Educational expansion and declining religiosity in Italy : a pathway to support for gender egalitarianism among men and women?

Abstract

Cultural norms connected to the role of women in society have been changing in Italy. This article asks whether educational expansion and declining religiosity act as possible change-inducing factors to foster gender egalitarianism and if so, whether they influence all age groups or only the young in their formative years. I employ a hierarchical age-period-cohort cross-classified random effects model across sixteen cohorts based on micro-level data from the European Values Study’s (1990 - 2020) Italian sample integrated with historical and contemporary contextual measures of educational expansion and secularization. Results show that overall, the changes over time in gender egalitarianism attributable to education and religiosity are mostly driven by period effects, not cohort replacement. I do not find socialization experiences connected to levels of (female) education and religiosity common to particular cohorts to result in distinct gender egalitarian attitudes of these cohorts.