Is Gender Balance Necessary to Learn about Gender in Politics?

• In Event: Innovative Pedagogies for Inclusive Classrooms

Abstract

It is well documented that women are underrepresented in politics. Gender bias within the discipline of political science is less documented, but is both normatively troubling and a potentially contributing factor to women being less likely to enter politics. Political science undergraduate, graduate, and faculty populations have historically been heavily skewed male. Failure to mainstream gender studies into political science curriculum makes it unsurprising that women are underrepresented among political science majors nationwide. Might gender-specific learning activities help ameliorate gender bias and imbalance in political science classrooms? We explore potential benefits of introducing gender-specific learning activities at two universities, one gender-balanced and the other predominately male. The disparate gender composition of these settings provides a unique opportunity to learn about the conditions under which classroom discussion and activities pertaining to gender politics can shape students’ beliefs about gender and politics. In the experiment, we randomly assigned Introduction to American Politics discussion sections to complete a reading, written reflection, and group activity on either gender representation in the Congress or general representation by the Congress. Students who read the treatment article about gender representation were both more likely to believe that the gender identities of elected officials affect policy outcomes and to bring up issues of gender representation during the group activity than students who read the control article about general political representation. However, the beneficial treatment effects were attenuated for students at the predominately male university. This merits additional research on best practices for teaching about the political representation of marginalized populations to non-marginalized student populations. More optimistically, students at both universities who read the article about gender representation were more likely to believe that research on gender and politics is essential to understanding American politics, suggesting that early exposure to gender and politics can bolster the status of gender studies among political scientists and, perhaps, candidates for office.

Authors

• Zoe Nemerever, Texas Tech University

• Kelly Senters Piazza, United States Air Force Academy

• Seth J. Hill, University of California, San Diego