Determine the indicator's value by using the following methodology:
1) Define who can be considered as ‘staff’ for the purpose of this indicator. It is recommended to include also the staff of partner organizations, relevant volunteers, consultants, and contractors.
2) Prepare a set of 8 to 12 statements expressing attitudes that either positively or negatively influence gender equality. Ensure that the statements are most relevant to:
- common gender-related attitudes in the given culture (do not guess these; identify them using interviews with key informants and reviewing relevant research, such as the IMAGES studies and Demographic Health Surveys)
- gender-related attitudes that you (do not) want the project staff to have (e.g. due to the nature of a project’s work)
- gender-related attitudes that negatively affect not only women but also men
Below you can see some examples of such statements. However, you are strongly discouraged from using them automatically – the statements you use must be relevant to the culture you work in.
EXAMPLES OF STATEMENTS
Our project’s gender focal person/gender officer should be a woman.
A man’s job is to earn money; a woman’s job is to look after the house and the family.
Real men should not be showing their feelings and emotions.
Women should work less outside the home and devote more time to caring for their families.
It is more important for boys to have good education than for girls.
A man should have the final word on decisions in his home.
The husband should decide when to use contraception.
A woman should not have more education than her husband.
Changing diapers, giving kids a bath & feeding kids are the responsibilities of mothers, not fathers.
Men make better [select: political, community] leaders than women.
A man should be the one who provides the most income to the family.
A woman should be free to refuse sex with her husband / partner.
In certain situations, it is acceptable for a person to hit their partner.
It is a woman’s responsibility to avoid getting pregnant.
A girl should obey the men of her family.
Women should have the same chance of being elected in elections as men.
3) Decide how the responses will be analysed. You should provide 2 points for each response representing strong gender equality and 1 point for each response representing moderate gender equality. For example, in the case of the statement, “A man should have the final word about decisions in his home”, the response:
- “strongly agrees” would represent very weak gender equality (i.e. no point given)
- “somewhat agrees” would represent weak gender equality (i.e. no point given)
- “somewhat disagrees” would represent moderate gender equality (i.e. 1 point given)
- “strongly disagrees” would represent strong gender equality (i.e. 2 points given)
Remember that depending on how the statement is phrased, the meaning of each response changes – for example, in the case of the statement “A woman should be free to refuse sex with her husband / partner”, the response “strongly agrees” represents strong gender equality. Mark such statements for reverse scoring in the analysis section.
4) Decide on the minimum score one needs to achieve to be considered as having “supportive attitudes towards gender equality”.
5) Incorporate the selected statements into a questionnaire. Use an anonymous online questionnaire to make people comfortable sharing their opinions honestly. For each statement, ask people to indicate their (dis)agreement by choosing one of the following options: 1) strongly agrees; 2) somewhat agrees; 3) somewhat disagrees; 4) strongly disagrees.
6) Ask all relevant staff to complete the online survey. Emphasize that the survey is anonymous and encourage honest responses.
7) For each respondent, calculate the total number of points using the system agreed upon in point 3 (see above). The minimum number of points can be zero (highly unsupportive attitudes towards gender equality), and the highest number (highly supportive attitudes towards gender equality) equals the number of survey questions multiplied by a maximum of 2 points per question. For example, 8 survey questions multiplied by 2 equals the highest possible score of 16 points.
8) Count the number of respondents who achieved the minimum score (see point 4).
9) To calculate the indicator’s value, divide the number of respondents who achieved the minimum score (or more) by the total number of surveyed respondents. Multiply the result by 100 to convert it to a percentage.