Gender,gendered personality traits and radical right populist voting

Abstract

Most previous research on radical right populist voting has revealed that men are substantially more likely to favour radical right parties than women. This article explores the interplay between gender, gendered personality traits – as measured by Bem’s Sex Role Inventory – and radical right populist voting. To do so, it makes use of the Dutch Longitudinal Internet Studies for the Social Sciences (LISS) Household Panel (2012 and 2013; N = 4328). The Logit regression analyses reveal no noticeable effect of feminine personality traits, but a significant and positive effect of masculine personality traits on supporting the Dutch radical right party, PVV. Women are significantly less likely to support the PVV, even once gendered personality traits are controlled for, and the effects of gendered personality traits are similar among women and men.

Keywords

Bem’s Sex Role Inventory gender gendered personality traits Netherlands PVV radical right

Introduction

The electoral success of radical right populist (RRP) parties throughout various European countries has grown exponentially over recent decades, as has the academic literature on these parties. One of the most consistent findings of this literature is that while some country differences do exist, men are overall significantly more likely to vote for RRP parties than women (e.g. Fontana et al., 2006; Ford and Goodwin, 2010; Gidengil et al., 2005; Givens, 2004; Harteveld et al., 2015; Harteveld and Ivarsflaten, 2016; Immerzeel et al., 2015; Rippeyoung, 2007; Spierings and Zaslove, 2015b). The vast majority of empirical studies looking at this gender difference in radical right voting behaviour use voters’ self-identification as woman or man (or transgender/intersex) to measure their gender.¹ While this is a common practice in empirical political science research, it provides an incomplete understanding of the way in which gender informs political behaviour. In particular, it leaves aside a central element of gender: individuals’ gendered personality traits or the extent to which aspects of their personality align with traits that are traditionally considered masculine or feminine.

Previous research has shown that these traits exert an influence on individuals’ political behaviour and beliefs compared with gender (e.g. Hatemi et al., 2012; McDermott and Hatemi, 2011). McDermott (2016), for instance, shows that voters with high scores on masculine personality traits – in particular, independence – are more likely to support the Republicans, whereas voters with high scores on feminine personality traits – in particular, compassion – are more likely to support the Democrats. Moreover, she found that after accounting for gendered personality traits, gender differences in vote choice disappeared. It is crucial, then, to include gendered personality traits in studies on voting behaviour in order to get a better understanding of the differences in women and men’s political behaviour.

Hitherto, research on the gender gap in radical right voting has – to the best of my knowledge – left the effect of gendered personality traits unexplored, despite the fact that some studies indicate that RRP parties have a more complex relationship with gender than a cursory review of the literature on the gender gap might suggest. For example, RRP parties often exhibit ‘masculine’ characteristics (Mayer, 2002, 2013; Meret, 2015), have a large number of female supporters (Spierings and Zaslove, 2015b), and are sometimes led by (masculine) women (Meret, 2015; Spierings and Zaslove, 2015a). Therefore, the main goals of the current study are to assess (1) how gendered personality traits relate to radical right voting and (2) to what extent and how they mediate and moderate the gender gap in radical right support. In brief, the simplistic discourse of RRP parties concerning the presence of immigrants and their strict migration policies with the aims of excluding or promoting tolerance towards a particular social group and that leave little room for nuance (Mayer, 2002; Mudde, 2007) seem to be at odds with higher scores on warmth, compassion, and sympathy, which are typically seen as feminine traits (Bem, 1981). Hence, possessing feminine personality traits is expected to be negatively related to support for a radical right party. By contrast, masculine traits such as assertiveness and aggressiveness (Bem, 1981) fit better with the strict, aggressive discourse and the radical opinion and policies typically utilized and taken by RRP parties (Mayer, 2002), and are, thus, anticipated to positively affect the probability of supporting a RRP party. Therefore, it may be expected that those with higher levels of masculine personality traits will be more supportive of RRP parties.

