Social dominance orientation, ambivalent sexism, and abortion: Explaining pro-choice and pro-life attitudes

Abstract

Abortion continues to be one of the most hotly debated issues in American politics. Despite its prominence in the public discourse, little social psychological work has been done to understand the ideological bases of individuals’ attitudes toward abortion. The current chapter seeks to address this oversight by using social dominance theory (Sidanius and Pratto, 1999) and the theory of ambivalent sexism (Glick and Fiske, 1996) to explain attitudes toward abortion. Specifically, we argue that individuals with a preference for group-based hierarchy – a variable referred to as social dominance orientation (SDO) – use beliefs about gender roles in order to justify their attitudes toward abortion. We tested this hypothesis by having 242 participants complete the SDO scale (Pratto, Sidanius, Stallworth, and Malle, 1994) and the Ambivalent Sexism Inventory (ASI; Glick and Fiske, 1996) – a measure that divides gender role attitudes into two components: 1) hostile sexism (HS) and 2) benevolent sexism (BS). After controlling for religiosity and previous abortion experience, multiple regression analyses indicated that SDO was significantly associated with attitudes toward both elective abortion (e.g., the woman wants an abortion, regardless of the reason) and traumatic abortion (e.g., the woman is pregnant as a result of rape or incest). The relationships between SDO and attitudes toward the two types of abortion were, however, mediated by the ASI. Specifically, HS and BS mediated the relationship between SDO and opposition to elective abortion, while only BS mediated the relationship between SDO and opposition to traumatic abortion. The implications of these findings are discussed within the context of intergroup relations.