Survey experiments increasingly show little respondent bias toward women leaders, suggesting decreased overt gender bias against women politicians. Women’s presence in politics has perhaps become normalized—but does acceptance of women leaders hold during tough times and when women leaders communicate stances counter to gender stereotypical expectations? This project advances the gender and crisis scholarship by focusing on voters’ evaluations of women and men leaders during tough times, defined as persistent disruptions to citizens’ daily lives. We analyse voters’ reactions to media reports about gendered actors responding to gendered crises, using an experimental design to vary the degree of gender-role congruence between the leader, the crisis type and the leader’s response. The media reports showcase a minister’s response to highly-disruptive strikes among either teachers or dock workers, which have ground either the education system or transport system to a halt. Fielded in England, where such strikes are common and where ministers are commonly blamed, the media story varies minister gender, the feminized or masculinized crisis type (education and transport, respectively), and adds a novel, third treatment arm: the ministers’ response to the strikers. We analyse how voters evaluate the minister’s response when they get tough (blame the strikers, threaten legal action, and refuse to negotiate) or seek collaboration (express empathy, promise to negotiate, and find common ground). This design allows us to explore whether voters’ evaluations of men and women ministers depend on whether the minister leads a role-congruent policy area and/or offers a role-congruent response. For example, how do voters respond when women leaders communicate toughness when navigating a masculinized policy area—like a dock workers strike—meaning the policy area and the response don’t match gender stereotypical expectations about women leaders’ competency and behavior? We hypothesize a penalty for gender role incongruity based on response (H1), and a double penalty for gender role incongruity based on response*crisis type (H2). We report results for a pilot (n=1400) and main survey (n=3000), anticipating that media reports will lead voters to penalize women politicians who transgress gender stereotypes by leading masculinized policy areas and communicating toughness.
