption frequency are greater in countries with higher human development ( A ) and gender equality ( B ). Country-level predictors centered at the global mean.

In this study, we used data from 23 countries from four continents to test gender differences in meat consumption frequency across cultures. As expected, we found that men tend to eat meat more often than women, and that people in more developed countries eat meat more often than people in less developed countries. Of primary interest was the interaction between gender and culture. Similar to previous research with attributes such as personality and self-esteem, we found greater gender differences in meat consumption in countries with higher levels of gender equality and human development. This finding supports the paradoxical gender effect and extends it to a variable that is less prone to reference group effects.

A large body of research now supports that both male gender and wealth are related to greater meat consumption 9 , 27 . With regard to gender, these results cannot parse various possible explanations for this gender difference, which may range from those involving biological processes to social norms and stereotypes. However, we note that gender differences were not observed in three of the world’s largest countries, India, Indonesia, and China. This suggests that gender differences are not universal and that cultural and contextual factors may play a role. The human development effect is relatively easy to explain by economic factors. Producing meat is more expensive than producing plant-based food for a variety of reasons 35 . It follows that countries in which people have more economic resources afford greater opportunities for people to purchase and consume meat.

Perhaps the most interesting finding from this study is that gender differences in meat consumption frequency are greatest in countries with the highest level of human development and gender equality. It is most intuitive to expect that, as economies develop and particularly as gender roles equalize, gender differences in attitudes and behavior should decrease. However, an emerging body of research across psychological attributes paradoxically suggests that gender differences actually increase in countries that afford women relatively greater opportunity in terms of both wealth and gender norms 21 , 22 , 23 , 24 . The extension of this effect to a more behavioral outcome that is rated in terms of frequency rather than relative anchors (e.g., false to true) helps rule out reference group effects as an explanation for this finding.

The finding that this effect is largely driven by increasing meat consumption among men is of considerable interest. Schmitt et al. 22 suggested that this kind of effect can be attributed to the emergence of natural, dispositional differences in behaviors, attitudes, and preferences in cultures that afford women greater freedom and choice. For instance, in countries relatively high in both human development and gender equality, there may be more options for satisfying non-meat foods and lower expectations that women will share the same preferences and food choices as men. However, our data suggest that the effects of human development and gender equality on gender differences in meat consumption have more to do with men’s consumption behavior than women's, meaning that this effect is more likely to be driven by more extensive meat consumption among men in developed countries, in which greater wealth creates more opportunities for men to choose meat, than by lower meat consumption among women. To the degree that various factors lead men to prefer meat more than women, these preferences could thus be both universal and expressed more easily in contexts with greater opportunity for independent choices by men.

Meat consumption is a significant contributor to climate change 36 , pandemic risk 37 , clean water shortages 38 , and social injustice for farmed animals 3 . Therefore, it is in society’s interest to curb meat consumption worldwide. These findings may hold some clues as to the most effective means of reducing meat consumption. For instance, interventions targeting individual behavior may be tailored based on gender and gender identity, and to focus on meat reduction among men 31 . Meat reduction strategies at a society level may benefit from considering context 39 , 41 , 41 . Countries with highest levels of consumption and highest human development offer consumers the most choice, including opportunities to consume plant-based or cultivated alternatives to farmed animals. In such countries, demand-side approaches involving marketing or other consumer-targeted strategies may be most effective. In contrast, meat consumption is increasing the most in developing countries, but these countries are also likely to be hardest hit by animal agriculture because it is economically inefficient and because such countries tend to be more vulnerable to environmental and social justice challenges. Thus, supply-side strategies involving incentives to produce plant-based alternatives and cultivated meat may be most effective.

Limitations

This study was affected by several limitations. First, we assessed a limited range of countries. Sampling issues may have influenced results and limited the sensitivity of our models to country-level effects, such as differences between the impacts of gender equality and human development. Moreover, no African countries were represented at all, and it is possible that gender and culture have qualitatively different impacts on meat consumption in an African context. Second, we counted the number of meals in which meat was eaten, but not self-reported caloric intake. Studies with more direct and objective measures of meat consumption should be conducted to replicate these results. Third, we classified people according to self-reported gender, and cannot draw conclusions about people who do not identify as men or women. Fourth, we did not examine different types of meat. Given how cultural and economic factors influence meat consumption, this is an important nuance to consider in future studies.

In addition to replicating findings that men tend to eat more meat women and that more meat is consumed in more developed countries, this study is the first to document paradoxical gender effects in meat consumption. Specifically, gender differences in meat consumption are greater in countries with higher human development and more gender equality. This finding builds upon similar studies with psychological attributes, and helps rule out reference group effects as an explanation. This study also provides information that may be useful in thinking about how to reduce meat consumption worldwide.

Data availability

Data and materials for this study are available at https://osf.io/z37w6/?view_only=a469a98d605046df890bfcf5f0f5d6c7 . Codebook for the overall study is available at https://osf.io/tx3u9/?view_only=07504017687249d3bb05d93db9c83914 .

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CH and WB conceived the study; CH drafted the paper; JZ and AN analyzed the data; CH, AT, CD, JG, DW, and AT collected the data; all authors edited drafts.

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Hopwood, C.J., Zizer, J.N., Nissen, A.T. et al. Paradoxical gender effects in meat consumption across cultures. Sci Rep 14 , 13033 (2024). https://doi.org/10.1038/s41598-024-62511-3

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Home — Essay Samples — Literature — The Yellow Wallpaper — Gender Roles in “The Yellow Wallpaper”

Gender Roles in "The Yellow Wallpaper"

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Gender roles and oppression, the impact on autonomy and mental health.

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Building an understanding of gender equality early: hey dee ho’s story

by Freya Lucas

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The early years are a critical time when gender roles and stereotypical notions of what it means to be ‘masculine’ or ‘feminine’ are shaped, and when positive influences on children’s and families’ understanding of gender norms can most easily be achieved. 

With increasing focus on gendered violence in Australia, early childhood educators are giving deep consideration to how they can have a positive impact in this space through encouraging children’s play, language, toys and storytelling through the lens of breaking down stereotypes. 

Educational programs provider hey dee ho understands deeply both the complexity and the opportunity that exists in this space, and the responsibility that it has, along with its early childhood education and care (ECEC) partners, to promote positive gender norms in the early years, creating the necessary foundation for children to grow and develop their ideas and understanding about gender and to learn about equal and respectful relationships.

Longstanding hey dee ho franchisee Amanda Testro has used her awareness and understanding of these issues to develop, in partnership with Drummond Street Services and Playgroup Victoria, the ALL come out to Play! Embedding Gender Equality in the Early Years session, which aims to offer participants a deeper exploration of the importance of role modelling and gender equality in its programs. 

“With 1 in 4 women having experienced intimate partner violence since the age of 15, 2 in 5 women with a disability, 3 in 5 Aboriginal or Torres Strait Islander women and with an almost twice weekly increase in the number of women in Australia killed by their current or ex intimate partner, the need for change has never seemed more urgently needed,” she said. 

“We want our girls to feel safe, strong and confident.  We want our girls to be whoever they want to be. We want our boys to feel it’s okay to be sad, to cry, to ask for a hug if they need it – we don’t want the tenderness shamed out of our boys.  We want equal opportunities for ALL our children and the early years are an excellent place to start.”

The session takes a close look at how gender equality is linked with the prevention of violence against women, and offers many practical tips and resources for those who attend. 

Ms Testro has worked with hey dee ho alongside her franchisee role as a consultant on these important issues and has helped maintain the gender equality focus in all of hey dee ho’s training. For those who have already participated in ALL come out to Play! it’s been incredibly valuable.

She will be running the program again at hey dee ho’s training day in July, and will be sharing snapshots of the All Come Out to Play! show, which is designed to explore the same topics with young children and families. 

“Solving an issue as complex as domestic and family violence is not, and cannot ever be, the domain of one part of society,” hey dee ho Director Jenny Wilkinson explained. 

“That being said, with so much research pointing to the value of the first five years of life, in terms of shaping children’s values, beliefs and sense of self, it would be remiss of us not to do everything we can to address the alarming statistics around this issue.” 

One of the key takeaways from the learning experience for Ms Wilkinson and her team was just how pervasive notions of gender are in the favourite stories and songs of teachers – everything from the cheeky monkeys jumping on the bed, waiting on Mum to ‘keep them in line’ through to the assumption in Miss Polly that Mummy would call the male doctor, and the male doctor would put things to rights is laden with expectations, and framing of what it means to be masculine or feminine. 

“While we have always encouraged our presenters to encourage boys to take on the role of the ‘feminine’ in songs and play – such as being a mermaid or a fairy – and vice versa, to see the girls have an opportunity to take on more ‘masculine’ roles, this session really opened our eyes to how big this issue is.”

Ultimately the session helped the team to realise that when it comes to making lasting societal change, the key is to start early. 

“Anything we can do to encourage respectful relationships is so important,” Ms Wilkinson said. 

“Our words, our actions, our stories, our songs – all of these elements can have a lifelong impact on a child.” 

To learn more about Playgroup Australia’s free All Come Out to Play program please see here . Information about hey dee ho’s programs for ECEC can be found on their website, here . 

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