She Said Yes! An Exploration of Confidence Among Women Who Run for Political Office

Abstract

This is a qualitative exploratory research study of confidence and the emergence of women as candidates for state and local elected office. Our study consists of over 30 hours of interviews with 20 women candidates running for state and local office where we explore the sources of confidence that motivate women to run for office. Our interviews with women candidates suggest confidence is tied to egalitarian families and robust network support, strong educational credentials and background, as well as a multitude of professional and community leadership experiences.

Keywords

women candidates confidence personality ambition

Introduction

Elections to the US House witnessed a surge of women candidates between 2016 and 2018, with a 74% increase in candidate filings. Many states elected their first women governors in 2018, and new records were set in 2022 with women making up nearly 29% of the US House and 31% of state legislators.^1,2 Additionally, Nevada recently became the first state to have a majority of women in their state legislature.³ The Women’s March held in January 2017 set the stage; coming on the heels of the election and inauguration of Donald Trump and the crushing defeat of Hillary Clinton (despite winning the popular vote) women across the country were inspired to participate in the political process as candidates for public office. Though women continue to make gains in elected positions, the fact remains that the U.S. is not close to reaching gender parity in politics.⁴ We seek to qualitatively understand the persistent gap in political representation by building out “deciding to run” accounts through interviews of women candidates in local and state-level races in the 2018 and 2020 election cycles. These cycles broke records for women candidacies. The election of Donald Trump and defeat of Hillary Clinton, led to a surge in Democratic women candidates in 2018 while Republican women countered and made gains in candidacies for the 2020 election cycle (Dittmar 2020).

The interviews suggest ability-based confidence as a key element that leads women to run, however this confidence does not always translate into beliefs that they will win. State and local positions serve as popular entry points into politics for politically interested persons. This is particularly the case for women, who are more likely to begin their political career in local elected offices (Carroll and Sanbonmatsu 2013; Maestas et al. 2006), where positions may be viewed as easier and less expensive to win (Crowder-Meyer, Gadarian, and Trounstine 2015; Levine and Abromowitz 2023). In general, the extant literature on the gender gap in politics generally breaks into two categories: the supply of and demand for women in politics (see Karpowitz, Monson, and Preece 2017). Though these categories do not exclusively cover all of the literature in this area, it provides a framework for what makes up such a large literature within women and politics. The supply side considers variables like socialization and lived experiences, education, and ambition, while demand investigates recruitment patterns, gatekeeping behaviors, gendered institutions, and voter stereotypes (Anzia and Berry 2011; Bernhard et al. 2019; Cross and Young 2013; Fox and Lawless 2005, 2011; Levine and Abromowitz 2023; Pruysers and Cross 2016). More recently, scholars have picked up additional investigations of the supply side—or the psychological underpinnings of women’s political ambition. In other words, why do some women say yes to politics (Preece, Stoddard, and Fisher 2016; Pruysers and Blais 2018)? We build upon these psychological investigations from a state and local candidate perspective to explore how ability-based confidence shapes political ambition, and reflect on the broader implications for female candidacies.

Considering Confidence

Confidence has been described in the literature as both an inherited personality trait and as a learned behavior (Bouchard 1994; Healy 2012; Oney and Oksuzoglu-Guven 2015; Petrides 2011; Plomin and Nesselroade 1990). We refer to the former as trait-based confidence and the latter as ability-based confidence. Personality trait-based confidence tends to remain stable, while ability-based confidence is a more dynamic measure that is responsive to experience (Cobb-Clark and Schurer 2012; Demo 1992; Oney and Oksuzoglu-Guven 2015; Suh 2000). The conceptualization of confidence as a social construct that is the result of experiences and practice, and for women in particular, requires a deeper exploration of the social experiences that produce or inhibit the development of confidence. Barbara Risman, a sociologist of gender, theorized a framework to analyze how gender inequality is constituted in society. Risman (2004) suggests that gender is a structure that undergirds a diversity of social processes across individual, interactional, and institutional realms. On the individual level, Risman discusses socialization and identity, while social processes such as bias occur on the interactional level, and organizational practices and resource allocation are institutional features. Drawing on this theoretical framework, we see that gender influences every dimension and realm of social life, and as such, could structure women’s political ambition as well. Risman (2004) also points out that identifying gender as a structure allows us to understand the mechanisms by which social processes lead to inequality. She states: “The ‘how’ is important because without knowing the mechanisms, we cannot intervene” (Risman 2004, 435). Investigating how confidence is socioculturally constructed on individual, interactional, and institutional levels will allow us to uncover the mechanisms through which not only benefits accrue, but additionally how experiences on each of these levels may be replicated to increase women’s participation in politics and representation in government.

Although there are many pieces to the political engagement and ambition puzzle, we choose to hone in on ability-based confidence, which has yet to be studied in the continuation of this gap. We believe investigating ability-based confidence in the political pipeline through in-depth interviews of women who ran for elective office will illuminate underlying questions that remain about the political ambition gap along with other behaviors. Women are generally less likely to believe they are qualified to run for office (Fox and Lawless 2011), and we argue that ability-based confidence may be intensifying this perception in some more than others.

Understanding confidence further down the political pipeline among elected officials comes with a different set of implications. The likelihood of being more easily reelected, for example, is associated with riskier policymaking choices (Sheffer and Loewen 2019). Female legislators are more likely to consider all information available to them when making policy decisions relative to their male counterparts (Nownes and Freeman 2019). Female lawmakers also tend to be silenced or ignored in their roles more so than men (Karpowitz and Mendelberg 2014; Kathlene 1994), leading them to use alternative policymaking routes to attempt to attain power and influence (Schmitt and Brant 2019; Swift and VanderMolen 2021). Understanding the dynamics of confidence among those who seek elected office may help shed light on the behaviors that follow after winning the seat.

Women and Ambition

Women can be more or less likely to express political interest, engagement, and ambition to run for office depending on reasons tied to the various structures, situations, and socialization mechanisms that women experience over the life course (Butler and Preece 2016; Fox and Lawless 2005). Even with socioeconomic and educational gains, however, many women still lack an interest in political life when compared to men (see Dow 2009; Thomas 2012). Though the “demand” side of women in office has changed, where voters do not appear to heavily reference female stereotypes when it comes to voter choice (Dolan and Lynch 2014), explanations for unequal representation increasingly point to the “supply” side of female candidates. The changing structures and voter preference may not be enough to alter the formative experiences that women have before ever thinking about running for office.

