THE EFFECT OF CHILDRENS SEX ON PARENTS GENDER-ROLE ATTITUDES - AN EXTENSION USING JAPANESE DATA

The relationship between the gender of children in a family and their parents' gender-role attitudes in Japan is examined. Warner (1991) hyp othesized and found that American and Canadian parents with daughters tend to have more egalitarian gender-role;attitudes, probably due to a n extension of ''self-interest''. Given much stronger gender inequalit y in Japan, we expected that parents with daughters would have less eg alitarian gender-role attitudes. Japanese parents world try to reduce cognitive dissonance on their daughters' structural positions by accep ting gender inequalities. Findings about Japanese men's, if not women' s, gender-role attitudes support the hypothesis, controlling for demog raphic variables.