Socialisation Influences on Gender Ideologies of Immigrant and Native Youth in Germany, England, Sweden and the Netherlands

Abstract

AbstractAdolescence is a crucial life course phase for identity formation, and youths’ gender ideologies significantly predict gendered behaviours and longer-term transitions. With Western post-industrial societies becoming more culturally diverse, the present study provides novel cross-nationally comparative evidence on gender socialisation processes among native and immigrant youth in Sweden, Germany, England, and the Netherlands, which vary in gender and migration policies and cultures. In addition to parents’ gender ideologies, the study also considers classmates’ gender ideologies as factors shaping 14-year-old adolescents’ gender ideologies. The analysis draws on 5917 adolescent-parent dyads from the Children of Immigrants Longitudinal Study which we link with country-level gender empowerment measures from the United Nations. Remarkably, with the exception of native female adolescents in England and Germany, parents tend to report slightly more egalitarian beliefs than adolescents across the four countries. OLS regressions show that parents’ and classmates’ gender ideologies correlate significantly with adolescents’ ideologies, with little variation across gender and immigrant groups in all four countries. From a policy and practical point of view, the great similarity in the intergenerational transmission of gender beliefs across diverse family backgrounds as well as cultural and policy contexts seem remarkable.