Low political ambition in women can occur early on in life, especially through socialization at home, in school, and among peers. Starting at a young age, political interest and ambition is intensified in boys in a way that is not for girls (Fox and Lawless 2014). For instance, girls are less likely to be engaged in political conversations in their childhood homes than are boys, and women receive comparatively less encouragement to run for office by family members and friends (Greenlee, Holman, and VanSickle-Ward 2014). Participation in competitive activities in school also correlates with political interest and ambition (Fox and Lawless 2014). These early life experiences, which are the primary agents of political socialization, play an important role in fostering future interest in politics and running for office.

Differences in political socialization practices among boys and girls carries into adulthood. Among college students, the gender gap in political ambition is at least as large as that among professionals in the eligible candidate pool (Lawless and Fox 2013). Classroom exercises that expose students to women in political office, along with literature and discussion that contextualizes those individuals’ experiences, encourages greater self-reported political ambition, particularly among female students (Greenlee, Holman, and VanSickle-Ward 2014). However, after being exposed to negative stereotypes about women’s political ability, women are half as likely to place a political office job in their top ten careers (Pruysers and Blais 2017). Women also tend to be averse to electoral behavior (Kanthak and Woon 2015).

What is especially pertinent to analyses of women and political engagement is the finding that women are less likely than men to view political leadership as a way to create positive change (Lawless and Fox 2013). Women tend to lack interest in conflict and power-related goals, leading to lower political ambition (Schneider et al. 2016). Additionally, priming men and women about the competitive nature of politics has a negative effect on women’s interest in political office but not on men’s (Preece and Stoddard 2015).

What motivates women who do choose to run for office? Findings are mixed in this regard. Women may be more likely to run for office when asked (Pruysers and Blais 2018), though the trend in using impersonal methods (like online recruitment) is not likely to overcome the hurdles that may result from prior socialization and view that politics is not a major means for accomplishing communal goals (Pruysers and Blais 2019). Women in prominent political offices can encourage more women to run (Ladam, Harden, and Windett 2018) and stay in office once they are elected (Butcher and Haynes 2024), but watching the electoral process play out can decrease ambition (Bonneau and Kanthak 2018). Support networks and children are important variables for women thinking about and already involved in political careers (Butcher and Haynes 2024). Women are more likely to consider running if they have older children and their families are supportive (Carroll and Sanbonmatsu 2013). These networks appear to be particularly important for female candidates who plan to run again after losing their initial race (Dolan and Shah 2020).

Extant research about women’s political ambition shows that improving institutions, increasing resources available, and altering gender expectations for women, while helpful, may not be enough to correct underrepresentation. Traditional explanations for ameliorating the gender gap in political ambition, such as changing gender roles and family expectations, or improved socioeconomic resources, have not fully attended to the issue as the gap remains, leaving lingering questions about reasons for women’s under-representation in politics (Bennet and Bennet 1989; Dow 2009; Thomas 2012). We argue that analysis of psychological underpinnings, such as general confidence, may be an understudied aspect of political ambition, and that this construct could provide meaningful insight into the missing link between structural remedies and the continued under-representation of women in political office.

Research Design

We conducted a qualitative study to explore ability-based confidence by examining the lived experiences of women who have run for political office. This study centers on interviews with women candidates from a three-state region in the southeastern portion of the United States who ran for local or state-level public offices in the 2018 or 2020 election cycle.

To produce the purposeful sample for this study, we focused on recruitment of a group of people who would be able to speak directly to our research questions based on their personal lived experiences. More specifically, we sought to construct a purposeful sample of women who ran for local- and state- level public office. To recruit this purposeful sample, we used the sponsorship method (commonly used in qualitative research), where we worked through a sponsor, or primary informant, to help us identify and connect with women who ran for local- or state-level public office. To reach these women candidates, we worked with a group of different sponsors/informants who were politically active in each of the three states we studied, from both sides of the aisle, as well as from a variety of racial-ethnic and social class backgrounds. The benefit of using the sponsorship method for recruiting our purposeful sample is that having a mutual friend or contact facilitated rapport between the interviewer and the respondent, and thus, trust as well. Rapport is essential in qualitative research for trust to build in the conversation and allow the respondent to comfortably express their authentic thoughts and feelings.

This allowed for candid conversations and the “thick” descriptions that are a hallmark of qualitative research (Brinkmann and Kvale 2015; Charmaz 2014; Denzin 1989; Patton 2015; Saldana 2015; Seidman 2013) which allows for exploration of the contextual factors that affect social action. Interviews ranged from 60 to 90 minutes on average, while some went longer and a few shorter. To tap ability-based confidence we asked participants about their past life and job experiences, previous leadership experience, support network, and motivations to run for office. Participants offered detailed accounts and the interviews often took the form of a conversation between the interviewer and participant. More details about the qualitative research methodology are found in subsequent sections of this manuscript and a copy of the interview guide can be found in Appendix A.

Results

The objective of this study is to better understand the experiences of women political candidates, and in particular identify sources of confidence that motivated women’s political ambition to seek elected office.

We conducted 20 in-depth interviews. The sample varied by age, social background, family characteristics, and political affiliation. Three-fourths of the sample (15 candidates) identified as White, while one-fifth (4 candidates) identified as Black, and 1 candidate identified as Latina. Their age spanned a range from about 25to 70 years old, with the average age in the mid-forties. All of the women in the sample were partnered at the time of the interview, some married for many years, and others in committed long-term relationships. Fifteen women had children and one had several grandchildren as well. The majority of the candidates ran for the first time in 2018 (see Table 1 for list).

Table 1.

Professions and Positions.

Candidate	Highest level of education	Profession	Office	Did they win?
1	J.D.	Attorney	State House	No
2	B.A./B.S.	Non-Profit Management	City Council	No
3	B.A./B.S.	Small Business Owner	City Council	No
4	B.A./B.S.	Small Business Owner	County Commission	No
5	J.D.	Non-Profit Management	County Board	No
6	Ph.D.	Professor	State House	No
7	Ph.D.	Non-Profit Management	County School Board	Yes
8	B.A./B.S.	Small Business Owner	State House	No
9	B.A./B.S.	Insurance Agent	County Commission	No
10	B.A./B.S.	Engineer	State House	Yes
11	M.A.	Political Consultant	Public Service Commission	No
12	B.A./B.S.	Community Organizer	State House	No
13	M.B.A.	Business Executive	State Executive	No
14	M.A.	Human Resources Manager	State House	No
15	M.A.	Scientist	State House	Yes
16	B.A./B.S.	Engineer	County Commission	Yes
17	Ph.D.	Professor	State House	No
18	J.D.	Non-Profit Management	State House	No
19	M.Ed.	Non-Profit Management	State Board of Education	Yes
20	Ed.D.	Non-Profit Management	State Board of Education	Yes

Interviews were primarily conducted by phone with a few in person, at the candidate’s choosing. Efforts were made to gain trust and establish rapport prior to conducting the interview. Over 30 hours of interviews were recorded, transcribed, and thematically coded (Braun and Clarke 2006). Thematic analysis of qualitative data involves a meticulous and multi-step process where each utterance of every participant is first coded according to its meaning or substance, then all similar utterances across all study participants within one topic area are grouped, and together, this group of utterances forms an emerging theme in the data. Imagine a tree, where the trunk represents the overall subject of inquiry (in this case, the emergence of women candidates), and each branch represents a theme that elucidates that primary topic represented by the trunk, while all the leaves on the branches represent the hundreds of utterances that formed the meaning of the theme (or branch). Utilizing an inductive process of thematic analysis in qualitative research allows for an organic understanding of the data to emerge that focuses on patterns, and a subsequent deep and detailed analysis of the many pieces of empirical evidence (utterances) that produced the identification of the theme, or pattern in the data (For a more detailed explanation, please see the Methodological Appendix of Bennett, Lutz, and Jayaram (2021).

Three themes emerged from the qualitative analysis on how ability-based confidence can be fostered to influence candidate emergence among women. Our findings demonstrate that ability-based confidence is tied to 1) the presence of egalitarian families and robust network support, 2) strong educational credentials and background, and 3) multitude of professional and community leadership experiences. Yet, such confidence does not extend to the results of elections. Illustrative examples from 20 women candidates in their own words are analyzed below.

Support From Family, Friends, and Social Networks

Interview participants discussed the support they received from their families, friends, and even acquaintances, in both making the decision to run for office and during the campaign. This type of support was crucial in increasing their confidence to become politically involved. One candidate, a professional fundraiser for a non-profit organization who has held many leadership positions in community organizations, explained:

I’ve been encouraged to run for the past five years by friends, contacts, and honestly, people I barely know who I mention an interest to. I also finally understood the value that my parents always placed on getting involved in these recent years. Although they never directly suggested I run, they have always been active as volunteers and activists (on the opposite side of the aisle, I’ll note) and their passion inspires me.

About half of the sample came from families of origin where activism and/or politics were part of their family history. The notion of running for office was even normative in some candidate’s families:

I grew up around parents and grandparents and uncles and aunts that all talk about politics. My dad was in the military and my dad ran for an office when I was a kid when we lived up north. All through school I ran for offices, our school councils, or leaders of teams. I was on the debate team in high school and college. I think I’ve lived in policy and political science for my entire life. I really honestly cannot tell you a time when I wasn’t engaged in some kind of civic discourse. My grandmother who immigrated from Eastern Europe told me about what it was like for women to get the right to vote. She had come over when she was 19, so that was in 1921 when she came to this country, and women had just gotten the right to vote. She was so excited to become a naturalized citizen, so she could vote!

For this candidate’s family, political engagement was inextricably tied to honoring citizenship, and celebrating the freedom of democracy. Other candidates also discussed their family history related to the civil rights movement and activism related to voting rights as well. Support during the campaign from family was also crucial, as one candidate shared that her parents and sibling moved from other states to work on her campaign. In addition, parents were often credited for the formative role they played in the development of women’s political ambitions:

My parents . . . people ask, “What did your parents do?” I’m like, “Well, they told me I could do anything and be anything.” [They told me,] “So we don’t have much, even if we don’t have money, even if we don’t live in a nice place or have safe neighborhoods, or even if things are really hard, that’s a moment in time. It’s a moment in time. Everybody has their moments in time. And as long as you’re focused on doing the best that you can, you can be anything, whatever that means.” And so that’s what kind of pushes me through.

Several candidates discussed backgrounds and upbringings where their families had to overcome serious and severe challenges, and the belief that a better day and life was possible was a theme that undergirded their political ambition. One candidate shared her parents’ struggles with poverty, addiction, and mental illness. But they always told her she was the “smartest and prettiest” and believed in her unconditionally. She credits much of her confidence in running for public office to their nurturance.

I mentioned my parents, and the challenges that they faced in life, but one thing that I think is absolutely remarkable, because my mother struggled from depression which I think of as the opposite of confidence in so many ways, is that my parents always raised me to believe that I was incredibly smart and beautiful and that I deserved anything I ever produced. And I’ve just thought that all parents did that, but one of the things I’m coming to learn about life is that it’s not. This is a beautiful gift that my parents gave me even though they didn’t have it, which is really astounding, and I think that’s even more precious. Confidence is not built or destroyed early on in life. Even if it is innate, if you don’t ever really get a chance to practice and get feedback, you wouldn’t even know that you have it.

For this candidate, her political ambition was one realm in which she discovered her confidence, which she explicitly connects to her family of origin.

