Trade in sex is legal in Denmark, but a majority of respondents hold negative attitudes towards it, women finding transactional sex less acceptable than men do

Predicting Attitudes Towards Transactional Sex: The Interactive Relationship Between Gender and Attitudes on Sexual Behaviour. Michael A. Hansen & Isabelle Johansson. Sexuality Research and Social Policy, Jan 20 2021. https://rd.springer.com/article/10.1007/s13178-020-00527-w

Abstract

Introduction: This article explores explanations for attitudes towards the acceptability of transactional sex. The sparse research investigating attitudes towards transactional sex uncovers a link between gender equality, or feminism, and a lack of support for the trade in sex. However, there are no research agendas that attempt to explain variance in attitudes towards transactional sex where support for gender equality is widespread throughout a population.

Methods: We estimate regression models utilizing the 2017 Danish Values Survey (Den Danske Værdiundersøgelse) in order to predict views on the acceptability of transactional sex.

Results: While the trade in sex is legal in Denmark, we find that a majority of respondents hold negative attitudes towards transactional sex, which conveys a lack of congruence between public opinion and policy. Further, gender is a powerful predictor of attitudes towards transactional sex, with women finding it less acceptable. In addition, the analysis uncovers that general attitudes towards sexual behaviour are the largest predictor of views on the acceptability of transactional sex. That being said, we find that men’s views on the acceptability of transactional sex are more of a function of their general attitudes towards sexual behaviour than they are for women.

Conclusions: The findings indicate that, unlike men, women appear to differentiate between their attitudes towards general sexual behaviour and their views on sexual behaviour that they may associate with negative societal implications.

Conclusion

In this study, we asked which are the influential factors on individual level attitudes towards the acceptability of transactional sex. At the beginning of this article, we argued that a better understanding of people’s attitudes towards the trade in sex is needed because the existing literature is limited. Another reason we pointed to for further research into this topic is that sex workers may face serious hardships as a result of negativity towards transactional sex. Moreover, we argued that a focus on individual level attitudes could assist in broadening the current debate regarding policies and how to best approach the sex trade and its related issues. Questions concerning policy are undoubtedly important ones, but so are questions about what shapes people’s attitudes towards transactional sex. By understanding what predicts individual level attitudes towards transactional sex, policy-makers and other key actors may be better equipped to address sex trade-related issues.

A nationally representative survey from Denmark inquiring about views on prostitution provided us with the possibility to explore attitudes in a country where it is legal to engage in transactional sex. Since the Danish population is quite ideologically homogenous (Holtug 2012), the case of Denmark made it possible to move beyond some of the explanations that scholars have provided when looking at divergent attitudes towards transactional sex, namely gender equality and traditional values. As our analysis demonstrates, there is a lack of variance in Denmark when exploring these explanations for differences in attitudes towards transactional sex. That being said, we were able to build on the findings of previous studies regarding gender (the one socio-demographic factor following a clear pattern in the literature) to look more closely at how gender interacts with attitudes towards general sexual behaviour. The results from Denmark indicate that diverging attitudes towards transactional sex may persist even when an increasing share of the population holds liberal attitudes and commits to gender equality. Other countries witnessing similar ideologically developments may want to consider this observation.

The findings that we present suggest that the majority of Danes (54%) hold negative attitudes towards the trade in sex. There is thus a lack of congruency between public opinion and policy in Denmark where it is legal to sell and pay for sexual services. Since negativity towards the sex trade may have adverse effects on sex workers’ lives, this incongruence is food for thought for anyone engaging in sex trade-related policy debates. That being said, in comparison with other Scandinavian countries, a larger proportion of Danes hold tolerant attitudes towards prostitution (EVS/WVS 2020). A useful next step would be to study the topic in a comparative context to see if further incongruences between public opinion and policy exist across Scandinavia.

We find that gender is the most important socio-demographic predictor of attitudes towards prostitution, with women finding it less acceptable than men. The most powerful attitudinal predictor is attitudes towards general sexual conduct. The interaction between gender and attitudes towards sexual behaviour is notable. On average, men who view non-committal sex as completely acceptable are twice as likely as their female counterparts to view prostitution as completely acceptable. The reason why women tend to hold more negative attitudes towards transactional may be because women are more prone to relate prostitution to negative societal implications, like the perpetuation of traditional gender roles and unequal power relations between men and women (Basow and Campanile 1990; Bernardo Ródenas 2001; Valor-Segura et al. 2011). Such associations may also explain why women are more likely to distinguish their attitudes towards general sexual behaviour from their attitudes towards transactional sex. Along the same line, the reason why men tend to be more positive towards transactional sex than women may be explained by the absence of negative associations ascribed to the trade in sex vis-à-vis men’s position in society. The fact that the sex trade largely caters to men may also play a role in accounting for this gender gap in attitudes.

While our findings contribute to gender theorizing, it would be fruitful to pursue further research into the gendered dynamics at play in determining individual level attitudes towards transactional sex in order to grasp their full make-up. One suggestion moving forward would be to pay close attention to how such attitudes interact with gender and attitudes towards other societal issues both nationally and cross-nationally, as attitudes towards transactional sex are likely to differ between countries. A second suggestion for future research into attitudes towards transactional sex is to include more nuanced survey questions in order to capture the complexity of the issue. A third suggestion is for qualitative studies to continue to deepen our understanding of the links between diversity of experiences, opinions and attitudes towards transactional sex, including those of people who do not conform to binary identity categories.