Does the Gender Gap in Political Attitudes and Behavior Vary Across Racial Groups?

Abstract

Past research on the gender gap in political attitudes and behavior has paid very little attention to the experiences of nonwhites. Particularly lacking are empirical studies involving Asians. How significant is the role of gender among Asians? How does gender gap in the extent of voting participation and direction of political opinions vary across racial groups? In this preliminary examination on the confluence of race and gender, this author tries to answer the research questions using a census survey and a national poll of multiracial opinions. Logistic regression results show that the significance of gender does vary across racial groups, but it also changes according to the behavior domain investigated. In the election of 1992, small but significant gender gaps in voting registration existed among whites and blacks, but not among Latinos and Asians. Gender was not useful to predict turnout among those registered for any race. When race intersects with gender to predict political orientation and public choice, few of the slope coefficients of the interactive terms are significant and those for Asian and black women bear an opposite sign to those for white women.