A Numbers Game: An Experimental Approach to Women’s Representation

• In Event: Experiments on Social Media, the Internet, and Political Engagement

Abstract

Does the number of women in a negotiation impact women’s willingness to advocate for women’s issues? Critical mass theory links women’s descriptive representation (the number of women in a room) to women’s substantive representation (women-specific policy). Negotiations with greater proportions of women may embolden women negotiators to advocate for women-specific policy. Alternatively, women may face backlash from male counterparts, limiting women’s ability or willingness to support women-specific policy. I test critical mass theory using a randomized control trial to observe gendered power dynamics in real time. Participants complete an independent rank order of social issues before being divided into 5-person online focus groups comprised between 0 and 5 women. Participants are asked to rank the same social issues as a group. Consequently, this study captures an independent baseline and how this changes based on a group’s gender composition. Leveraging priming surveys, randomized focus groups, and debriefing surveys with participants, I quantify substantive and descriptive representation and test whether women are emboldened or silenced using ethnographic analysis. Detailed negotiation transcripts and negotiator survey reflections offers causal insight into gendered power dynamics in deliberative settings.

Author

• Elizabeth Good, Northwestern University