The importance of friendships was also often noted and one candidate discussed the role her core group of friends, whom she affectionately called her “Kitchen Cabinet,” played in encouraging her to run for office as well as their tireless efforts on her campaign. And another candidate shared that her campaign manager was her oldest and dearest friend, someone she had known since she was a child whom she trusted completely. Another candidate shared: “My whole family was very supportive and then I had a small group of friends who, I mean, just corralled around me, [they were] my support system. I had one of my closest friends, who always had my back. And my husband was at home with our son while I was out there knocking on doors.” In addition to close friends, the role that partners played was especially important to many women. As another candidate explains:

I was coming home from work at six o’clock at night, rushing in, changing, rushing out, knocking on doors until it got dark. Coming home, answering emails, making my fundraising list. It was never ending. And there were days where I would break down in tears and just say, “I can’t do this anymore. I can’t do this anymore.” And my husband was great because he was not like, “Well, then just quit.” He would never just say that. He would say, “Look, shut down the computer, get a good night’s sleep, and tomorrow we’ll . . .” He would talk me off the ledge. He was great like that. I definitely sacrificed family time. I was not around a lot. My kids would come walk with me at night and on the weekends [canvassing] just so we could spend time together . . . When I was home, I was exhausted, I was on my computer, I just was not present for months. But on those days that I would cry and say, “I can’t do this another day,” my kids and my husband would be the first ones to be like, “Mom, you can do it. It’s fine.” And I’d be like, “But I wasn’t there for your ballgame.” They would say, “It’s okay, mom, we’ll have other ballgames. You can do this!” They were great cheerleaders. They never complained.

The expressions of understanding and support that children offered were especially poignant for women candidates. As another candidate shared:

My husband is very supportive and was very proud [of me]. But I was concerned about our son—at the time he had just turned six. I remember in November, it was Grandparents Day [at his school] and probably in front of like 500 grandparents, he was like, “I love my dad, but I really love my mom, and make sure you go vote for her!” I was so concerned that mommy wasn’t around, but he got what I was doing, and that was validation.

Families of creation, spouses, partners, children, and friend groups were all a tremendous source of support which helped construct the confidence that candidates needed to run for office. Candidates also note the importance of encouragement from their social networks. As one candidate explains:

The more I heard from other people, and the more other people believed in me, the more I was like, “Okay, I can actually do this.” I definitely had imposter syndrome. I think I probably still have it some days, when it comes to me being in this position. But, the more I talked about this, and the more people talked me through it, and the more people explained to me why they saw the value in me running for office . . .I mean, I knew why I was doing it, but I had my doubts. Like, “Will people even vote for me or should I be doing this? I didn’t even think I was going to run for office, and now all of a sudden I’m on a ballot. Will people see right through me?” I had all those thoughts, but then people around me were just like, “You’re an amazing person. You’re smart. You’re what we need in leadership.” They’re like, “You’re smart, but you’re humble. You don’t come across as a know it all, but you’re compassionate,” things like that. So, hearing it from others, kind of solidified in me that, “Okay, I can do this.” So, it built my confidence over time. But in the beginning, it was definitely hard, harder for me to really truly believe that I could do this.

The praise, compliments, and words of support and encouragement that many women candidates received while making the decision to run for office and during their campaigns often offered a much-needed counter-narrative to one of doubt that played through their minds, and especially so for first-time candidates. However, while some candidates also viewed the recognition as a welcome “ego-boost,” the recognition of their leadership qualities also created a sense of responsibility and urgency to represent these well-wishers and their views in government, and in the process, constructed the confidence to do so as well.

Any time you do something for a group of people, everyone says, “You should run for office.” Or any time you say something or you have a solution for something, everybody says, “Oh, you should run for office.” So there’s been a lot of those along the way. And I can’t say that it doesn’t boost my ego. It absolutely does, because I’m human. It’s just people have a natural fixation to someone being in public office being . . . There are certain attributes that go along with that individual. And so any time someone displays those attributes, that becomes an option that’s usually articulated by someone. So if you’re a good speaker, right? If you’re an eloquent speaker that can speak and articulate issues, everybody says, “You should run for office.” If you’re able to influence a bunch of people for a particular thing, people say, “Oh, you should run for office.” If you amass wealth, it would be considered an anomaly based on statistics, and people say, “Oh, you should run for office.” My whole thing is—it boosts an ego, right, because you want to live a life where you’re doing “an extraordinary thing”—but the role of public office is to show people that it’s really their government.

This analysis reveals the ways in which families of origin, families of creation, friendships, and social networks facilitate the construction of confidence for women candidates so their political ambition may come to fruition, where thoughts do indeed become action. This emerging theme underscores the human dimension of the political process. Whether through family socialization where civic engagement was valued and confidence was nurtured, or through egalitarian marriages and partnerships where sons and daughters are raised to believe that mothers can be elected officials, or through broader social interactions that both boosted candidates in their journey as well as solidified their desire to govern, candidates’ political ambition is interwoven with these human bonds.

Knowledge About Public Issues

The women candidates in this sample gained confidence through their knowledge about issues affecting their communities. They uniformly credited formal education as the means through which they learned how to become critical thinkers and knowledgeable beings about a spectrum of public issues and social problems. As one candidate, who is the first in her family to earn a college degree, explained:

Yeah, well, I’m always a newspaper reader, especially the local paper. Before I had my child, I was always a morning news watcher as well, you know all the different cable shows, but always an avid reader. And when I find out about a topic in the age of Google, I was able to always research things and find out more information. I would attend different events if someone was speaking just to learn more. You know I’ve always been a believer that knowledge is power, so I never think something at the surface level. So even if the person is a registered [same party as me], I always say well let me check that out more, you know. I’ve never been one to come out and fully support something until I know a lot more about it. So that’s kind of how I’ve always been. I always have to read and I always have someone send me an article about something. Then I try to find the other perspective of that article to understand both sides. And I just think it’s very important, it just makes a lot more sense. I think that actually helped me in my campaign even though I didn’t win. I came pretty close for a first-time candidate, and pretty close [in opposite party] leaning district with little to no money. I think I did pretty well because of my background in being able to read, and understand a lot more than most people do. I’m someone who is on my issues with the reasons why [voters] should agree with me on this.

The phrase, “knowledge is power” was stated by many. For women candidates, confidence grew as their knowledge grew, as it did indeed allow them to feel more powerful to effect change and fueled their political ambition. In addition, candidates expressed confidence in being independent thinkers and asking critical questions rather than just toe the party line. Another candidate also points to the importance of her education in gaining access to current research in public policy as well as the professional opportunities that her degree has allowed her to pursue.