Since women and men are known to differ in the extent to which they hold masculine and feminine personality traits, gendered personality traits are also expected to have a mediating effect and, thus, explain part of the known gender gap in RRP voting. In addition, and in line with some of the previous research on gendered personality traits and voting behaviour (Hatemi et al, 2012; Hershey and Sullivan, 1977; Rubinstein, 1995), I will suggest a moderating effect of gendered personality traits. In particular, I will suggest that the effect of the gendered personality traits is stronger when women and men behave ‘typically’ or ‘normatively’ for their own gender. I, thus, hypothesize finding a stronger positive link between masculine personality traits and support for a radical right candidate among men than among women and a stronger negative effect of feminine personality traits among women compared with men.

To investigate these expectations, I use data collected at the end of 2012 and the beginning of 2013 within Dutch Longitudinal Internet Studies for the Social Sciences (LISS) panel survey.

Theory

Gender, masculine and feminine personality traits and radical right support

While some cross-national differences have been found (Immerzeel et al., 2015), there is considerable agreement among scholars that radical right parties have a distinctive gender specific profile: women are under-represented among the radical right electorate (e.g. Fontana et al., 2006; Gidengil et al., 2005; Givens, 2004; Rippeyoung, 2007). An important explanation that has been suggested for the gender gap is the difference in the occupational positions of women and men, and related differences in attitudes towards immigrants. First, while women’s participation in the labour force has increased greatly during the last few decades, they still participate to a lesser degree than men. This makes them less likely to be confronted with and affected by the processes of globalization and immigration, which lessens their chances to support the radical right (Betz, 1994; Givens, 2004). Second, blue-collar workers face more competition from immigrants than white-collar workers, leading to stronger negative attitudes towards immigrants. Consequently, as men are more likely than women to be blue-collar workers, men are more likely to be attracted by the radical right’s us versus them discourse compared with women (Givens, 2004; Immerzeel et al., 2015; Rippeyoung, 2007). Finally, Givens (2004: 40) suggests that women tend to be employed in ‘female-dominated areas and the service sector, which tend to have fewer immigrants in them’, resulting in less negative attitudes towards immigrants.

The apparent link between gender, attitudes towards immigrants, and radical right voting is, thus, supported by ideas of (occupational) gender stereotypes (see also McDermott, 2013). Other explanations for the gender gap in radical right voting also look implicitly through the lens of gendered personalities. For example, as a result of their roles as mothers and their socialization into nurturing and caring tasks, women are said to be more strongly opposed to the use of force, more supportive of compassionate politics, and more likely to fear violence compared with men (Gilens, 1988; Immerzeel et al., 2015; Rippeyoung, 2007). These attitudes are in their turn expected to negatively affect their likelihood of supporting radical right parties, which are known for their authoritarian appeal and strong emphasis on law and order (Immerzeel et al., 2015).

In sum, gendered personality traits have been at the core of various explanations for the differences between women and men in support for radical right candidates. Despite this, all studies on gender and radical right voting, to date, have defined gender strictly by voters’ self-identification as a woman or man, leaving differences between feminine and masculine personalities unexplored. This article seeks to remedy this deficiency and study the link between feminine and masculine personalities and radical right voting in detail.

Pleck (1975: 164) defines masculinity and femininity measures as indications of ‘the extent to which the individual shows gender-appropriate traits, attitudes, and interests’. Masculinity is generally described as ‘adaptive-instrumental’ and ‘assertive-dominant’, while femininity is more ‘integrative-expressive’ and depicts ‘nurtureness-interpersonal warmth’ (Bem, 1981; Williams and Best, 1982). While most would agree on these descriptions of masculinity and femininity in contemporary, Western societies, they are socially constructed and time and context dependent (Connell, 2005). Moreover, while masculinity and femininity are often labelled in opposition to one another, with feminine being ‘not masculine’ and masculine being ‘not feminine’ (Foushee et al., 1979), they can be better understood as multidimensional concepts that vary independently (Bem, 1974). Hence, each is expected to relate independently to supporting the radical right. Furthermore, they are ‘graduating concepts rather than dichotomous ones’ (McDermott, 2013: 11). It is, thus, the degree to which individuals possess feminine and masculine traits (rather than whether or not individuals are feminine or masculine) that is anticipated to relate to radical right support.

