Are Hispanics that socially conservative?

I often hear in the media that Hispanics are “socially conservative.” For that sort of thing you do need “quick & dirty” rules-of-thumb, and the assertion seems broadly plausible. On the other hand, the Hispanic attitude toward gay marriage isn’t really that different from non-Hispanic white (see GSS MARHOMO variable). So I decided to query non-Hispanic white and Hispanic attitudes to a range of “hot-button” social issues in the GSS. I also broke it down by college vs. non-college educated cohorts. All results are from the year 2000 and later.

	White non-Hispanic		Hispanic
	No college	College	No college	College
Abortion on demand, yes	38	53	28	47
Abortion if serious defect, yes	75	70	67	79
Make divorce easier	23	16	44	28
Keep divorce laws same	23	34	17	40
Make divorce more difficult	55	50	38	32
Premarital sex always wrong	26	19	21	16
Premarital sex almost always wrong	8	8	10	7
Premarital sex sometimes wrong	18	23	20	13
Premarital sex not wrong at all	47	50	49	64
Homosexual sex always wrong	58	35	61	33
Homosexual sex almost always wrong	4	5	5	4
Homosexual sex sometimes wrong	6	11	7	9
Homosexual sex not wrong at all	32	48	27	55
Porn should be illegal to all	40	30	36	25
Porn should be illegal to under 18	57	67	60	70
Porn should be legal to all	3	3	4	4
Strongly favor spanking children	28	17	25	19
Favor spanking children	47	44	44	43
Do not favor spanking children	19	28	22	20
Strongly do not favor spanking children	6	11	9	17
Allow incurable patients to die	72	72	58	76
Strongly agree better for man to work, woman to tend home	10	5	14	9
Agree better for man to work, woman to tend home	31	19	32	16
Disagree better for man to work, woman to tend home	43	49	43	48
Strongly disagree better for man to work, woman to tend home	16	28	11	27

These results can be used to support the proposition that Hispanics are socially conservative. But they are not of the magnitude or direction of difference that one finds when comparing evangelical white Protestants to other whites, or even blacks to whites. So though technically defensible, I think the assertion that Hispanics are socially conservative in their attitudes misleads the public somewhat.

(unless the divorce results are mis-coded, they do seem correct)