I have a master’s degree in public administration, so I’m going to go directly to research journals. I also know these issues really well, and I’ve [worked on] them over many, many years. So I’m a policy person. I didn’t come into this from not understanding politics and policy. I rely on my well educated ability in the policy arena.

Another candidate, a scientist by profession who also teaches collegiate science courses, clearly links her scientific training to her ability to sift through information, dive deeper for missing details, and judge the reliability of sources.

I’m a researcher by nature. So, I just go, I look up things online. Because I’m in science, I do feel like I’m sometimes a better gauge of what a good source is. I also feel like my reading of an article, my reading of something from the media, is not going to be superficial. For example, some people will read the headline, and that’s enough. Some people will read the article and that’s enough. I’m a person that will read the article, and then go on and start researching all the things that were in the article, because I want to get more information. For example, if someone’s like, “The police report said this,” I’m the one that wants to actually see the physical police report. I don’t want you to tell me what it said, I want to see the police report myself. So, that’s just kind of what I find myself doing. I go down rabbit holes sometimes, trying to get to primary sources of information. So, I’ll usually start broad, I’ll start with something in the news or something that was said somewhere. Then, I’ll start to dig a little deeper.

A key source of confidence for women candidates is knowing they are informed and knowledgeable about current issues and events. Such knowledge allows them to feel more confident about articulating their position on and analysis of various public concerns. Candidates directly link their ability to be informed to their educational experiences and backgrounds. Staying in school, pursuing higher education and even graduate studies, led to a type of confidence that develops into political ambition for the women in this study.

Professional and Volunteer Leadership Experiences

Each of the candidates interviewed discussed the many ways that their professional and volunteer experiences have given them a multitude of opportunities to become leaders. They have served on boards, ran major community events, earned promotions at work, managed large staffs, and most of all, have jobs and positions where they are constantly in front of an audience and expected to communicate clearly and effectively. These experiences have given each of the women interviewed tremendous confidence in themselves, their ideas, and their ability to express themselves and connect with others. They are confident in their leadership and give voice to a diversity of ideas. As one candidate, a small business owner, explains:

Besides being the President of my company, most of my leadership has been with community charities and women’s business groups. I look at situations with an open mind. I consider myself a problem solver. You are faced with them every day in business. I feel you are only as good a leader as the last problem you’ve solved, to keep moving it forward.

This candidate was not the only one who had leadership roles both at work and in her community. Several candidates discussed boards they sat on, organizations they advocated for, fundraising galas they planned for non-profits, scholarship committees they served on, mentoring programs they had created, and the list continues on and on. An important source of confidence to run for office for women candidates is that they are experienced leaders. For example, one candidate shared this list of leadership experience:

I have been the Chief Operating Officer of a non-profit organization and in nonprofit executive leadership on and off throughout my career. I have been on or the head of task-forces. I was appointed by the governor for a blue-ribbon committee and to state commissions. And I also am a believer in my sorority. I have held many positions at various levels in my sorority [as an alumna] to guide initiatives or oversee chapters. I’ve served on [community] boards. And I served on and chaired boards for various [national] groups as well.

This impressive list of leadership accomplishments was similar to the comprehensive leadership experiences we saw on resumes for each of the candidates we interviewed. Several candidates also had a notable depth of experience and expertise in a particular area, such as education or the environment. In addition, several women discussed juggling high-level responsibilities in their jobs and in the community alongside care-work at home. As one candidate explains:

Because I work across the K-20 spectrum, I had a pretty broad perspective of the systems and how they interact. All those years of experience, that’s why I really chose [to run for] the school board because that’s my expertise. And so, I feel like that expertise really lends itself best to the school district and the school board. I think working at a university, which is a big bureaucracy, and having experiences within the politics of a university and a college system, helped me for some of the cutthroat types of experiences, because there’s a lot of politics in colleges and universities, especially [large ones]. And navigating that and understanding that helps me navigate the school district politics. It’s very similar. I think in life, in general, I juggle a lot. Being a full-time working mom, I’ve had to learn, very quickly, how to be efficient with my time and resources. And certainly as a politician, whether you’re running a campaign or once you get elected, you have to be able to juggle a lot and continue to do that. And I think, too, just the experiences I’ve had from graduate school all the way through my academic career, the conferences I went to, presenting at conferences, being published, that all helps with your confidence level. The more confident you are, the more risks you’re willing to take. And so, I think that all played a role in my wanting to run for office, having the confidence during that time, and now being an elected official. There’s still a lot to learn, don’t get me wrong. But I think just the fact that I had so much experience in the K-20 arena, I probably had more confidence going into the campaign and then office than some folks. My learning curve was not as steep because I had been doing this a long time.

Returning to the concept of confidence as taking thoughts and turning them into action, in this sample, it was clear that a critically important element for women candidates to act on their political ambitions was already having sizable leadership experience.

Confidence to run Versus Confidence to Win

An important caveat to these findings is that while these three areas, of family/network support, strong educational backgrounds, and leadership experience all certainly contribute to the motivation that women candidates describe in feeling a sense of confidence to run for office, these same experiences do not spur the same sense of confidence when it comes to the results of elections. Candidates differentiated between ways these factors contributed to their confidence to become politically engaged and their confidence in winning an election.

One woman candidate ran in a three-way primary against another woman and one man in a statewide race. Here’s her description of what ensued:

He’s a nice young man [but] he was in no way qualified relative to the women in that race. Literally, I don’t think he’s ever had a full-time job. And by the way, he whipped our asses. It wasn’t close. But think about it: he ran against a woman who had been a locally-elected official for years and a trial attorney for decades before that, and he ran against an Ivy League grad who’s been running multi-million-dollar corporations for twenty years. He never talked about his qualifications at all, but from the day he entered the race he was the front runner. I mean, that’s the thing. [People said to me] “I’m really surprised. Your message was spot on,” and it was, by the way. I mean, there was a reason I was running, and I knew it. And I said, “To be honest, I think what I learned is it has nothing to do with the message.” And nobody wants to hear that. I mean, I’ve studied political science for 25 years, literally. It was my undergraduate work. Then I did some of my graduate schoolwork in government also. I read biographies of random founding fathers people forgot for fun. That’s what I consider entertaining. I know my stuff on this, and none of it matters.