On the basis that voters are generally more likely to vote for candidates or parties that resemble themselves (Dolan, 2008; Huddy and Carey, 2009), I expect gendered personality traits to relate to voters’ decisions on whether or not to vote for a RRP party. Masculine traits such as assertiveness, aggressiveness, and the willingness to take a stance are closely associated with the hard and strict discourse that radical right parties endorse (Mayer, 2002, 2013; Meret, 2015). Recent work has also found that populism, including anti-elite sentiment, is more likely to draw votes from men, at least when it is attached to a radical right ideology. This may be due to the conflictual nature of populism, which is more attractive to those with high levels of masculine personality traits (Spierings and Zaslove, 2017).

The relationship between feminine traits and voting for a RRP party, however, is less clear. Yet, high scores on warmth, compassion, sympathy, and sensitivity, which are typically feminine traits, are at odds with much of the radical right parties’ simplistic discourse around the presence of immigrants and their strict migration policy with little room for nuance (Mayer, 2002; Mudde, 2007). I, thus, expect feminine personality traits to relate negatively to support for RRP parties, as their main policies – particularly their anti-immigration policies – tend to be exclusionary in nature, and thus, less attractive to voters with feminine personality traits. To summarize, the hypotheses are

H1. The more masculine an individual’s personality is, the more likely they are to support a RRP party.

H2. The more feminine an individual’s personality is, the less likely they are to support a RRP party.

While the correlation between biological sex and gendered personality traits is not perfect (McDermott, 2013), the two are related. Indeed, as a result of socialization forces, men generally score higher on masculine traits than women. Women, on the other hand, possess, on average, more feminine traits than men. Given this link and the expected influence of gendered personality traits on radical right voting, masculine and feminine personality traits may also explain and mediate (part of) the gender gap found in previous research. In empirical terms, this means that controlling for these traits may decrease the effect of gender. Hence, the hypothesis reads as follows:

H3. Masculine and feminine personality traits explain (a substantial part of) the negative effect of being female on the likelihood of supporting a RRP party.

Gender differences in the effect of masculine and feminine personality traits on radical right voting

The above hypotheses suggest that gendered personality traits will similarly affect both women and men’s likelihood of supporting a radical right candidate. It is, however, possible that explanatory patterns will differ between women and men. The limited research looking at explanations for radical right voting among women and men has, indeed, revealed differences between the genders (Coffé, 2012; Fontana et al., 2006; Gidengil et al., 2005; Spierings and Zaslove, 2015b). For instance, Harteveld et al. (2015) find that despite similar levels of nativism and authoritarianism among women and men, women appear to use these views differently when assessing RRP parties compared with men.

Moreover, some of the previous research on gendered personality traits and voting behaviour does suggest that the effect of gendered personality on a variety of political attitudes and behaviour differs between women and men. Hatemi et al. (2012), for example, found that the more ‘feminine’ men are or the more ‘masculine’ women are, the more likely they are to support the left-leaning Labor Party of Australia. They also show that gender interacts significantly with the Childhood Gender Non-Conformity (CGN) scale when explaining support for minor parties, suggesting that non-conformist behaviour (i.e. participation in non-sex stereotypic activities before the age of 13 years) has a stronger positive effect among men than among women. They do not, however, find significant interactions between gender and the AGI (Adult Gender Identity) and CGN scale when studying the influence on the preference for Labor versus the Coalition (a coalition of two right-wing parties).

