Attitudes Toward Women's Rights: Relationships with Social Dominance Orientation and Political Group Identities

This research assessed the extent to whichattitudes toward women's rights are predicted by socialdominance orientation (SDO) and the political groupidentities socialist and capitalist. Respondents were 181 Australian undergraduates (54 males, 127females), most of whom were of European descent. Theresults of multiple regression analyses suggested thatSDO was the most consistent predictor of negative attitudes, although the extent to which itunderpins attitudes toward women's rights was found tovary for men and women: for men it was the onlysignificant predictor. Support was also found for theideological asymmetry hypothesis. The results are discussedwith reference to social dominance theory.