IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/zbw/glodps/1640.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

Rowing with and against the flow: fatherhood of daughters and perception about women

Author

Listed:
  • Okara, Assi
  • Tani, Massimiliano
  • Mbaye, Linguère Mously

Abstract

We investigate whether having a daughter in a patriarchal society gives fathers a reason to reject prevailing social norms favouring gender discrimination against women. In particular, we develop a utility (rather than behavioural) model to frame the problem and derive hypotheses that can be empirically tested using cross-sectional data from the Senegal 2023 Demographic and Health Surveys (DHS). We find that fathering daughters can positively influence men's attitudes toward gender equity. In particular, men with daughters exhibit more positive attitudes toward women compared to their peers without daughters. This finding is robust across various sub-samples, particularly regarding violence-related outcome variables.

Suggested Citation

  • Okara, Assi & Tani, Massimiliano & Mbaye, Linguère Mously, 2025. "Rowing with and against the flow: fatherhood of daughters and perception about women," GLO Discussion Paper Series 1640, Global Labor Organization (GLO).
    • Handle: RePEc:zbw:glodps:1640
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://www.econstor.eu/bitstream/10419/323344/1/GLO-DP-1640.pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Esther Duflo, 2012. "Women Empowerment and Economic Development," Journal of Economic Literature, American Economic Association, vol. 50(4), pages 1051-1079, December.
    2. Nava Ashraf, 2009. "Spousal Control and Intra-household Decision Making: An Experimental Study in the Philippines," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 99(4), pages 1245-1277, September.
    3. Rachel Glennerster & Kudzai Takavarasha, 2013. "Running Randomized Evaluations: A Practical Guide," Economics Books, Princeton University Press, edition 1, number 10085.
    4. Goldin, Claudia, 1992. "Understanding the Gender Gap: An Economic History of American Women," OUP Catalogue, Oxford University Press, number 9780195072709.
    5. Alberto Alesina & Paola Giuliano & Nathan Nunn, 2013. "On the Origins of Gender Roles: Women and the Plough," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 128(2), pages 469-530.
    6. George A. Akerlof & Rachel E. Kranton, 2000. "Economics and Identity," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 115(3), pages 715-753.
    7. David Evans & Edward Miguel, 2007. "Orphans and schooling in africa: a longitudinal analysis," Demography, Springer;Population Association of America (PAA), vol. 44(1), pages 35-57, February.
    8. Emily Oster, 2019. "Unobservable Selection and Coefficient Stability: Theory and Evidence," Journal of Business & Economic Statistics, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 37(2), pages 187-204, April.
    9. Laurenzi, Christina & Mwamba, Chanda & Busakhwe, Chuma & Mutambo, Chipo & Mupakile, Eugene & Toska, Elona, 2024. "Social scripts of violence among adolescent girls and young women in Zambia: Exploring how gender norms and social expectations are activated in the aftermath of violence," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 356(C).
    10. Muriel Niederle & Lise Vesterlund, 2007. "Do Women Shy Away From Competition? Do Men Compete Too Much?," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 122(3), pages 1067-1101.
    11. C. Mark Blackden & Quentin Wodon, 2006. "Gender, Time Use, and Poverty in Sub-Saharan Africa," World Bank Publications - Books, The World Bank Group, number 7214.
    12. Daniel Kahneman & Amos Tversky, 2013. "Prospect Theory: An Analysis of Decision Under Risk," World Scientific Book Chapters, in: Leonard C MacLean & William T Ziemba (ed.), HANDBOOK OF THE FUNDAMENTALS OF FINANCIAL DECISION MAKING Part I, chapter 6, pages 99-127, World Scientific Publishing Co. Pte. Ltd..
    13. Fafchamps, Marcel & McKenzie, David & Quinn, Simon & Woodruff, Christopher, 2014. "Microenterprise growth and the flypaper effect: Evidence from a randomized experiment in Ghana," Journal of Development Economics, Elsevier, vol. 106(C), pages 211-226.
    14. Marianne Bertrand & Kevin F. Hallock, 2001. "The Gender Gap in Top Corporate Jobs," ILR Review, Cornell University, ILR School, vol. 55(1), pages 3-21, October.
    15. Blackden, Mark & Wodon, Quentin, 2006. "Gender, Time Use, and Poverty: Introduction," MPRA Paper 11080, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    16. Mary Hallward-Driemeier, 2013. "Enterprising Women : Expanding Economic Opportunities in Africa," World Bank Publications - Books, The World Bank Group, number 13785.
    17. Tomz, Michael & King, Gary & Zeng, Langche, 2003. "ReLogit: Rare Events Logistic Regression," Journal of Statistical Software, Foundation for Open Access Statistics, vol. 8(i02).