In research conducted in the United States, Hershey and Sullivan (1977) reveal that men with more flexible sex role identities are less favourable towards military force, more likely to identify as Democrats, and slightly more likely to approve of new political parties. They do not find such a link between a flexible sex role identity and liberal political attitudes among women. Yet, they show that women who have more typically masculine identities are more likely to hold liberal positions. More feminine men, in their turn, were found to give responses similar to more masculine men. According to Hershey and Sullivan (1977), this suggests that internal conflict (such as men being feminine) leads to a defensive reaction that is associated with conservative beliefs, at least among men. Sex reversal among women did not seem to have the same effect among their sample of university students. Masculine women were more likely to hold liberal positions. Hershey and Sullivan (1977: 56) surmise that this may be because ‘society is often more accepting of masculinity in women than of femininity in men’. Finally, Rubinstein (1995) concludes that whereas among women, the cross-sex types (possessing more masculine than feminine traits) tend to support left-wing parties, define themselves as secular, and score lowest in authoritarianism, such a pattern does not occur among men.

Given that very little work has theoretically interrogated the interactions between gender and gendered personality traits and the mixed results of the existing research, it is challenging to develop hypotheses related to the interactions between gender and gendered personality traits when studying radical right voting. One possible expectation could start from the assumption of a reinforcing effect between gender and gendered personality traits. It would suggest that the effect of the gendered personality traits is stronger when women and men behave ‘typically’ or ‘normatively’ for their own gender.

As men are known to be more likely to support a radical right party and to score higher on masculinity traits, and masculine personality traits are anticipated to relate positively to the support for a radical right candidate (H2 above), one could expect a reinforcing effect between being a man and masculine personality traits, and thus, anticipate finding a stronger positive link between masculine personality traits and support for a radical right candidate among men than among women. Based on the idea of a reinforcing effect, one would also expect to find a stronger negative link between feminine personality traits and support for a radical right candidate among women than among men. In particular, because women are known to be significantly less likely to support a radical right candidate and feminine personality traits are anticipated to relate negatively to the support for a radical right candidate (H3 above), one could expect a reinforcing effect between both, and thus, anticipate finding a stronger negative effect of feminine personality traits among women compared with men.

In sum then, the hypotheses related to the interaction between gender and gendered personality traits and radical right voting read as follows:

H4. Masculine personality traits will have a stronger positive effect on the likelihood of supporting a RRP party among men than among women.

H5. Feminine personality traits will have a stronger negative effect on the likelihood of supporting a RRP party among women than among men.

Data and method

To answer my research question, I draw on data from the Dutch LISS Household Panel administered by CentERdata (Institute for Data Collection and Research, Tilburg University, the Netherlands).² The LISS panel, which has been in full operation since October 2007, is based on a true probability sample of Dutch households drawn from the population register by Statistics Netherlands. It consists of 4500 households, comprising 7000 individuals.

Panel members complete online questionnaires every month of about 15–30 minutes in total and are paid for each completed questionnaire. Households that would otherwise not have been able to participate in the panel were provided with a computer and Internet connection. Part of the interview time available in the LISS panel is reserved for LISS Core Studies which are repeated yearly. In addition to the LISS Core Study questions, data are collected for different research purposes from a wide variety of disciplines.

For the current study, I rely on the ‘Gender, Party Characteristics and Radical Right Voting’ survey which measures respondents’ feminine and masculine personality traits and was organized in October 2012. This survey was linked to the Core ‘Politics and Values’ survey (Wave 6) which was organized in December 2012–January 2013 and which includes various variables measuring relevant political attitudes and party preference.

Combining the two surveys and prior to dropping the missing values, the sample included 4848 respondents. That is the number of panel respondents which participated in both surveys. A listwise deletion of observations with missing data was employed, resulting in a final sample size of 4328 respondents.

