ABSTRACT
This chapter discusses the state of the art by outlining the key debates surrounding the gender gap in political knowledge. It traces the antecedents of political sophistication and points out potential sources of gendered differences in knowledge. The chapter explores questions about measurement and asks whether existing research has measured what it had intended to measure. It also explores the scope and breadth of what is commonly referred to as political knowledge, revealing that the way this knowledge is defined and assessed has profound effects on the size and shape of gender gaps. The chapter focuses on limitations in existing research and to questions that remain to be answered. It describes the different approaches to measure political knowledge and encourage further research to engage with the meaning of different facets of political sophistication for “good citizenship.” Gender roles affect political knowledge also in more intricate ways.
