Associations Between Men's and Women's Conformity to Masculine Role Norms and Firearm Ownership: Contributions Beyond, Race, Gender, and Political Ideology

Many of the problems linked to rigid adherence to traditional masculine role norms, such as violence and suicide, are exponentially more dangerous when a firearm is involved. Despite men being disproportionately more likely to own a firearm compared to women, however, comparatively few researchers have examined the links between masculinity and firearm ownership. Understanding the common characteristics of the typical firearm owner beyond established demographic qualities (e.g., White, male, and politically conservative) may provide important information to inform harm reduction programs revolving around reducing firearm access. Accordingly, the present study tested the relative contributions of conformity to nine masculine norms as predictors of the likelihood of owning a firearm in a sample of men and women: Emotional Control, Winning, Playboy, Violence, Self-Reliance, Risk-Taking, Power Over Women, Primacy of Work, and Heterosexual Self-Presentation. A total of 665 U.S. participants (206 men and 459 women) were recruited through Amazon's Mechanical Turk system. The mean age of the total sample was 20.91 (SD = 7.61), and 20% reported currently owning one or more firearms. A negative binomial regression revealed that firearm ownership was best explained by a combination of being White, a man, politically conservative, and reporting more conformity to masculine role norms emphasizing violence, risk taking, and power over women, as well as (for women only) less conformity to playboy norms. These results suggest that owning a firearm may be a behavioral manifestation of a broader traditional gender role identity. Implications for harm reduction programs centered on firearms access are discussed.