Dependent variables

The dependent variable is based on the question ‘Which party would you vote for if elections were held today?’ The variable distinguishes (1) those who would vote for the radical right party Partij voor de Vrijheid (PVV) from (0) those who would not support the PVV. The latter category, thus, includes those who do not know which party they would vote for.³

Independent variables

Gender is a dichotomous variable with a value of 0 for male respondents and a value of 1 for female respondents. The measures of feminine and masculine personality traits are based on the shortened form of the Bem’s Sex Role Inventory (BSRI; Bem, 1981).⁴ Whereas masculinity and femininity are often labelled in opposition to one another, with feminine being ‘not masculine’ and masculine being ‘not feminine’ (Foushee et al., 1979), the BSRI is built on the view that gendered personality traits can be better understood as multidimensional concepts that vary independently (Bem, 1974) and as ‘graduating concepts rather than dichotomous ones’ (McDermott, 2013: 11). Individuals can, thus, possess a certain degree of several traits considered masculine and feminine in contemporary, Western societies, rather than being uncompromisingly feminine or masculine. While the BSRI is not without criticism, it has been used in the last few decades and is still the most utilized and validated measure of gendered personality traits (Carver et al., 2013; Donnelly and Twenge, 2017; Holt and Ellis, 1998). Moreover, despite the dynamic nature of the concept of gender, the categorization of traits measured by the BSRI as masculine or feminine has been found to be relatively stable across time (Holt and Ellis, 1998; McDermott, 2016). While Donnelly and Twenge (2017) found that there had been a decrease in femininity among female college students in the United States, they found that masculinity among women and femininity and masculinity among men have remained stable over a 20-year period (1993–2012).

Respondents were asked to assess how often a given personality trait applies to their character, with the possible answers ranging from 1 ‘never or almost never true’ to 7 ‘always or almost always true’. Respondents rated themselves on 10 masculine traits and 10 feminine traits. The masculine personality traits were willing to take risks, forceful, strong personality, assertive, independent, leadership ability, aggressive, dominant, willing to take a stand, and willing to defend own beliefs (Cronbach’s α = .82). The feminine personality traits were: understanding, sympathetic, warm, loves children, compassionate, gentle, eager to soothe hurt feelings, affectionate, sensitive to needs of others, and tender (Cronbach’s α = .87). The questions regarding masculine and feminine personality traits were randomly posed throughout the questionnaire. A factor analysis revealed a clear two-dimensional structure with the masculine personality traits clustering together and the feminine personality traits clustering together. Hence, femininity and masculinity personality traits are measured as two unique and separate constructs. Women do score significantly higher on feminine personality traits than men (mean women: .74; mean men: .67). Men, in their turn, score appreciably higher on masculine personality traits than women (mean women: .56; mean men: .60). While the gender differences are not large, they are statistically significant (p < .001).

The analyses below include various socioeconomic characteristics known to relate significantly to radical right voting and the gender gap therein (e.g. Immerzeel et al., 2015; Lubbers et al., 2002; Mudde, 2007; Norris, 2005; Rydgren, 2007). Education is represented by a variable with three categories. It has a value of 1 for respondents whose highest level of education is elementary school or lower secondary education (LBO/VMBO; referred to as ‘low education’), a value of 2 for those whose highest educational level is junior vocal education (MBO; referred to as ‘vocational secondary’), a value of 3 for those whose highest educational level is higher secondary school (HAVO_VWO; referred to as ‘general secondary’), and a value of 4 for those whose highest educational level is higher vocational college or university. The latter group is the reference group in the analyses. Occupational status refers to the respondent’s current job (or last job if the respondent is currently not working) and represents three categories: (1) non-manual occupation, (2) manual occupation, and (3) no occupation. The first category is used as the reference category. I also introduce a dichotomous variable, measuring whether the respondent is (1) currently employed or (0) not. Age is a continuous variable.⁵

