Attitudes towards Gender Equality of Government Institution ́s Workers in Southeastern Mexico

The objective of this research was to analyze if there are differences between the Institutions of Social and Public Security Assistance and between men and women who work for the government of the State of Campeche, southeastern Mexico. This article uses a quantitative methodology; For this, the Questionnaire "Attitudes towards Gender Equality" (CAIG) was applied, which was prepared by Amelia Sola, Isabel Martínez Bellonch and José Luis Meliá (2003), validated in a Mexican sample by Olga Marfil Herrera (2006) with an alpha of Cronbach's .885. The sample was composed of 212 people, 79 women and 133 men, six factors were evaluated. The Student's t-test revealed that there are significant differences; the Social Assistance Institutions present greater egalitarian attitudes as does the group of women. Meanwhile, the percentiles show these egalitarian attitudes at a medium level. The Analysis of Variance (ANOVA) to compare groups revealed regarding religion, there are significant differences between the Christian, the Catholic and the people who claim to have no religious beliefs; Catholics are those who present a more favorable attitude towards gender equality.


Introduction
Gender has become important based on its construction as an analytical category; gender studies are often discussed to explain its relationship with violence, identity or gender policies, among others (Lamas, 2007, cited in Bogino & Fernández-Rasines, 2017. To talk about gender, you must talk about biological sex; purely natural human male or female, unlike gender, which is defined as male or female based on their sex. Thus, gender is a cultural construction of meanings and of behaviors imposed on it (Osborne & Molina, 2008).
Similarly, Bogino & Fernández-Rasines (2017) mention that the gender category is used to analyze human relationships, these relationships that appear to be natural, which shows that there are power relationships behind the dichotomy; man and woman; a binarism, which promotes a category of critical analysis. This is how the interaction of the relations of men and women through their sex is organized, such as the division of labor, which shows the socially constituted differences that lead to identities with genders that adapt to structured social norms and the expectations of each culture (Osborne & Molina, 2008). It is worth mentioning that in most cultures they have the purpose of imposing heteronormativity and whoever leaves it may suffer situations of inequality and discrimination, hindering their opportunities to develop the life they desire.
In relation to this, Husain-Tolero & Muñoz (2019) found that in the leadership of women in Colombia the existence of female representations in the military context was insufficient, since "the glass ceiling" was one of the limitations among many others, which were conceived to believe that the feminine is related to attributes that do not belong to leadership. Camacho (2011) mentions that the women who enter these spaces where they are traditionally based on male roles, the high income of the female gender is hindered, since it is thought that they do not have what is necessary and support is less. Anzorena (2019) claims that the need to intervene as public institutions is essential since actions that modify the inequality relations that they sometimes promote in some cases must be guaranteed, an example of this would be the militarized institutions that are accused of producing and reproducing gender inequalities, however, these are not the only ones.
On the other hand, Estrada & Pérez (2009) found in a university sample, women have attitudes oriented towards gender equality compared to men, since the social order favors the masculine gender, therefore these different attitudes are shown in a population from Campeche, Mexico. While Moreno, Soto, Gonzáles & Valenzuela (2017) demonstrated changes in attitudes and behaviors associated with gender in the classroom, under an action research questioning with critical analysis the social ordering of gender; they had favorable results in the men, greater respect was shown to their companions, leaving aside reification and sexism attitudes, seeing them as equals, in the same way it happened in the case of women, reducing sexist behavior towards them.
Contrasting the attitudes of men and women, Bem's Sexual Role Inventory was applied in Chile, which concludes that men compared to women present more negative attitudes towards homosexuality or homosexual behavior (Barra, 2002). Discrimination is based on different reasons and religious influence is one of the important factors. Tarducci (2001) mentions that religions are generally family oriented, promoting specific behaviors and expectations for men and women, which favor male dominance. One of these examples is that women establish domestic and family roles (private sphere) and men exercise political and religious leadership (public sphere).
Therefore, some research such as that carried out in Andalusia Spain found that non-Catholic people show a more egalitarian attitude regarding sexual orientation than Catholic people (Rodríguez, 2011). In the same way, with 356 health science students from a private university in Monterrey, Mexico, they found that people with a Christian religion show greater rejection of homosexuality followed by Catholics, the group that has the greatest acceptance of homosexuality are the people belonging to other cults (Moral & Valle, 2012). Consequently, it is important to know the attitudes towards gender equality in men and women who are part of the staff of government institutions in the state of Campeche, Mexico, in charge of promoting, preparing and executing public policies with a view to consolidating the family nucleus, inclusion and gender equality.
The objective of this study was to analyze if there are differences between the Institutions of Social and Public Security Assistance and between men and women who work for the government of the State of Campeche, Mexico. We hypothesized that there are differences in attitudes towards gender equality between men and women in this sample (Hypothesis 1) and there are differences in attitudes towards gender equality between the different Social Assistance and Public Security Institutions (Hypothesis 2), just as there are differences between people's religious status regarding their attitudes towards gender equality (Hypothesis 3).

