Why are female politicians more often targeted with violence? New findings confirm depressing suspicions

The study focused on Italian mayors. Our findings support the idea that women face double standards when it comes to political violence. They are targeted even when they make the same decisions as men. Misogyny and gender bias may cause people to judge female leaders more harshly. Using detailed measures of mayoral performance, we found that the gender gap in attacks only appears when mayors perform poorly. In these cases, women are more likely to be targeted than men for similar shortcomings. This aligns with other evidence of double standards against women in the corporate world.