In addition to the socioeconomic characteristics, three attitudinal characteristics, known to relate strongly to radical right voting and/or explain the gender gap in radical right voting (e.g. Harteveld et al., 2015; Immerzeel et al., 2015; Mudde, 2007), are included. First, a scale measuring attitudes towards immigrants which is based on the respondents’ opinions related to the following six statements: ‘it is good if society consists of people from different cultures’, ‘it should be made easier to attain asylum in the Netherlands’, ‘legally residing foreigners should be entitled to the same social security as Dutch citizens’, ‘there are too many people of foreign origin or descent in the Netherlands’, ‘some sectors of the economy can only continue to function because people of foreign origin or descent work there’, and ‘it does not help a neighbourhood if many people of foreign origin or descent move in’ (Cronbach’s α = .79). Each item was assessed on a scale ranging from (1) ‘fully disagree’ to (5) ‘fully agree’. Some items have been recoded so that the scale refers to negative attitudes towards immigrants. Second, a scale measuring feelings of political efficacy which relies on six items (Cronbach’s α = .69): ‘I am well capable of playing an active role in politics’, ‘I have a clear picture of the most important political issues in our country’, ‘Parliamentarians do not care about the opinions of people like me’, ‘Political parties are only interested in my vote and not in my opinion’, ‘People like me have no influence at all on government policy’, and ‘Politics sometimes seems so complicated that people like me can hardly understand it’. Each item is assessed on a dichotomous scale, with (0) signifying ‘that is true’ and (1) signifying ‘that is not true’. Some items have been recoded in such a way that a higher score refers to stronger feelings of political efficacy. Finally, to measure political discontent or dissatisfaction, I include a question asking respondents how satisfied or dissatisfied they are generally speaking about what the government has done lately. Answer categories range between (1) very dissatisfied and (5) very satisfied, and were recoded in such a way that a high score indicates dissatisfaction with the government.

An overview of the descriptive statistics of all variables included in the analyses is provided in Appendix A1. For ease of comparability, all variables have been recoded to range between 0 and 1.

Analytical strategy

To test my hypotheses, I present four different models below. The first model only includes gender and sociodemographic control variables. The second model adds the gendered personality traits and answers (1) to what extent and how gendered personality traits relate to radical right voting and (2) to what extent they explain a possible gender gap in radical right voting. It thus tests H1–3. A third model adds the attitudinal characteristics: political efficacy and negative attitudes towards immigrants. This analysis allows examination of whether the link between gender and gendered personality traits and radical right voting as shown in the second model are similar once these attitudes are controlled for. The fourth and final model adds interaction terms between gender and gendered personality traits and offers a direct test of H4 and H5 presented above, suggesting that the effect of masculine and feminine personality traits on radical right voting will differ between women and men.

Given that the dependent variable (intending to vote PVV or not) is a categorical variable, the presented analyses are Logit regression analyses.

Results

I begin with the base models explaining respondents’ likelihood of supporting the PVV. The first model, only including sociodemographic characteristics and gender, reveals in line with previous research that women are appreciably less likely to vote PVV than men. This gender effect remains, even once masculine and feminine personality traits are added in the second model. Hence, the analysis does not support H3, suggesting that gendered personality traits will mediate the gender effect on radical right voting.

Furthermore, Model 2 reveals that feminine personality traits have no impact on supporting the PVV. By contrast, and supporting H1, there is a considerable positive effect of masculine personality traits on the likelihood of supporting the PVV. Citizens with a stronger masculine personality are more likely to support the PVV.⁶ This positive effect of masculine personality traits remains significant, even once political attitudes are controlled for (Model 3). Similarly, the negative effect of being female remains significant even once political attitudes are controlled for. Of the political attitudes, political dissatisfaction and negative attitudes towards immigrants have a major positive impact on considering voting PVV. Those who are dissatisfied about what the government has done lately and who hold negative attitudes towards immigrants would be significantly more likely to vote for the PVV if elections were held.

To get a more substantive meaning of the significant effects of gender and masculine personality traits, Figure 1 presents the predicted values for the likelihood of supporting PVV for women and men and Figure 2 presents the predicted values for voting according to the level of masculine personality traits. The predicted probabilities are based on the results obtained in Model 3 in Table 1, holding all other variables in the model at their means.

Figure 1.

Predicted values for voting PVV according to gender.

Figure 2.

Predicted values for voting PVV according to masculine personality traits.

Table 1.

Logit regression analyses for voting PVV (N = 4328).