Method
The methodological design was descriptive because the data obtained were compared and analyzed without influencing the behavior of the sample; it had a quantitative approach since it was intended to collect and analyze the statistical data obtained from the Questionnaire on Attitudes towards Gender Equality; it is non-experimental in nature as none of the variables were manipulated and finally, the study is also cross-sectional because the research focused on analyzing attitudes towards gender equality at a given time.

Participants
The sample was no probabilistic of 212 people (100%), 133 men (62.73%) employees and 79 (37.26%) women employees of Government Institutions, distributed as follows. The number of participants in the sample was determined by the number of people to which each institution allowed access. Institutions were contacted through the Humanities Faculty of the Autonomous University of ijps.ccsenet.org International Journal of Psychological Studies Vol. 12, No. 3;2020 Campeche, each institution subsequently allowed access to a certain number of people who work in them. All the participants signed a personal data protection confidentiality letter and informed consent.

Measures
For the evaluation, the Attitudes towards Gender Equality Questionnaire (Cuestionario de Actitudes hacia la Igualdad de Géneros CAIG) made by Amelia Sola, Isabel Martínez Benlloch and José Luis Meliá (2003), validated in a Mexican sample by Olga Marfil Herrera (2006), was used. The questionnaire is intended to measure the degree of egalitarianism in attitudes towards gender.
It consists of 30 items that are answered on a Likert-type scale (1 = total disagreement, 7 = total agreement); The questionnaire reveals a structure of six factors: aspects related to sexual orientation (ASO), aspects related to religious symbolism (ARS), values and structure of couples (VSC), private sphere (PS), public sphere (PBS) and sexuality and personal freedom (SPF) with five items each, some written in reverse and therefore scored as a mirror.
It is worth mentioning that the reliability level obtained in this application Cronbach's alpha reliability analysis was .885, an acceptable value since the minimum value required for Cronbach's alpha coefficient is 0.7; which means that the instruments that are below this percentage their internal consistency is not reliable for their requirements (Celina & Campo, 2005).

Methodological Procedure
The selection of the sample has been considered as non-probabilistic of convenience, since only some dependencies of Social Welfare Institutions and Public Security were selected as inclusion criteria, which agreed to participate in the investigation. Once the permits were obtained, people were given an informed consent form, in which personal information was respected as confidential according to ethical standards. In the first instance, data collection was carried out by applying the CAIG to both male and female workers and workers of these institutions, who received the instructions and the necessary support to respond to it. Subsequently, the collected data were analyzed quantitatively.

Data Analysis
The data analysis was carried out using the SPSS 25 program, which is software that allows statistical data to be analyzed. The Kolmogorov-Smirnov normality test was first performed, in which it was found that the normality of the distribution (sig. >.05), so the following parametric tests were carried out; Student's t-test was used. This test allows comparisons to be made between two groups and to identify whether or not there are statistically significant differences between men and women and between the two aforementioned government institutions. Percentiles were obtained to place each group in any of the three low, medium, and high levels in relation to their egalitarian attitudes. ANOVA was used to compare groups in terms of belonging to a religion.

