How to Measure Sexism Quickly and Reliably in Political Surveys

🔎 Problem: Varied Sexism Measures Hamper Political Research

Political scientists are increasingly focused on how sexist attitudes shape vote choices and policy opinions. Current research uses a wide variety of items and scales to measure sexism, creating inconsistency and making comparison across studies difficult.

🧪 How Measures Were Assessed

An approach was developed to evaluate prominent contemporary sexism measures and identify optimal survey items. Items were assessed according to three clear criteria:

• Convergent validity — agreement with related sexism constructs
• Predictive validity — ability to predict vote choices and issue opinions
• Distance from politics — degree to which items are not entangled with partisan or political cues

📊 Key Findings

• A subset of items from the hostile sexism scale exhibits the most desirable measurement properties across the three criteria.
• These items maximize convergent and predictive validity while maintaining greater distance from politics relative to other items.
• Based on these results, a simple two- to five-item reduced hostile sexism battery is recommended to measure sexism efficiently and consistently.

⚖️ Why It Matters

A short, validated hostile sexism battery reduces respondent burden, improves comparability across studies, and strengthens researchers' ability to use sexism measures as predictors of political behavior and opinions. This recommendation offers a practical tool for scholars seeking efficient, valid, and consistent measurement of sexist attitudes in surveys.