The irony of (romantic) harmony: Heterosexual romantic relationships can drive women’s justification of the gender hierarchy

Abstract

Even though gender inequality is evident across life domains, women often justify the gender hierarchy. We examined whether the very closeness that heterosexual women share with their male romantic partners predicts their justification of gender inequality. We drew on intergroup-related research, showing that positive perceptions that minority groups develop within harmonious intergroup interactions, generalize to affect their views of group-based inequality. We expected that to the extent that women experience their romantic relationships positively, they will be more accepting of gender inequality within their homes, and these perceptions will generalize to predict justification of macro-level gender inequality. Five correlational and two experimental studies supported this prediction. The more women rated (or were primed with) their relationship as positive, the more they justified the gender social system. This was mediated by women’s perception of their housework division as fair, and was less pronounced among feminists. Implications regarding social change are discussed.