PARTY ELITES AND WOMEN CANDIDATES - THE SHAPE OF BIAS

Using a four state survey of party county chairs and locally elected w omen, this study finds support for the notion that potential women can didates are subject to bias in recruitment that hinders the cause of e lecting more women to state legislatures and Congress. It is hypothesi zed that bias is most likely due to one of two processes: one, the out group effect where negative evaluations of women as candidates are pre dicated on their lack of surface similarity to the predominantly male party elite, or two, the distribution effect where negative evaluation s of women as candidates are predicated on the relative paucity of wom en in high status positions generally and politics specifically Strong support was found for the outgroup effect, as party chairs consistent ly preferred candidates more like themselves. Given the ubiquity of me n in the party elite, such outgroup biased attitudes represent a signi ficant hurdle for prospective women candidates.