Rejection on the rise

Austrians find gendering increasingly unimportant

Austrians find gender-neutral language less and less important.

(Bild: stock.adobe.com)

Austrians' approval of gender equality has fallen in recent years. This was the result of a survey conducted by the Linz-based opinion research institute IMAS, the results of which were published on Friday. Just under a third have never heard of gender-neutral language, and the issue is probably most important to young women.

62% - six percentage points more than in 2016 - have heard of gender-neutral language, 32% have not, and 6% do not know. In any case, gender-neutral language is not used diligently: 52% stated that they never use gender-neutral language, twelve percent each "rarely" and "sometimes" and only four percent "always".

Significant increase in rejection
Specifically, the 1025 Austrians interviewed in January and February were asked whether "these initiatives (on gender-neutral language, note) and the associated changes in the German language, for example the use of all gender groups by means of a colon, which also includes personal designations between the masculine and feminine, for example 'students', are developing in the right direction overall". While 27% answered yes in 2016, this year it was only 19%. On the other hand, the number of those against increased from 46% to 63%.

65% of respondents think that gender-equitable language is not important for strengthening all gender groups in our society, while 25% do. In general, women and those with a higher level of education think more highly of it than men and those with a lower level of formal education.

Older women are also skeptical
However, the gap between young and older women is particularly striking: While 33 percent of women under 50 consider gendering to be important, only 20 percent of women over 50 do, making the latter more skeptical of gender-neutral language than men at 25 (young) and 23 (old) percent.

The opinion researchers also subjected their test subjects to a practical experiment: one half were asked to spontaneously name well-known sportsmen and women, politicians and pop musicians, while the other half were asked to name "sportsmen and women", "politicians", etc. The result was that the names mentioned did not differentiate between men and women. Conclusion: The names mentioned hardly differed between the two groups.