	Model 1			Model 2			Model 3			Model 4
	Coefficient	Significance	S.E.	Coefficient	Significance	SE	Coefficient	Significance	SE	Coefficient	Significance	SE
Female	−.57	***	.12	−.48	***	.12	−.43	**	.14	−.61		.77
Masculine personality traits				2.19	***	.47	1.46	**	.51	1.40	*	.71
Feminine personality traits				.03		.46	.16		.49	.10		.65
Female * Masculine personality traits										.13		.98
Female * Feminine personality traits										.15		.96
Level of education(ref.: high)
Low	1.48	***	.19	1.54	***	.19	1.01	***	.21	1.01	***	.21
Vocational secondary	1.28	***	.19	1.32	***	.19	.94	***	.20	.94	***	.20
General secondary	.63	*	.25	.67	**	.25	.50		.27	.50		.27
Occupational status(ref.: non-manual work)
Manual work	.39	**	.13	.43	**	.13	.19		.14	.19		.14
No occupation	−.06		.26	−.03		.26	−.08		.27	−.08		.27
Currently employed	.08		.13	.09		.13	−.04		.14	−.04		.14
Age	−1.24	***	.30	−1.10	***	.30	−1.22	***	.34	−1.22	***	.34
Negative attitudes immigrants							5.46	***	.40	5.46	***	.40
Political efficacy							−.08		.27	−.07		.27
Political dissatisfaction							2.88	***	.32	2.88	***	.32
Constant	−2.68	***	.25	−4.17	***	.44	−8.63	***	.57	−8.55	***	.65
Pseudo R-squared		.07			.08		.23			.23

Data Source: LISS (2012, 2013).

LISS: Longitudinal Internet Studies for the Social Sciences.

Significance: *p≤.05, **p≤.01, ***p≤.001 (two-tailed).

Figure 1 highlights the difference in likelihood of voting PVV between women and men, with women scoring, on average, .07 and men .10. Figure 2 reveals a clear pattern of increasing likelihood to consider voting PVV with increasing levels of masculine personality traits. Keeping all other variables at their means, respondents with the lowest level of masculine personality traits have a likelihood of .04 to consider voting for the PVV, whereas those with the highest level of masculine personality traits have a likelihood of .13.

To test whether the explanatory pattern of gendered personality traits differs between women and men, the fourth and final model presented in Table 1 adds interaction terms between masculine and feminine personality traits and gender. In contrast to the expectations specified in H4 and H5, the analysis reveals no significant interaction between masculine personality traits and gender. This suggests that the effect of the gendered personality traits is similar among women and men.

Discussion and conclusion

This study sought to contribute to the literature on gender and radical right voting behaviour by being the first to introduce masculine and feminine personality traits. The findings provide clear support for the novel claim that the appeal of a RRP party varies between individuals with different gendered personality traits, although the effect varies as a function of the gender personality trait being measured. While female personality traits do not seem to matter, masculine personality traits play a considerable and positive role in determining the likelihood of whether an individual will support the PVV. Masculine and feminine personality traits both have a similar effect on the likelihood of supporting the PVV among women and men.

Overall, these findings contribute to the existing literature which underlines the relevance of (gendered) personality traits for political attitudes and party preference (e.g. Hatemi et al., 2012; Hershey and Sullivan, 1977; McDermott, 2016; Rubinstein, 1995). The analyses also emphasize the complexity of gender and reveal a significant effect of gender above and beyond gendered personality traits. This demonstrates that self-identification as a woman or man has a direct effect on voting behaviour and suggests that there are aspects of self-identification not captured by gendered personality traits that are related to vote choice, at least in the case of support for RRP parties. Furthermore, while masculine personality traits matter when explaining support for RRP parties, feminine personality traits do not. This could be due to the independent nature of the two dimensions of gendered personality traits. In other words, RRP parties demonstrate masculine traits, and thus, voters who possess those masculine traits are more likely to vote for them, whereas RRP parties’ relationship to femininity is less clear (Mayer, 2013; Meret, 2015; Spierings and Zaslove, 2015b), meaning that feminine traits do not factor into voters’ decisions as to whether or not to support RRP parties. It is possible, then, that more left-leaning parties will have stronger feminine traits (or be perceived as such by voters; Winter, 2010) and will therefore be more likely to attract voters who themselves possess feminine traits (McDermott, 2016).

