Male U.S. representatives with daughters are more likely to vote in favor of abortion rights and "more liberally on a range of women's issues" than male representatives without daughters, according to a working paper published this month in the National Bureau of Economic Research, the Washington Post reports. Ebonya Washington of Yale University examined the 105th Congress members' familial compositions and the National Organization for Women's ratings of its male members. The ratings, which are based on members' votes on 20 women's issues, range from zero -- which means they consistently vote against NOW's position -- to 100 -- which signifies consistently voting with NOW's position. Washington found that a male representative was more likely to vote with NOW's position on women's issues, especially reproductive rights, if he had daughters. Specifically, the report says that "each daughter is associated with an increase of nearly three points" on NOW's rating scale. The report adds that the association between voting records and daughters superseded any party affiliation. There were not enough female representatives in the 105th Congress to draw any conclusions about their voting habits with respect to family composition, the report says (Morin, Washington Post, 2/8).