Results
The obtained descriptive results are as follows.  As can be seen in Table 2, all the factors show a (bilateral) significance of .000*, which shows a statistically significant difference between the group of social assistance and public security.
The differences are statistically significant (.000*) in the total CAIG scores, it should be noted that Public Safety Institutions maintains the lowest mean compared to Social Assistance Institutions in all factors, which shows less equal attitudes in workers in Public Security compared to workers in Social Assistance Institutions. The ASO factor, which refers to equal rights between people with different sexual orientation, finds a statistically significant difference (.004 *) between men and women, with women having the highest mean.
The VSC factor that includes normative aspects about the couple and desirable potential characteristics show statistically significant differences (.000 *) between men and women.
The PS factor which alludes to the supposed differences between the sexes, in interest and abilities, in the private sphere there is a statistically significant difference (.014 *) between men and women regarding their egalitarian attitudes.
The PBS factor is about the training and adaptation of the sexes in the public sphere, there is a statistically significant difference (.000 *) between men and women.
In the total score of the factors of the CAIG a statistically significant difference (.000 *) is found between both sexes, it is worth mentioning that in all the factors it is observed that women have the highest means. In Table 4 there is a statistically significant difference between the means in all the factors of CAIG as well as in the total score of the same in relation to the religion to which they belong.
In the ASO factor shows a statistically significant difference (.005 *), people who identify with the Christian religion have the lowest average compared to Catholics who have the highest average in more egalitarian attitudes towards people of different sexual orientation.
The VP factor there are statistically significant differences (.015 *) in which people of different religions that are not categorized in the sample are observed to have the lowest mean followed by people who do not identify with any religion. While people with a Christian religion have the highest mean, followed by people with a Catholic religion, which means that they have more egalitarian attitudes regarding the normative aspects of the couple and the desirable potential characteristics for the other sex. The PBS factor has statistically significant differences (.034 *) which reflects that people who do not belong to any religion have the lowest mean, followed by people who have some other religion that is not in the sample categories, while people of Christian religion show the highest average in relation to the capacity of the sexes to develop in the public sphere, followed by people of Catholic religion.
The SPF factor that is related to the alleged differences in aspects such as sexual impulses, security, personal freedom and autonomy capacity has statistically significant differences (.004) where people who do not belong to any religion have the lowest mean, while the mean highest is in the Catholic religion group.
The total CAIG score shows that the group indicating that they belong to one of the other non-categorized existing religions has the lowest mean while Catholics retain the highest mean. La prueba post hoc de Tukey, demostró que las diferencias entre grupos respecto a los factores del CAIG y la puntuación total, se dan principalmente entre el grupo de personas católicas y personas con otra religión no pertenecientes al grupo de cristianos.  A three-way ANOVA analysis was performed to determine the interaction of the independent variables with the total CAIG score, it was found that only the institution variable to which they belong influences the dependent variable (CAIG) (p <0.05). Regarding the interaction between independent variables, the combination religion * institution influences together (p <0.05), not so with the interaction religion * sex; sex * institution; and religion * institution * sex.