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Zhang, Y. Jane, 2013. "Culture and the Gender Gap in Competitive Inclination: Evidence from the Communist Experiment in China," MPRA Paper 47356, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    2. Claudia Olivetti & Barbara Petrongolo, 2016. "The Evolution of Gender Gaps in Industrialized Countries," Annual Review of Economics, Annual Reviews, vol. 8(1), pages 405-434, October.
    3. Gazeaud, Jules & Khan, Nausheen & Mvukiyehe, Eric & Sterck, Olivier, 2023. "With or without him? Experimental evidence on cash grants and gender-sensitive trainings in Tunisia," Journal of Development Economics, Elsevier, vol. 165(C).
    4. Doepke, M. & Tertilt, M., 2016. "Families in Macroeconomics," Handbook of Macroeconomics, in: J. B. Taylor & Harald Uhlig (ed.), Handbook of Macroeconomics, edition 1, volume 2, chapter 0, pages 1789-1891, Elsevier.
    5. Jeffrey A. Flory & Andreas Leibbrandt & John A. List, 2015. "Do Competitive Workplaces Deter Female Workers? A Large-Scale Natural Field Experiment on Job Entry Decisions," The Review of Economic Studies, Review of Economic Studies Ltd, vol. 82(1), pages 122-155.
    6. Fredriksson, Per G. & Gupta, Satyendra Kumar, 2023. "Irrigation and gender roles," Journal of Development Economics, Elsevier, vol. 163(C).
    7. Booth, Alison L., 2009. "Gender and competition," Labour Economics, Elsevier, vol. 16(6), pages 599-606, December.
    8. Liu, Chong & Lu, Wenyi & Yuan, Ye, 2025. "The quiet revolution: Send-down movement and female empowerment in China," Journal of Development Economics, Elsevier, vol. 172(C).
    9. Da Ke, 2021. "Who Wears the Pants? Gender Identity Norms and Intrahousehold Financial Decision‐Making," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 76(3), pages 1389-1425, June.
    10. Akerlof, Robert & Rayo, Luis, 2020. "Narratives and the Economics of the Family," The Warwick Economics Research Paper Series (TWERPS) 1299, University of Warwick, Department of Economics.
    11. Akerlof, Robert & Rayo, Luis, 2020. "Narratives and the Economics of the Family," CAGE Online Working Paper Series 503, Competitive Advantage in the Global Economy (CAGE).
    12. Rudolf, Robert & Wang, Shun & Wu, Fengyu, 2023. "The Arab Spring, a setback for gender equality? Evidence from the Gallup World Poll," Journal of Asian Economics, Elsevier, vol. 84(C).
    13. Tewodros Makonnen Gebrewolde & James Rockey, 2017. "The Global Gender Gap in Labor Income," Discussion Papers in Economics 17/14, Division of Economics, School of Business, University of Leicester.
    14. Naomi Friedman-Sokuler & Claudia Senik, 2025. "From pink collar to lab coat: cultural persistence and diffusion of socialist gender norms," Journal of Population Economics, Springer;European Society for Population Economics, vol. 38(1), pages 1-34, March.
    15. Booth, Alison & Nolen, Patrick, 2012. "Choosing to compete: How different are girls and boys?," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 81(2), pages 542-555.
    16. Rios, Vicente & Barba, Izaskun & Gianmoena, Lisa & Pascual, Pedro, 2024. "Clearing the smog ceiling: The impact of women’s political empowerment on air quality in European regions," European Journal of Political Economy, Elsevier, vol. 85(C).
    17. Finlay, Jocelyn E., 2021. "Women’s reproductive health and economic activity: A narrative review," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 139(C).
    18. Sreevidya Ayyar & Uta Bolt & Eric French & Cormac O'Dea, 2024. "Imagine your life at 25: Gender conformity and later-life outcomes," IFS Working Papers W24/32, Institute for Fiscal Studies.
    19. Stanislao Maldonado, 2024. "Empowering women through multifaceted interventions: long-term evidence from a double matching design," Journal of Population Economics, Springer;European Society for Population Economics, vol. 37(1), pages 1-44, March.
    20. Grogan, Louise, 2018. "Time use impacts of rural electrification: Longitudinal evidence from Guatemala," Journal of Development Economics, Elsevier, vol. 135(C), pages 304-317.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    ;
    ;
    ;
    ;
    ;

    JEL classification:

    • D63 - Microeconomics - - Welfare Economics - - - Equity, Justice, Inequality, and Other Normative Criteria and Measurement
    • J16 - Labor and Demographic Economics - - Demographic Economics - - - Economics of Gender; Non-labor Discrimination
    • Z13 - Other Special Topics - - Cultural Economics - - - Economic Sociology; Economic Anthropology; Language; Social and Economic Stratification

    NEP fields

    This paper has been announced in the following NEP Reports:

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:zbw:glodps:1640. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: ZBW - Leibniz Information Centre for Economics (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/glabode.html .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.