Where both partners contribute equally to earning and caregiving. However, they often doubt that this ideal preference is attainable given the reality of workplaces that demand long hours for a successful career and cultural norms that demand long hours for successful parenting. As a result, men and women end up employing fallback plans that are more gender-differentiated (with men preferring a more traditional arrangement, and women preferring an arrangement in which they can remain financially autonomous). Similarly, Stone (2007) finds that women who opt to forego their careers in order to care for their family typically do so as a last resort–only after they have encountered inflexible, even hostile, workplace environments. The overall implication of these findings is that work-family preferences are formed largely in response to the constraints and options created by workplace institutions, and because these institutions are traditionally gendered, men’s and women’s patterns of behavior follow accordingly. However, observed work-family preferences and decisions may also reflect gender differences in preexisting, stable, and potentially Enzastaurin web internalized beliefs that individuals hold about men, women, caregiving, and earning. Indeed, scholars have argued that such gendered aspects of individuals’ identities operate alongside gendered institutions to maintain patterns of inequality (Ferree, Lorber and Hess 1999; Risman 1998). Thus, a critical challenge for researchers has been to determine the extent to which gendered preferences for employment and caregiving are produced by gendered institutional conditions (such as gendered workplace cultures and policies), independent of otherwise durable beliefs about gender at the individual-level. Prior studies have been limited in their ability to address this question because they rely on in-depth interviews or survey data, and thus cannot demonstrate the extent to which a causal relationship exists between institutional conditions and preference formation. The goal of our study is to evaluate the direct relationship between institutional constraints and preference formation by drawing on original survey-experimental data from a representative U.S. sample of young, unmarried, childless individuals. Our study is designed to assess the extent to which men’s and women’s stated preferences for balancing future work and family responsibilities differ under high, medium, and low BAY 11-7083 price levels of institutional constraint. First, we use experimental methods to replicate and elaborate on Gerson’s (2010a) findings by investigating how the distribution of men’s and women’s statedAuthor Manuscript Author Manuscript Author Manuscript Author ManuscriptAm Sociol Rev. Author manuscript; available in PMC 2016 February 01.Pedulla and Th audPagepreferences for balancing work and family responsibilities differ depending on whether or not respondents are provided an egalitarian earner-caregiver relationship as a response option (thereby simulating high versus medium levels of institutional constraint). Second, we test the causal relationship between work-family policies and work-family preference formation by investigating how the distribution of men’s and women’s preferences differ depending on whether or not policies designed to support an egalitarian earner-caregiver arrangement (see Gornick and Meyers 2009a) are universally available (thereby simulating medium versus low levels of institutional constraint). Finally, we t.Where both partners contribute equally to earning and caregiving. However, they often doubt that this ideal preference is attainable given the reality of workplaces that demand long hours for a successful career and cultural norms that demand long hours for successful parenting. As a result, men and women end up employing fallback plans that are more gender-differentiated (with men preferring a more traditional arrangement, and women preferring an arrangement in which they can remain financially autonomous). Similarly, Stone (2007) finds that women who opt to forego their careers in order to care for their family typically do so as a last resort–only after they have encountered inflexible, even hostile, workplace environments. The overall implication of these findings is that work-family preferences are formed largely in response to the constraints and options created by workplace institutions, and because these institutions are traditionally gendered, men’s and women’s patterns of behavior follow accordingly. However, observed work-family preferences and decisions may also reflect gender differences in preexisting, stable, and potentially internalized beliefs that individuals hold about men, women, caregiving, and earning. Indeed, scholars have argued that such gendered aspects of individuals’ identities operate alongside gendered institutions to maintain patterns of inequality (Ferree, Lorber and Hess 1999; Risman 1998). Thus, a critical challenge for researchers has been to determine the extent to which gendered preferences for employment and caregiving are produced by gendered institutional conditions (such as gendered workplace cultures and policies), independent of otherwise durable beliefs about gender at the individual-level. Prior studies have been limited in their ability to address this question because they rely on in-depth interviews or survey data, and thus cannot demonstrate the extent to which a causal relationship exists between institutional conditions and preference formation. The goal of our study is to evaluate the direct relationship between institutional constraints and preference formation by drawing on original survey-experimental data from a representative U.S. sample of young, unmarried, childless individuals. Our study is designed to assess the extent to which men’s and women’s stated preferences for balancing future work and family responsibilities differ under high, medium, and low levels of institutional constraint. First, we use experimental methods to replicate and elaborate on Gerson’s (2010a) findings by investigating how the distribution of men’s and women’s statedAuthor Manuscript Author Manuscript Author Manuscript Author ManuscriptAm Sociol Rev. Author manuscript; available in PMC 2016 February 01.Pedulla and Th audPagepreferences for balancing work and family responsibilities differ depending on whether or not respondents are provided an egalitarian earner-caregiver relationship as a response option (thereby simulating high versus medium levels of institutional constraint). Second, we test the causal relationship between work-family policies and work-family preference formation by investigating how the distribution of men’s and women’s preferences differ depending on whether or not policies designed to support an egalitarian earner-caregiver arrangement (see Gornick and Meyers 2009a) are universally available (thereby simulating medium versus low levels of institutional constraint). Finally, we t.