Gender Dynamics and Engagement in Jewish Life: A Comprehensive Review and Analysis of Existing Data
Graham Wright, Shahar Hecht, and Nicole Samuel
July 2025
This report investigates disparities between non-Orthodox Jewish men and women with respect to Jewish religious and communal engagement. The study draws on survey data from five different sources collected over the past decade.
Key Findings
- Jewish women are more likely to be involved in a variety of forms of Jewish life than Jewish men. This dynamic mirrors the gender dynamic evident in American society with respect to religious and civic engagement.
- The magnitude of the differences between Jewish men and women with respect to engagement in Jewish life was larger for some forms of involvement than others and was sometimes concentrated among certain segments of the population.
- For many forms of Jewish engagement, the gender disparity is concentrated among families that have only one Jewish partner. Jewish women who are partnered with non-Jewish men are more likely to participate in Jewish life compared to Jewish men partnered with non-Jewish women. In contrast, Jewish men who are partnered with Jewish women are involved in roughly as many forms of Jewish life as Jewish women who are partnered with Jewish men.
- Gender differences in some forms of engagement may not arise until later in life, perhaps in connection with family formation.
- Women are dramatically overrepresented among all Jewish employees in Jewish nonprofit organizations but are less likely to be executive team members compared to their share in the overall workforce. Despite this fact and the well-documented gender disparities in position and pay between Jewish men and women in Jewish nonprofit organizations, there are no meaningful differences between men and women with respect to their work satisfaction at these organizations.