Gender Role Attitudes and Family Values Across Time and Countries

Gender roles and family structure have undergone massive changes in most countries in recent decades. These relational and structural changes have in turn interacted with attitudes and values relating to gender roles and the family. Topics covered include views on the adoption of non-traditional roles by women in the paid labor market, politics, and elsewhere in society; the nature and purpose of marriage; intergenerational relations within families in general and the care of the elderly in particular; and having and raising children.

First, this paper follows changes in these attitudes and values from 1988 to 2012 using the International Social Survey Program (ISSP). There are trends across 31 countries. Second, this paper examines cross-national differences. The ISSP covered a total of 45 countries. Third, socio-demographic differences in general are examined and especially the impact of cohort, education, gender, and labor-force participation. Finally, multi-level, multivariate models are used to determine what individual-level and country-level variables explain the variation across countries and the changes over time. The specific gender role/family values changes are then related to general theories of modernization and globalization.