“What this paper shows is that masculinity is not just an ideology that men strive to achieve. It is something we value as a culture,” said lead author Theresa Vescio, a professor of psychology and studies on women, sex and sexuality at Pennsylvania State University.
“The beauty of masculinity as a cultural ideology is that we can make women participate in it and support it, even if it subordinates them. We can get men of color, men with low socioeconomic status, gay men to support her, even if she is implicitly subordinate, ”Vescio said.
This perspective may “explain the increase in the number of Latino and black men who support Trump … or the white women who support Trump,” Vescio said.
“This is an interesting study, and the results are relatively convincing in terms of the idea that ‘hegemonic masculinity’ predicts voting and candidate attitudes even after controlling for other variables that we might expect to predict political behavior,” Christopher said. Federico, a professor of political science and psychology at the University of Minnesota, who was not involved in the studies via email.
The results are only observational and cannot show a direct cause and effect, but are consistent with previous research that found that “dominance assessment” and the placement of a “low value of cooperation” were predictive of Trump’s support, Federico said. , who is also the director of the Center for the Study of Political Psychology at the university.
“It makes sense for individuals who appreciate a form of masculinity that emphasizes control, toughness, and so on to support Trump,” Federico said, adding that “individuals who hold traditional views on gender and traditional beliefs about” appropriate “roles for men and women to have in society tend to support Trump even more. “
Seven studies over two electoral periods
The researchers asked more than 2,000 people in seven separate studies over two election periods. Six of the studies were conducted by Vescio and her colleague in the days and months after Trump won the presidential battle over Democratic candidate Hillary Clinton in 2016. The seventh study was conducted 50 days before the November 2020 election. in which Trump was defeated. of former US Vice President Joseph Biden.
Participants were recruited from the Pennsylvania State University student pool, as well as from two crowdsourcing applications. Students were given partial credit for the class, while the other participants were paid $ 0.50 or 9.66 per hour.
While a dominant male preference provided support for Trump, “prejudiced attitudes were more consistent predictors of the vote,” the study found. “Further research is needed to fully understand the predicted results of (hegemonic masculinity) versus open prejudices,” the study said.
Matthew Feinberg, associate professor of organizational behavior at the Rotman School of Management at the University of Toronto, disputed that the data was collected after Trump’s 2016 victory over Clinton.
“Maybe people’s attitudes, especially when it comes to masculinity, were shaped by Trump becoming president,” Feinberg said in an email. “Many people held their noses and voted for him in 2016, choosing to vote for their favorite party, despite Trump’s behavior and his depiction of hegemonic masculinity.
“However, processes such as cognitive dissonance dictate that people often reconcile their attitudes with the behaviors they have engaged in,” Feinberg continued. “If so, people whose attitudes about Trump and his support for hegemonic masculinity could have come to believe that they, too, have attitudes more in line with Trump.”
vescitur indicated the 2020 study that examined pre-election attitudes and said cognitive dissonance did not explain the data it found.
“We can’t completely rule it out. But the data isn’t consistent with that, because even when we control for Republicans and Democrats, we get the effects over it,” she said.
More than a “precarious” male identity
The results of the seven studies also suggest supporting “hegemonic masculinity” to be more predictive of support for Trump than a concept called “precarious male identity” or PMI, in which “masculinity is gained and maintained through continuous behavioral displays of masculinity ”and“ momentary decreases in the behavioral manifestations of masculinity have the potential to threaten masculinity, ”the study authors wrote.
With a precarious male identity, he has traditionally been seen as a key reason why men might want to align with Trump, but did not explain his support for women and minorities, the study said.
“The basic idea is that masculinity is more fragile than femininity and must be constantly earned and maintained in public. Men who feel (or have been led to feel) that their status as men is insufficient tend to support Trump more. “Federico said.
“One reason is that Trump – at least in the person he plays in public – exudes an exaggerated dominant masculinity. His support can thus be a way to borrow that ethos or to show that one is male supporting a “male” proxy, he said.
There are also studies that have found that PMI is associated with other “aggressive attitudes, such as support for weapons culture and militarism,” Federico said, as well as “greater sexism and opposition to equality.”
“To the extent that Trump is seen to support these positions, people could indirectly end up supporting Trump more, because he is believed to support them,” he added.
However, the fact that the new study found that PMI is less predictive than a preference for hegemonic masculinity makes sense in both sexes, Federico explained.