Associate Professor Victoria Baranov and her colleagues have been investigating the historical impact of skewed sex ratios on contemporary Australia, with insights for institutional and international environments.
The problem
Masculinity norms—collective expectations about how a ‘real’ man should behave—are implicated in explanations of higher rates of male violence, risk taking, intolerance for gay men, and refusal to do work perceived as feminine. But where do these norms come from?
The research
Victoria Baranov and her colleagues studied the present-day consequences of a natural historical experiment that created male-biased sex ratios, and heightened male-male competition, for over a century: convict-era Australia where there was an average sex ratio of more than 3 men for every woman.
The researchers showed that historical counties with male-biased populations had higher rates in the present day of bullying in school, crime, male suicide, males in masculine occupations, and lower support for same sex marriage in the 2017 referendum. Since sex ratios across Australia have been at parity for the last century, this can only be explained by masculinity norms.
The impact
The results can inform discussion about the long-term consequences of skewed sex ratios, whether in countries like China, India and parts of the Middle East, or in institutional settings, such as the army, police force, and executive boards.
Department: Economics
Area: Policy, politics and law; Media and culture
Researcher
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Sustainable Development Goals
We align our research activity with the United Nations' Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs).