Gender differences in attitudes toward nuclear war and disarmament

A survey on attitudes toward nuclear war and disarmament is used to test two hypotheses: (1) the fundamentally different world orientations of males and females will be reflected in different factor structures for attitudes toward nuclear war and disarmament, and (2) males are more pro-force than females. A confirmatory factor analysis was used to test the first hypothesis. In addition, components of the separate factor structures for males and females were compared. Differences between the means for males and females on three factors extracted from the entire sample were used to test the second hypothesis. Both hypotheses were found to hold for the present sample. Interpretation of the differing factor structures for males and females is presented as well as implications for the more pro-force emphasis of males.