Beginning in the 1970s, the number of women elected to state and national office increased substantially. However, by the mid-1990s the rate of increase slowed considerably. One explanation for the lack of women officeholders is their comparative lack of political ambition. Researchers find that women think about running for office and actually run for office at lower rates than similarly situated men.

This study contributes to the understanding of women's political ambition in several ways. First, this research develops a comprehensive model of political ambition which acknowledges that the candidate emergence process is gendered. Moreover, this model is specific to state level elective office. The model is applied to a unique source of potential candidates—political activists who attended their party's national nominating conventions. Since the Conventional Delegate Survey series provides comparable longitudinal cross-sectional data that spans more than twenty years, this analysis provides, for the first time, a dynamic examination of women's political ambition levels.

This research demonstrates that, despite the narrowing of the gender gap in political ambition since 1972, contemporary women activists are still less politically ambitious than their male counterparts. The findings presented also demonstrate that the path to political candidacy is substantively different for women than men. Individual, recruiting and environmental factors shape political ambition differently based on gender. Specifically, holding a local political office has a more substantive impact on political ambition for a state level office for women than it does for men. Also, having a law degree, being unmarried, having held a local party position, and the gender composition of their state legislature all positively influence political ambition for women, but do not for men. Also, the findings show that Democratic women are on average more politically ambitious than their Republican counterparts. Moreover, the gender gap in political ambition is larger in the Republican Party than it is in the Democratic Party. This research provides a comprehensive view of gender differences in political ambition as well as how ambition levels have changed since the 1970s.