Do feminists use quantitative methods? a Content

Transcript:Do feminists use quantitative methods? a Content:
Do feminists use quantitative methods? a Content Analysis of ‘Women’s Studies’ Journals Rachel Cohen, Christina Hughes, Richard Lampard Study outline Preliminary analysis of articles published in gender, women’s studies and feminist journals. Journals selected from ISI citation index (‘Women’s Studies’ category). Top cited journals (English language), plus selected others with ‘feminist’/’feminism’ in title. Analysis of every full article in first and last issue of 2007 (unless ‘Special Issue’, then next issue chosen). Current N = 256 articles from 19 journals. Future project – extend this historically. Journals included in the study Journals included N articles Gender and Society 11 Women's Health Issues 13 Gender, Work and Organisation 9 Feminist Review 16 Feminist Studies 12 Gender, Place and Culture 14 Women's Studies International Forum 14 Violence Against Women 12 Psychology of Women Quarterly 19 Social Politics 10 Journals included N articles European Journal of Women's Studies 9 Journal of Gender Studies 11 Women and Health 13 Feminism and Psychology 11 Sex Roles 24 Journal of Aging 11 Feminist Economics 9 Signs 12 Journal of Women’s Health 26 Total 256 Overview of methodological approaches in Women’s Studies articles. Overview of feminist engagement in Women’s Studies articles. Variation by journal (discipline?) Exemplar quantitative journals: Women’s Health Issues: 92% Quantitative, 8% mixed Psychology of Women Quarterly: 84% Quant, 16% mixed Feminist Economics: 67% Quant, 33% Theoretical Exemplar non-quantitative journals Feminist Review: 92% Qualitative, 8% Mixed Gender, Place and Culture: 57% Qual, 36% Theoretical, 7% Quant Feminism and Psychology: 73% Qual, 18% Theoretical, 9% Quant Framing of publication spaces and methodological choice Geographic base and methodological choice Logistic Regression of quantitative methods use (summary) The following increased the likelihood of quantitative methods being used: US author affiliation Publishing in a journal with ‘women’ identification Male second author (first, third and fourth authors have no significant influence!) Absence of methodological justification The following decreased the likelihood of quantitative methods being used: Publishing in a journal with ‘feminist’, ‘women studies’ or ‘gender’ identification Engagement with feminist literature (note: this accounted for all of an initial effect of explicit feminist positioning) Either feminist, transformative or ‘other’ methodological justification Do feminists count? Published articles on women, gender and feminism do employ quantitative methods. But those published in explicitly feminist/gender studies journals that engage most thoroughly with the feminist literature rarely do. Moreover, even when quantitative methods are used by feminists, explicitly ‘feminist’ methodological justifications for using quantitative methods are