The effects of gender stereotypes on citizens’ perceptions of corruption: evidence from a conjoint survey experiment in Malaysia

Do gender stereotypes influence citizens’ perceptions of government corruption? Gender stereotypes of female politicians generally cast an image of higher ethical behavior when compared to their male counterparts. While recent research has established a causal relationship between women’s involvement in politics and reduced concerns about political corruption, the results are limited exclusively to a western sample-where there are more female politicians and generally more gender equity. As such, we cannot ascertain (1) whether the purported effects of gender stereotypes are more pronounced because non-western women are seen as even more ethical, honest, and trustworthy; and if so, (2) whether this difference is driven more by men or women-if not both. To examine this, I employed a conjoint survey experiment in Malaysia-home of one of the largest government corruption scandals globally to date (N=2000). The results suggest men are perceived to be more likely to engage in corruption than women at a higher rate than what the existing literature suggests-and that much of this finding is driven by male respondents.