Ideological constraint, political interest and gender: a Swedish-American comparison

Abstract. American and Swedish university and gymnasia students were examined in order to discover whether or not evidence could be found for higher levels of: a) ideological coherence, b) political interest, c) ideological variance, and d) strength of interface between political party preference and political self-concept on the one hand and socio-political attitudes on the other for Swedish citizens as compared to American citizens. The results confirmed the hypotheses in almost all cases and the results are discussed in terms of differences between the nations' political party environments.