A multidimensional perspective on gender beliefs and perceptions among Colombian couples

Gender perceptions and beliefs produce and reproduce gender inequalities as they are linked to individuals’ decisions related to family formation, how to organize care for children, and related, labour market participation and economic independence. Dyadic data on couple’s gender perceptions and beliefs is scarce though indispensable to understand to understand how couples negotiate gendered practices around family and work.

The Colombian 2015 Demographic and Health Survey provides a unique opportunity to study homogamy and heterogamy in gender perceptions and beliefs for more than 12,500 heterosexual and coresident couples. Our first objective is to study the prevalence of coresident couples sharing (or not) gender beliefs and perceptions. Second, we are interested in how gender role homogamy and heterogamy is associated with age, educational and labour homogamy and heterogamy. Additionally, we apply a gender lens when distinguishing gender role heterogamy when the female partner is less traditional than her partner and vice versa. Our methodological approach includes the use of Multiple Correspondence Analysis to estimate the gender beliefs profiles.

Preliminary results suggest three gender beliefs profiles among Colombians: non-egalitarian, egalitarian and ambiguous beliefs. A quarter of the individuals have non-egalitarian gender beliefs, this percentage is higher in women compared with men, most of the individuals (5 out of 10) can be categorized with ambiguous belief, and around 30 per cent are identified with egalitarian beliefs. In terms of the couples, there is a high number with gender beliefs heterogamy, which are associated with greater educational hypergamy in cases where women have more ambiguous gender beliefs than their partners, on the other hand, in couples with gender beliefs homogamy we observe greater age, educational and occupational homogamy especially among those who share more gender egalitarian beliefs.