In this case, this woman candidate had broad support from her family and friends, as well as many encouragers. She is highly-educated and professionally very successful. She was extremely confident about running for office and in acting on her political ambition. As she states, I knew why I was running. Yet that confidence did not follow through to confidence about the outcome of the election. She lost to a much younger and much less experienced man who did not have her educational pedigree either. In a similar situation, a highly experienced and educated woman candidate with broad support within her networks lost a general election for a local office to the hometown high school football hero who had dropped out of college after one semester with no professional experience at all. As the candidate below comments, the public somehow finds a man, though a novice, more credible.

I think that my job experience has been discounted because of the “where-we’re-at” politics. Like I’ve worked for Congress for five years. I worked for the State Senate. I worked for a state agency for a year. I worked in advocacy. I have a master’s degree. I’ve taught public policy. I thought that my credentials were pretty good, but the people that I have run against have had absolutely the opposite, have had no experience. And the public has found that that’s more credible than someone who has spent 30 years [doing this work].

In yet another example, a woman candidate shared her shock and surprise when she lost her first race but also explains how that shaped her thinking about the second office she ran for.

I think spending all that time at the legislature and watching the decision-making process and realizing that I was smart and competent, that as an academic, I have a better skill set than the average legislator does. I think that really built my confidence. To be able to go in front of them and speak in front of them and argue for a particular take on a bill, the advocacy work that I did prior to running for office was very helpful. And to be honest, losing the school board race, and knowing I can survive losing, is what helped me stick my neck out there for the state legislature. I think I was way more pragmatic when I did that than I was when I ran for the school board. When I ran for the school board, I think I thought I had done the hard work, I had been advocating for this district for over a decade and I’ve got kids in the school. And, there’s this guy I’m running against, like when’s the last time he’s even been in a public school? I was invested and thought voters would see that. But it turned out they didn’t. Special election turn-out was low. Party matters. So when I ran [the next time], I tried to think about being realistic with my chances and looking at the data. Because I had the stars knocked out of my eyes in the school board race, that is what made me confident to run [again].

As powerful as the resiliency that flows from election losses for women candidates, there is an important idea emerging in these narratives that could be a topic for future research. Though not a representative sample, 70% of women interviewed did not win their elections, and all but one lost to a male candidate. Yet, these women continue to contribute to civic life through the myriad of leadership positions they hold in their communities and are widely recognized for it. Based on this data, gender bias in politics is a lived experience, and warrants deeper inquiry. While women have opportunities, support, and respect to hold leadership roles in professional and civic life, the ceiling appears extremely low for publicly-elected positions. The interviews also highlight a theme of partial confidence—where confidence in their own ability to run does not necessarily translate into a confidence that they will win.

Limitations

While revealing, our study is limited in certain capacities. One of the biggest limitations is the fact that our interview pool includes women who have already emerged as candidates for office, which is one of the biggest hurdles in the process of running. The interviewed population, given their backgrounds, could be classified as already having a high likelihood of political entry for reasons outside of ability-based confidence (Fox and Lawless 2005). The sample also fails to account for politically ambitious women who ultimately decide against formally running and it is heavily skewed toward Democratic candidates.

Conclusion

We examine the role of gender and confidence as it applies to political ambition and candidate emergence. We use a qualitative approach to investigate ability-based confidence and how confidence is constructed through lived social experiences. This study complements existing research on women and political ambition with a focus on confidence. We show how women can build the confidence they need to see themselves as qualified for running for elected office and how they can build support networks for success. The broader implication is that representation in democratic institutions matter. When more women run and get elected to public office the more representative and diverse our institutions become, fulfilling a basic principle of democracy.

To be sure, women political candidates are not typical of the women in the mass public (Crowder-Meyer 2020). They are confident; and they draw their confidence from the privileges and opportunities they have experienced in family life, schooling, workplaces, and communities. Yet, women are not a monolith. Our findings reveal a great deal of variation in experience among women candidates. Based on the experiences and backgrounds described by women political candidates, gaining the confidence and support to run for public office requires strong networks, education, and experience that only a small percentage of American women possess, and even then, this confidence to run does not necessarily translate into a confidence that they will win. The findings also point to ways that these pathways could be improved to be more inclusive of all women from a diversity of social backgrounds. These pathways can be strategically constructed so that the experiences of the women in our analysis can be replicated for others who are contemplating entering the political arena.

The psychological literature traditionally identifies confidence as an in-born personality trait, while developments in neuroscience also recognize an evolving understanding about the role and importance of brain plasticity in learning various personality traits, such as confidence. While certain biological and physiological features may predispose confidence, lived experiences also hold the potential to create, validate, and reinforce confidence as well. For women candidates, support from family and friends, knowledge about the issues, and leadership experience all influenced both their decision to run, their tenacity during their campaigns, as well as their positive outlook about political participation even with election losses. Examining confidence as a reflection of lived experiences allows us to understand the sociocultural mechanisms that construct a possibility to take thought to action. In particular, this analysis illustrates that key institutions, such as the family, schools, workplaces and communities are integral to cultivate greater confidence for all women. Such confidence, fostered through lived social experiences within important social institutions, may lead to more women running for elected office. The findings we present offer an avenue for future research which could investigate the formative role that these institutions play in constructing and cultivating the confidence that leads to political ambition for women. Further, an examination of confidence for those further down the political pipeline could shed light on how women negotiate and formulate policy and how confidence relates to the retention of women elected in political office, particularly around the finding of support networks.

Though we have passed the 100th year anniversary of suffrage, women are not yet fully exercising their political right to participate in public life. Normalizing civic engagement in family life, promoting egalitarianism in partnerships, encouraging girls to pursue higher education, and celebrating the leadership of women in our workplaces and communities are some areas where we can implement supports to facilitate women’s confidence, and perhaps encourage them to act on their political ambition.

Footnotes

Appendix A

Data Availability Statement

The datasets generated during and/or analyzed during the current study are available from the corresponding author on reasonable request.

Declaration of Conflicting Interests

The author(s) declared no potential conflicts of interest with respect to the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article.

Funding

The author(s) disclosed receipt of the following financial support for the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article: The authors received financial support for the research from the University of Tampa Learning Enrichment Grant, RISE Grant, and Board of Fellows Grant.

ORCID iD

Mary R. Anderson

Notes

Author Biographies

Mary R. Anderson is a Professor of Political Science at the University of Tampa, she specializes in research on civic engagement and political psychology.

Lakshmi Jayaram is a teacher of History and the Social Sciences at Tampa Preparatory and President of Research Inquiry Group LLC. She earned her PhD in Sociology from John Hopkins University and an MPP from the University of Chicago.

Kathryn VanderMolen is an Associate Professor of Political Science at the University of Tampa, she specializes in research on American state politics and legislative behavior.

References

Anzia

Sarah F.

Berry

Christopher

. 2011. “The Jackie (and Jill) Robinson Effect: Why Do Congresswomen Outperform Congressmen?” American Journal of Political Science 55 (3): 478–93.

Bennett

L. L. M.

Bennett

S. E

. (1989). Enduring Gender Differences in Political Interest: The Impact of Socialization and Political Dispositions. American Politics Quarterly, 17(1), 105–122. https://doi.org/10.1177/1532673X89017001

Bennett

Pamela R.

Lutz

Amy

Jayaram

Lakshmi

. 2021. Parenting in Privilege or Peril: How Social Inequality Enables or Derails the American Dream. New York, NY: Teachers College Press.

Bernhard

Rachel

Holman

Mirya

Shames

Shauna

Teele

Dawn Langan

. 2019. “Beyond Ambition.” Politics, Groups, and Identities 7 (4): 815–6. doi:10.1080/21565503.2019.1678883.

Bouchard

Thomas J.

1994. “Genes, Environment, and Personality.” Science 264 (5166): 1700–1701.

Bonneau

Chris W.

Kanthak

Kristin

. 2018. “Stronger Together: Political Ambition and the Presentation of Women Running for Office.” Politics, Groups, and Identities 8 (3): 576–94.

Braun

Virginia

Clarke

Victoria

. 2006. “Using Thematic Analysis in Psychology.” Qualitative Research in Psychology 3 (2): 77–101.

Brinkmann

Svend

Kvale

Steinar

. 2015. InterViews: Learning the Craft of Qualitative Research Interviewing. 3rd ed. Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage.

Butcher

Jordan

Haynes

Noah

. 2024. “Already Gone, Retaining Women in State Legislatures.” Legislative Studies Quarterly 49 (1): 33–73.

10.

Butler

Daniel

Preece

Jessica

. 2016. “Recruitment and Perceptions of Gender Bias in Party Leader Support.” Political Research Quarterly 69 (4): 842–51.

11.

Carroll

Susan J.

Sanbonmatsu

Kira

. 2013. More Women Can Run: Gender and Pathways to the State Legislatures. New York, NY: Oxford University Press.

12.

Charmaz

Kathy

. 2014. “Grounded Theory in Global Perspective: Reviews by International Researchers.” Qualitative Inquiry 20 (9): 1074–84.

13.

Cobb-Clark

Deborah A.

Schurer

Stefanie

. 2012. “The Stability of Big-Five Personality Traits.” Economics Letters 115 (1): 11–5.

14.

Cross

William

Young

Lisa

. 2013. “Candidate Recruitment in Canada: The Role of Political Parties.” In Parties, Elections, and the Future of Canadian Politics, edited by Koop

Bittner

, 24–45. Vancouver, Canada: University of British Columbia Press.

15.

Crowder-Meyer

2020. “Baker, Bus Driver, Babysitter, Candidate? Revealing the Gendered Development of Political Ambition Among Ordinary Americans.” Political Behavior 42 (2): 359–84.

16.

Crowder-Meyer

Gadarian

S. K.

Trounstine

Vue

. (2015, April). Complex interactions: Candidate race, sex, electoral institutions, and voter choice. In Annual Meeting of the Midwest Political Science Association, Chicago, IL, April (pp. 16-19).

17.

Demo

David H.

1992. “The Self-Concept Over Time: Research Issues and Directions.” Annual Review of Sociology 18 (1): 303–326.

18.

Denzin

Norman K.

1989. Interpretive Interactionism. Newbury Park, CA: Sage.

19.

Dittmar

Kelly

. 2020. “What You Need to Know About the Record Numbers of Women Candidates in 2020.” Center for American Women and Politics. https://cawp.rutgers.edu/blog/what-you-need-know-about-record-numbers-women-candidates-2020 (accessed December 4, 2023).

20.

Dolan

Kathleen

Lynch

Timothy

. 2014. “It Takes a Survey: Understanding Gender Stereotypes, Abstract Attitudes, and Voting for Women Candidates.” American Politics Research 42 (4): 656–76.

21.

Dolan

Julie

Shah

Paru

. 2020. “She Persisted: Gender, Electoral Loss, and the Decision to Run Again.” Political Research Quarterly 73 (4): 957–66.

22.

Dow

Jay

. 2009. “Gender Differences in Political Knowledge: Distinguishing Characteristics-Based and Returns-Based Differences.” Political Behavior 31 (1): 117–36.

23.

Fox

Richard

Lawless

Jennifer

. 2005. “To Run or Not to Run for Office: Explaining Nascent Political Ambition.” American Journal of Political Science 49 (3): 642–59.

24.

Fox

Richard

Lawless

Jennifer

. 2011. “Gendered Perceptions and Political Candidacies: A Central Barrier to Women’s Equality in Electoral Politics.” American Journal of Political Science 55 (1): 59–73.

25.

Fox

Richard

Lawless

Jennifer

. 2014. “Uncovering the Origins of the Gender Gap in Political Ambition.” American Political Science Review 108(3): 499–519.

26.

Greenlee

Jill S.

Holman

Mirya R.

VanSickle-Ward

Rachel

. 2014. “Making it Personal: Assessing the Impact of In-Class Exercises on Closing the Gender Gap in Political Ambition.” Journal of Political Science Education 10 (1): 48–61.

