You Talking to Me? The Diverging Effects of Organizational Communication on the Gender Ambition Gap

Women's underrepresentation in civic life is accompanied by a persistent ambition gap. Research attributes this gap partly to gendered socialization and unequal encouragement. How does organizational communication affect this gap, and can organizations narrow it by addressing women directly? We examine these questions through a pre-registered survey experiment with more than 7,000 members of a major Turkish public sector trade union confederation. Women and men were randomly assigned to a gender-neutral mobilization video, a video that addressed women directly and exclusively, or a placebo. The women-focused message increased women's willingness to participate in and lead union activities, while the gender-neutral message had no detectable effect among women. In contrast, the gender-neutral message appeared to speak primarily to men. Exploratory analyses link the success of the women-focused message to increases in self-efficacy and interest among women. These findings suggest that how organizations address their members can shape the ambition gap in participation, and that apparently gender-neutral appeals may not be neutral in their effects.