Mind the Gap: Gender, Racial, and Educational Differences in American Gender Attitudes from 1977 to 2018

Abstract Despite dramatic changes since the 1970s, gender and educational gaps in gender egalitarian attitudes have persisted while the racial gap (with Blacks leading) has narrowed. We apply interest-based and socialization mechanisms to predict the differential influences of labor market influences on changing gender attitudes for different races, genders, and educational groups. Using 21 waves of the General Social Survey, 1977–2018 ( N = 27,662), and cross-classified age-period-cohort models, we examine the effects of two known labor market dynamics that shifted Americans’ gender attitudes, gender equality in the labor force and men’s overwork, on egalitarian gender attitudes among different racial, gender, and educational groups. The findings indicate that rising labor force gender equality is associated with stronger shifts toward gender egalitarianism among whites, bringing their attitudes more in line with Blacks and closing the racial gap. The rise of men’s overwork in the mid-1990s coincided with the “stalled gender revolution” and is associated with rising conservatism among whites and the college-educated. The gender gap in attitudes has persisted in the last four decades and neither of these labor market dynamics has exerted any impact. Results align with the socialization perspective that individuals respond to labor market dynamics more in accordance with their socially prescribed roles than their self-interests.