27.

Healy

Maureen

. 2012. Growing Happy Kids: How to Foster Inner Confidence, Success, and Happiness. 1st ed. Deerfield Beach, FL: Health Communications Inc.

28.

Kanthak

Kristin

Woon

Jonathan

. 2015. “Women Don’t Run? Election Aversion and Candidate Entry.” American Journal of Political Science 59 (3): 595–612.

29.

Karpowitz

C. F.

Mendelberg

. (2014). The Silent Sex: Gender, Deliberation, and Institutions. Princeton University Press. http://www.jstor.org/stable/j.ctt7zvffd

30.

Karpowitz

Christopher F.

Monson

J. Quin

Preece

Jessica Robinson

. 2017. “How to Elect More Women: Gender and Candidate Success in a Field Experiment.” American Journal of Political Science 61 (4): 927–43.

31.

Kathlene

Lyn

. 1994. “Power and Influence in State Legislative Policymaking: The Interaction of Gender and Position in Committee Hearing Debates.” American Political Science Review 88 (3): 560–76.

32.

Ladam

Christina

Harden

Jeffrey J.

Windett

Jason H.

2018. “Prominent Role Models: High Profile Female Politicians and the Emergence of Women as Candidates for Public Office.” American Journal of Political Science 62 (2): 369–81.

33.

Lawless

Jennifer

Fox

Richard

. 2013. “Girls Just Wanna Not Run: The Gender Gap in Young Americans’ Political Ambition.” Policy Report, Women and Politics Institute at American University, Washington, DC.

34.

Levine

Abromowitz

. (2023). Challenges reported by candidates for local office. State and Local Government Review, 55(2), 139–152.

35.

Maestas

C. D.

Fulton

Maisel

L. S.

Stone

W. J

. (2006). When to risk it? Institutions, ambitions, and the decision to run for the US House. American Political Science Review, 100(2), 195–208.

36.

Mendelberg

Karpowitz

C. F.

Goedert

. (2014). Does descriptive representation facilitate women’s distinctive voice? How gender composition and decision rules affect deliberation. American journal of political science, 58(2), 291–306.

37.

Nownes

Anthony J.

Freeman

Patricia K.

2019. “Gender-Based Differences in Information Use and Processing among State Legislators.” Journal of Women, Politics & Policy 40 (4): 473–97.

38.

Oney

Emrah

Oksuzoglu-Guven

Gizem

. 2015. “Confidence: A Critical Review of the Literature and an Alternative Perspective for General and Specific Self-Confidence.” Psychological Reports 116 (1): 149–63.

39.

Patton

Michael Quinn

. 2015. Qualitative Research & Evaluation Methods. 4th ed. Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage.

40.

Petrides

K. V.

2011. “A General Mechanism for Linking Personality Traits to Affect, Motivation, and Action.” New Ideas in Psychology 29 (2): 64–71.

41.

Plomin

Robert

Nesselroade

John R.

1990. “Behavioral Genetics and Personality Change.” Journal of Personality 58 (1): 191–220.

42.

Preece

Jessica

Stoddard

Olga

. 2015. “Does the Message Matter? A Field Experiment on Political Party Recruitment.” Journal of Experimental Political Science 2 (1): 26–35.

43.

Preece

Jessica

Stoddard

Olga

Fisher

Rachael

. 2016. “Run, Jane, Run! Gendered Responses to Political Party Recruitment.” Political Behavior 38 (3): 561–77.

44.

Pruysers

Scott

Blais

Julie

. 2017. “Why Won’t Lola Run? An Experiment Examining Stereotype Threat and Political Ambition.” Politics & Gender 13 (2): 232–52.

45.

Pruysers

Scott

Blais

Julie

2018. “A Little Encouragement Goes a (Not So) Long Way: An Experiment to Increase Political Ambition Among Young Women.” Journal of Women, Politics, and Policy 39(3): 384–95.

46.

Pruysers

Scott

Blais

Julie

. 2019. “Narcissistic Women and Cash-Strapped Men: Who Can Be Encouraged to Consider Running for Political Office, and Who Should Do the Encouraging?” Political Research Quarterly 72 (1): 229–42.

47.

Pruysers

Scott

Cross

William

. 2016. “Candidate Selection in Canada.” American Behavioral Scientist 60 (7): 781–98.

48.

Risman

Barbara

. 2004. “Gender as Structure: Theory Wrestling with Social Change.” Gender & Society 18:4.

49.

Saldana

Johnny

. 2015. The Coding Manual for Qualitative Researchers. 3rd ed. Los Angeles, CA: Sage.

50.

Schmitt

Carly

Brant

Hanna K.

2019. “Gender, Ambition, and Legislative Behavior in the United States House.” Journal of Women, Politics & Policy 40 (2): 286–308.

51.

Schneider

Monica

Holman

Mirya

Diekman

Amanda

McAndrew

Thomas

. 2016. “Power, Conflict, and Community: How Gendered Views of Political Power Influence Women’s Political Ambition.” Political Psychology 37 (4): 515–31.

52.

Seidman

Irving

. 2013. Interviewing as Qualitative Research: A Guide for Researchers in Education & the Social Sciences. 4th ed. New York, NY: Teacher’s College Press.

53.

Sheffer

Lior

Loewen

Peter

. 2019. “Electoral Confidence, Overconfidence, and Risky Behavior: Evidence from a Study with Elected Politicians.” Political Behavior 41:31–51.

54.

Suh

Eunkook M.

2000. “Self, the Hyphen Between Culture and Subjective Well-Being.” In Culture and Subjective Well-Being, edited by Diener

Suh

E. M.

, 63–86. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.

55.

Swift

Clint S.

VanderMolen

Kathryn

. 2021. “Marginalization and Mobilization: The Roots of Female Legislators’ Collaborative Advantage in the States.” State Politics & Policy Quarterly 21 (4): 355–79.

56.

Thomas

Melanee

. 2012. “The Complexity Conundrum: Why Hasn’t the Gender Gap in Subjective Political Competence Closed?” Canadian Journal of Political Science 45 (2): 337–58.