Discussion
There is a statistically significant difference between the Social Assistance and Public Security Institutions in all the factors of the CAIG and in its total score. As some studies on the armed forces mention, there are stereotypes in this profession since it has been considered a masculinized space, which is governed by practices that promote hegemonic masculinity (Camacho, 2011). Also, from the statistics it is observed that female participation in Public Security Institutions is lower in comparison with Social Assistance Institutions. Consequently, Camacho (2011) mentions that women who enter these environments where they are traditionally based on "male roles" make it difficult for women to enter as they are believed to lack the necessary parameters and are not supported or encouraged. However, in recent years through advertising, the female population has been invited to integrate, which in a certain way we see that even so the majority are still men, regardless of this, the armed forces and the police must be sensitized to have favorable environments for both men as women without questioning their performance in relation to their gender. It is worth mentioning that in an investigation by Husain-Tolero & Muñoz (2019) they found that in the military context there are limitations, women are allowed to enter certain positions in the hierarchy, however, only up to a certain level. So, it is more common to expect that workers in Public Security Institutions show less egalitarian attitudes compared to people who work in Social Assistance Institutions.
As it can be observed in the results of the attitudes towards gender equality, statistically significant differences were found between men and women in the total CAIG score, it should be noted that in all the factors it is observed that women have the highest means.
In an investigation carried out by Estrada & Pérez (2009) in Campeche, Mexico, they found that university women show more gender equality-oriented attitudes compared to university men, although it can be said then that the social and cultural order favors gender inequality, which makes it clear that in terms of equality, men and women have differentiated attitudes. It is important to raise awareness in the different institutions, as well as governmental, non-governmental, educational institutions among many others. ijps.ccsenet.org International Journal of Psychological Studies Vol. 12, No. 3;2020 Since in an action research carried out in Chile by Moreno, Soto, Gonzáles & Valenzuela (2017) they showed changes in attitudes and behaviors associated with gender in classrooms, considering that their purpose was to actively question the social ordering of gender under critical analysis, having as a result the change of attitudes in men mainly since they showed greater respect towards their partners, leaving aside attitudes of objectification and sexism, in the same way it happened in the case of women, decreasing sexist behaviors towards them, increasing their self-care behaviors and limits of respect. Due to the aforementioned, it is important to work on gender mainstreaming in all educational institutions as well as government and independent programs and institutions. On another hand, Ojeda & Jiménez (2016) mentions that in families, gender roles do not yet reflect the changes of thought that manifest egalitarian attitudes, they continue to find the existence of deeply rooted stereotypes.
Regarding the factor related to sexual orientation, in a study carried out in Chile in 2002 in which Bem's Sexual Role Inventory was applied, it was concluded that men compared to women present more negative attitudes in relation to homosexuality or homosexual behavior (Barra, 2002). This may be the result of the conceptualization of the hegemonic masculinization in which men live, impacting on their personal relationships and how they have been built, which is related to behaviors of rejection or discrimination against other men who, in this case, may have a sexual orientation different from heterosexual. Statistically significant differences were found between the factors of the CAIG and religion because in the factor aspects related to sexual orientation, the Catholic religion has the highest mean in relation to equal attitudes among people of different sexual orientation compared to those of religion Christian showing the lowest mean. While in a similar investigation carried out in Andalusia, Spain by Rodríguez (2011) found that non-Catholic people have shown a more egalitarian attitude regarding sexual orientation than Catholic people. This is contrary to what was found in the sample of workers in Social Welfare and Public Security Institutions.
Another study carried out in Mexico by Moral and Valle (2012) found that people with a Christian religion show greater rejection towards homosexuality followed by Catholics, the group that has the greatest acceptance of homosexuality are people belonging to other cults. Coinciding with this research, Christians obtained the lowest mean regarding their egalitarian attitudes among people of different sexual orientation. However, it does not match with the case of Catholics who have a higher average than the opposite found by Moral and Valle in the sample of Mexican students. This may be due to the characteristics that the samples present since some are workers in government institutions, while the others are university students, we know well that the particular characteristics of the sample may influence the results. Statistically significant differences were also found in the values factor and the couple structure that talks about the desirable potential characteristics for the other sex, as well as the public sphere factor where there is agreement in the capacity of both men and women to develop in a public sphere, people who identify with the Christian religion are those who have the highest mean, and therefore have more equal attitudes in both factors. Similarly, people who identified with other non-categorized religions have the lowest means in both factors. Finally, in the sexuality and personal freedom factor, Catholics have the highest mean, which means that they have more egalitarian attitudes that cover aspects such as sexual impulses, security, personal freedom and autonomy compared to the people who indicated that they do not belong to any religion. Thus, Tarducci (2001) affirms that the family generally with a religious affiliation educates according to specific behaviors and expectations assigned to the highest hierarchy males, favoring male dominance, which is interpreted as a differentiated important factor. No other investigations were found that could corroborate or refute the data in this investigation, finally people who belong to the Catholic and Christian religions showed more favorable egalitarian attitudes compared to those who expressed not belonging to any religion, this may be possible if religious beliefs foster values of respect and equality contrary to what has been found about religion. Likewise, there can be progress within the religious sphere based on the respect and equality of people.

Conclusion and Implications
Regarding attitudes towards gender equality between men and women, statistically significant differences were found in four of the six factors of the CAIG already mentioned. Similarly, regarding attitudes towards gender equality between Social Assistance and Public Security Institutions, statistically significant differences were found in the CAIG factors. Statistically significant differences were also found between the groups that practice the Christian and Catholic religions and those who claim to have no religious beliefs; in which Catholics present a more favorable attitude towards gender equality. It is worth mentioning that Social Assistance Institutions, like women, have the highest averages compared to Public Security Institutions and men who show less egalitarian attitudes. In this case, it is necessary to reaffirm the commitment to gender mainstreaming in these institutions and to achieve a better service for people. It is favorable to mention that both institutions obtained medium levels; however, they are not conscious enough to be in a high level of awareness of gender equality and equity. This Research addressed the importance of investigating a very important topic that affects Mexico, Latin America, and other continents, from the perception of attitudes towards gender equality that can be modified through knowledge and awareness. Ultimately, we hope that the limitations in investigations like this will disappear, since the approval and disposition of certain institutions is crucial to carry it out. The present study has implications in the construction and implementation of public policies for the incorporation of the perspective of gender equity in public institutions. Since the National Development Plan 2018-2024 of the federal government considers gender equity and non-discrimination as a transversal axis of national public policy. For this reason, the selected sample acquires relevance since public security and social assistance workers are fundamental in the incorporation of the gender perspective in their daily activities with citizens.