Chapter 14

Pink and Blue

Gender Typing

• The process by which children

  • Become aware of their gender identity

  • Acquire behaviours, values, and motives considered appropriate for their identified gender within their culture

Gender-Role Standards

• Sex vs. Gender

  • Sex -- A person’s biological attributes (chromosomes, phenotype, and hormonal influences)

  • Gender -- A person’s individually and socially constructed identity

• Gender-role standard

  • Value, motive, or behaviour that is considered more appropriate for members of one sex than the other

  • Girls assume an expressive role

  • Boys assume an instrumental role

Gender-Role Stereotype

• Well-ingrained cognitive schemas that we use to interpret and often distort the behaviour of males and females

• The features we assign to women and men that are based on their social roles

  • Feminine or masculine

• Stereotype threat

  • The risk of confirming negative stereotypes about an individual's racial, ethnic, gender, or cultural group → create high cognitive load and reduce academic focus and performance

Gendered Toys

• By age 2.5 to 3, almost all children can label themselves as either boys or girls = Gender identity

• By age 2.5, children have some knowledge of gender-role stereotypes

  • Girls play with dolls and help mom with chores

  • Boys play with cars, build thing, and help dad

Development of Gender-Role Stereotypes

• By age 5 to 6, gender-role stereotypes by sex

  • Boys only like masculine activities

  • Girls only like feminine activities

• By age 7 to 8, use gender-role stereotypical information to infer others’ preferences

  • Chris would like to play with dolls because he wears pink clothes a lot

Development of Gender Typed Behaviour

• Gender segregation

  • Preferences for same-sex playmates

  • 2-year-old girls prefer to play with other girls

  • 3-year-old boys prefer to play with other boys

  • 4-and 5-year-olds actively reject to play with the opposite sex

  • Elementary and preadolescent children find opposite sex peers less pleasing and behave more negatively toward them

• Popular children = ones that maintain clear gender boundaries and adhere to gender segregation rules

Why Does Gender Segregation Occur?

• Play styles

• Gender identity established → Gender-stereotypes → in-group vs. out-group

Gender-Creative Parenting

• Children are less gender-stereotyped in their beliefs about which activities and occupations are appropriate for males and females

• They are aware of traditional gender stereotypes

• They play with gendered toys and activities

Gender-Equal Parenting

• Children are less gender-stereotyped in their beliefs about which activities and occupations are appropriate for males and females

• They are aware of traditional gender stereotypes

• They play with gendered toys and activities

Theories of Gender-Typing and Gender Role Development

• Social learning theory

  • Direct tuition (differential reinforcement) of gender roles

  • Parents, especially fathers, provide the “gender curriculum”

    • Children are quick to label themselves as boys or girls, develop strong gender-typed toy and activity preferences, and acquire an understanding of gender stereotypes

• Observational learning

  • Same-sex modelling of parents, teachers, peers, older siblings

  • Media

Gender Schema Theory

• Gender schemas

  • Organized sets of beliefs and expectations about males and females that guide information processing

  • In-group/out-group schema

    • Classify objects, behaviours, and roles as “for boys” or “for girls”

  • Own-sex schema

• Serve as scripts for processing social information

Psychological Androgyny

• Balancing or blending both desirable masculine-stereotyped traits and desirable feminine-stereotyped traits