Most Americans Say They'd Prefer A Son Over A Daughter

According to a Gallup poll of 1,020 adults, 40% of Americans say that if they could only have one child, they would prefer a boy rather than a girl. The other 28% said they’d want a girl, and the rest said they didn’t have a preference.

Interestingly, these numbers are strikingly similar to a Gallup poll from 1941:

The boy preference was a 38 percent to 24 percent margin. In fact, Gallup’s done the same poll 10 times since 1941 and the results have always skewed in favor of boys.

Apparently, men seem to be the driving force behind the poll results, with 49% of men saying they would prefer to have a son, and only 22% of men saying they would prefer a daughter.

Women, however, “showed no real preference, with 31 percent choosing a boy and 32 percent preferring a girl.”

But there may also be some additional reasons for this “preference”:

It’s also an age thing. Americans younger than 30 were the most likely to want a little dude (54 percent compared to 27 percent who wanted a gal), and the gap declines with age.

Other categories that tipped in favor of boys: education (people with only a high-school education or less preferred boys) and politics (Republicans want boys more than Dems do).

In some ways, I can certainly see why you might fear having a daughter. Trying to raise a young boy might seem like it would be easier, just as trying to raise a young girl might seem like it would be mind-boggling —especially in a world that provides padded bikini tops for seven-year-olds.

But why do you think there is such an overwhelming preference for sons over daughters? Could it possibly be attributed to the fear of what you’d have to face —such as the real or imagined social, physical, and emotional differences— if you had a girl?