ORIGINAL RESEARCH article
Front. Psychol.
Sec. Quantitative Psychology and Measurement
Assessing Antifeminism Introducing the Leipzig Antifeminism Short Scale (LAF-S) in a German Representative Sample
Provisionally accepted
- 1GESIS Leibniz Institute for the Social Sciences, Cologne, Germany
- 2Department of Psychosomatic Medicine and Psychotherapy, University Medical Center of the Johannes Gutenberg University Mainz, Mainz, Germany
- 3Else-Frenkel-Brunswik-Institut, Leipzig University, Leipzig, Germany
- 4Institute for Psychological Research, Sigmund Freud University Berlin, Berlin, Baden-Württemberg, Germany
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While gender equality and attitudes towards gender roles have become a topic of increased public interest, little attention has been drawn to the phenomenon of antifeminism as a distinct form of opposition against women's emancipation. Although some approaches to measuring antifeminism exist, no instrument has yet been tested and validated on a large scale. The present study examines the psychometric properties of the four-item Leipzig Antifeminism Short Scale (LAF-S) in a representative German sample (N = 2,459). Results suggest good internal consistency and external validity. Unidimensionality was confirmed, and measurement invariance may be assumed across various sociodemographic groups. Differences in latent means were analyzed and discussed. The LAF-S thus proved to be a valuable and highly efficient instrument for measuring antifeminism on a large scale. Future studies should aim to validate the scale in different cultural settings, using the translation provided here.
Keywords: antifeminism, Validation, scale construction, Measurement invariance, Latent means
Received: 19 Mar 2025; Accepted: 28 Oct 2025.
Copyright: © 2025 Heller, Höcker, Braehler and Decker. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) or licensor are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.
* Correspondence: Ayline Heller, ayline.heller@gesis.org
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