When XX marks the ballot: Six gender myths

JoNel Aleccia Health writer • E-mail

Less than two weeks before an election marked — some would say scarred — by historic firsts for female candidates, the presidential campaigns are still convulsing over the classic question: “What do women want?”

Whether they’re fretting over the neck-and-neck race for the votes of married women or striving to bolster support among still-undecided baby boomers, presidential candidates Barack Obama and John McCain are trying to seal the deal with the ladies, whose turnout is expected to be large — and crucial.

Despite the attention lavished on female voters during this nearly two-year campaign, persistent myths linger about how and why women vote the way they do.

It's still widely assumed that women automatically align with gender or are solely responsible for the gender gap, analysts note.

Here’s a primer on the most common myths about women voters, gleaned from interviews with political scientists and pollsters and a review of past voting patterns.

Myth No. 1: Women vote as a group  
The myth of a single-minded sisterhood among women voters alternately amuses and annoys political scientists, especially those who must routinely remind people that diversity abounds among more than half of the nation’s population.

“Women aren’t a monolithic vote,” said Barbara Norrander, a political science professor at the University of Arizona.

Women make up not only more of the general population, but also more of the adult voters, totaling about 67 million in the 2004 presidential election, compared to 58 million men, according to U.S. census reports. But unlike slightly more predictable ethnic, racial or religious groups, women do not share a common geography of place, persuasion or philosophy. And they certainly don’t vote in a united bloc.

“Women’s political preferences, attitudes and partisan choices are heterogeneous and vary along race, ethnic and class lines,” noted Karen Beckwith, a political science professor at Case Western Reserve University in Cleveland, and the author of a new book, “Political Women and American Democracy.”

Women aren’t even adequately captured by popular categories that are supposed to define and unite them, noted Maryann Barakso, an assistant professor of political science at the University of Massachusetts at Amherst.

“We’ve had the soccer moms, the security moms,” said Barakso, who neglected to mention hockey moms. “Those monikers didn’t explain much then and I think it explains even less now."

Mark Blumenthal of the National Journal, who's also editor and publisher of the poll tracking site Pollster.com, agrees.

“My own sense is that elections are rarely about one type of voter, soccer moms, NASCAR dads, whatever, even though news coverage makes it seem that way,” he said. “To the extent that turnout among a particular demographic is going to matter, the one that is most important is men and women under age 30 or 35.” 

Myth No. 2: Women vote less often
Perhaps that’s why, early in the primary season, there was a spate of stories fretting about the “single, anxious female” and emphasizing a get-out-the-vote imperative aimed at pushing reluctant women, particularly young women, to the polls.

While it’s true that unmarried women vote less often than married women — about 55 percent to nearly 65 percent, according to 2004 reported census figures — in the big picture, women vote more often than men.

“It’s definitely true that overall women are voting more frequently than men,” said Barakso, who noted that in every presidential election since 1980 and in every mid-term election since 1986, women have registered and voted in larger numbers.

Margie Omero, president of the Democractic polling firm Momentum Analysis, noted in a Pollster.com blog that although single women are less likely to vote than their married counterparts, they’re much more likely to vote than unmarried men, by 55 percent to 46 percent. “The marriage gap is actually larger among men,” Omero wrote.

In 2004, 8.8 million more women than men reported that they voted in the presidential election, U.S census figures show, a number that likely could be eclipsed this year, thanks to record numbers of newly registered voters.

“It has the potential to have women determining the outcome of the election,” said Debbie Walsh, director of the Center for American Women and Politics at Rutgers University.

Groups such as the Women’s Voices. Women Vote Action Fund aimed to register more than 7 million unmarried women in 24 states before Election Day.

Myth No. 3: Women favor female candidates
Of all the myths about women voters, the notion that they always support fellow females — the so-called “affinity effect” — remains the most egregious, said Kathleen Dolan, a professor of political science at the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee. There’s no history at the presidential level, of course, but a review of other high-profile national races between 1990 and 2000 showed that women are swayed much more by party than gender.

“Party identification is the single biggest predictor of choice among women — and men,” Dolan said.

Sometimes, women appear to be favoring women candidates, but it usually turns out that they’re supporting Democrats, whose ranks include 60 percent to 65 percent of all female candidates, Dolan said.

“We don’t have any evidence that women cross party lines to vote for a candidate,” she said.

That may be why the selection Sarah Palin as a vice-presidential nominee failed to sway women beyond a brief “bounce” just after the Republican convention, added Barakso.

“The idea that, somehow, Sarah Palin’s nomination would attract Hillary Clinton supporters was completely inaccurate,” she said.

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