Gender, Competition and Matrilineal Inheritance

尽管女性在职场上已经在追赶男性方面取得了巨大进步，但在工资和晋升水平上，性别差距仍然存在。人们对这些差异的原因知之甚少。一种假设是，女性对竞争的偏好和对风险的态度有生物或自然的根源。如果是这样的话，这些偏好差异的结果可能很难消除。然而，最近的研究表明，在竞争偏好方面的性别差距，特别是与文化制度，特别是男孩和女孩的抚养方式有关。这对观察到的性别差异提出了一个完全不同的解释：女孩观察到并被教导的行为模式导致她们长大后的行为与男孩不同。先前对坦桑尼亚马赛人和印度卡西人的研究表明，母系遗传（遗传给女孩，而不是男孩）和母系婚姻（男人离开家加入妻子的家庭）导致女性更具竞争力。目前的项目旨在通过研究马拉维八种不同母系和母系习俗的力量和历史的文化对竞争的偏好，进一步了解文化与性别偏好之间的联系。通过比较同一国家的不同文化机构和从事类似活动的家庭的偏好，该研究项目可以更好地隔离文化和偏好之间的联系。此外，本研究将审查这些文化差异对男女生活的影响，特别是这些文化选择对其儿童（包括男孩和女孩）的人力资本（教育和保健）进行投资的方式。对发达国家工作场所结果的研究表明，对竞争的偏好会导致成年人的不同结果，本研究将检验文化制度（如母系婚姻）和成年人教育水平等结果之间联系的证据。

Although women have made huge strides in catching up with men in the workplace, a gender gap persists in both wages and levels of advancement. The reasons for these differences are poorly understood. One hypothesis is that women's preferences for engaging in competition and attitudes toward risk have a biological or natural root. If so, the outcomes of these differences in preferences may be hard to eliminate. However, recent research has shown that the gender gap in preferences for competition, in particular, is correlated with cultural institutions particularly the way boys and girls are raised. This suggests an altogether different explanation for the observed gender gaps: girls observe and are taught patterns of behavior that lead them to behave differently from boys when they grow up. Previous research with the Maasai in Tanzania and the Khasi in India suggest that matrilineal inheritance (inheritance to girls, not boys) and matrilocal marriage (men leave their home to join the household of their wife) lead women to be more competitive. The current project aims to further our understanding of the link between culture and the gender gap in preferences for competition by examining preferences for competition across eight cultures in Malawi that differ in the strength and history of matriliny and matrilocal customs. By comparing preferences across cultural institutions in the same country and for households that engage in similar activities the research project can better isolate the link between culture and preferences.In addition, this study will examine the implications of these cultural differences on the lives of men and women and in particular, the way these cultures choose to invest in the human capital (education and health) of their children, both boys and girls. The research on workplace outcomes in developed countries suggests that preferences for competition can lead to different outcomes in adults and this study will examine the evidence for links between cultural institutions (such as matriliny) and outcomes like education levels in adults.