This opens up an interesting avenue for further research, examining the effect of gendered personality traits on support for parties of different ideological orientations. In addition, it would be beneficial to the literature on electoral behaviour for future studies to develop a more comprehensive theory on the relevance of gendered personality traits and to further explore it empirically. Here, I used the shortened version of the BSRI (Bem, 1981). This index offers a useful framework in which masculinity and femininity comprise two separate and independent dimensions. It offers the opportunity to assess how gendered personality traits relate to political opinions and behaviour and how they interact with people’s self-identification as woman or man. As previously noted, however, the BSRI dates from 1981, and there appears to have been some changes in the trends of reported gender traits since then, at least among a sample of US college students (Donnelly and Twenge, 2017). Future research could therefore usefully explore the effect of other measures of gendered personality traits on RRP voting.

Since the current study relies on data collected in a single country, future research could also usefully consider countries outside of the Netherlands. The Netherlands has known a number of relatively successful RRP parties in the last few decades, such as the Pim Fortuyn List (Lijst Pim Fortuyn, LPF) and the Freedom Party (PVV). The visibility of these parties in the media and their contribution to the increased political salience of the migration debate in the Netherlands (Bale et al., 2010) may have elevated RRP parties from ‘outsider’ to legitimate members of the traditional party system (van Heerden and Creusen, 2014), which may potentially influence the profile of supporters of RRP. It would therefore be useful to investigate to what extent the findings presented here also hold outside of the Netherlands.

Despite these unanswered questions, I trust that the current study has filled an important empirical gap in the literature on gender and the radical right by recognizing the importance of gendered personality traits when studying radical right voting behaviour. Such parties have become electorally successful in recent decades and are today significant political forces in many countries across Europe. It is therefore important to fully understand their success. Supporting Bem’s argument as to the relative importance of gender-role orientation versus gender, the current article poignantly demonstrates that integrating non-dichotomous concepts of gendered personality traits is crucial if we want to gain a full understanding of the gender structure in radical right voting behaviour.

Discovering that masculine personality traits have an independent influence on voters’ preference for a RRP party beyond someone’s self-identification as a woman or man – which itself has a direct, independent effect – supports a comprehensive model that recognizes the complexity of gender. I believe that the contribution of these findings lies exactly in that recognition and encourages scholars to include measures of gendered personalities in surveys on political behaviour. This will allow political behaviour scholars to improve the current understanding of people’s self-identification as woman or man, gendered personality traits, the link between them, and how they affect political behaviour and attitudes.

Footnotes

Acknowledgements

I gratefully acknowledge support from Victoria University of Wellington and the New Zealand European Union Centres Network. I would also like to thank the Measurement and Experimentation in the Social Sciences (MESS) project for accepting my research proposal, helping with recording the videos, and providing the data. A previous version of this article has been presented at the 2013 European Conference on Politics and Gender and at the Research Seminars at the Politics Department of the University of Sussex, the Department of Government and International Relations at the University of Sydney, and Department of Public Administration at the Erasmus University Rotterdam. I am grateful to all participants for their useful feedback. Finally, I would like to thank Fiona Barker, Tim Immerzeel, Marcel Lubbers, and Laura Stoker for their helpful advice and suggestions, and Sebastiaan Bierema and Sam Crawley for their editorial work.

Funding

The author(s) received no financial support for the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article

Supplementary Information

Additional supplementary information may be found with the online version of this article. Means and standard deviations (SD) or proportions for dependent and independent variables (N = 4328).^a

Notes

Author biography

Hilde Coffé is associate professor at the Political Science and International Relations Programme at Victoria University of Wellington. Her research interests focus on public opinion, political behaviour, and political representation. She has written numerous articles in leading political science and sociology journals, and has been a visiting fellow at different institutions, including the University of California Berkeley, the University of Sydney, and the Åbo Akademi University.

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