Parental leave for fathers has the power to decrease sexist attitudes and gender bias, according to a new research.
The study, “Father’s Leave Reduces Sexist Attitudes”, appears in the American Political Science Review and was conducted by researchers from Rice University, Washington University in St. Louis, the University of Oxford and ETH Zurich.
Researchers examined the attitudes of 1,362 new parents in relation to how they were affected by a policy reform in Estonia that tripled the amount of fathers’ leave time for babies born on or after July 1, 2020.
Their aim was to explore how providing parental leave only for non-traditional caregivers (fathers) impacts individuals’ attitudes about stereotypical gender roles.
“By offering a benefit that can be accessed only through the choice of a nontraditional caring role by men, fathers’ leave directly challenges mothers and fathers to conceive of their social roles in less stereotypical ways,” said researchers.
The results showed that families with fathers who received more parental leave saw an increase in belief in gender equality among both men and women.
This policy reform in Estonia also increased support among women for pro-female policies such as requiring the promotion of female candidates at the expense of male candidates, which the study notes called for further research.
“While both groups respond to the change in social roles promoted by the fathers’ leave reform by expressing more gender equal attitudes, support for positive action to bring it about rises only among women,” researchers said.
“Disrupting traditional gender roles may not be sufficient to increase men’s support for positive action. This could be because of differences in the perceived cost: after all, positive action implies the promotion of women at the expense of men.”
Nevertheless, the study’s findings seem to suggest that social policy has the power to reduce ingrained attitudinal biases, and the study is the first to show causal evidence that direct exposure to fathers’ leave reduces sexist attitudes.
“These findings are particularly timely as governments around the world continue to reform their parental leave policies,” said researchers.
“The implications of our findings also extend beyond fathers’ leave. The intervention that we study amounts to a disruption of traditional gender roles. Its sizable effect implies that other policy interventions that broaden gender roles may also move attitudes in a more gender-equitable direction.”