GENDER - gender schema theory

GENDER SCHEMA THEORY

MARTIN AND HALVERSON (1981)

• Acquiring gender-reps at information happens before gender constancy

• Basic gender identity is enough for a child to identity themselves and take an interest in appropriate gender behaviours while Kohlberg argued the opposite 

• Acquisition of stereotypes affects later behaviour especially in attention and memory 

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SCHEMAS

• Children learn schemas related to gender from interactions with other children and adults, TV and media

• Related to cultural norms

• Function of organising and structuring other information that’s presented to children

• Eg they learn gender appropriate toys, clothes etc

• More of a naive/personal theory than scientific about gender appropriate behaviours 

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Ingroup schemas

• Groups with which a person’s identifies eg being a girl means that you identity within that ingroup alongside many other groups

• Once a child identifies with any group, they positively evaluate this group and avoid the behaviours of the outgroup to enhance their self-esteem

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Outgroup schemas

• Evaluation motivates a child to be like their own group and avoid behaviours of the other group

• They actively seek information about what their group does to acquire ingroup schemas

• From an early age before gender constancy, children focus on ingroup schemas and avoid behaviours that belong to outgroup schemas 

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RESILIENCE OF GENDER BELIEFS

• Explains the power of gender beliefs

• Children hold very fixed gender attitudes as the ignore any information that isn’t consistent with ingroup information

• Eg if a boy sees a film with a male nurse, he ignores this as the man isn’t behaving consistently with the boy’s ingroup schema so his existing schema does not alter

• Gender schemas have a profound effect on what we remember and our perceptions of the world around us

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PEER RELATIONSHIPS

• Play with other children leads children to believe that all girls have the same interests and all boys like the same interests and avoid the opposite sex because they’re not fun to play with and “less like them”

• Same-sex peers are fun to play with as they are “like them” and more fun to play with

• Develop knowledge of potential consequences associated with different social relationships 

• Eg girls will tease other girls for playing with boys so they avoid this

• Influence children’s likelihood of developing social relationships with same and opposite sex peers 

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EVALUATION

Gender identity earlier ❌ 

• Children’s language was recorded and they were observed them at play to identify when they labelled themselves as boys or girls and they were using gender labels by 19 months 

• This can also be seen even earlier which challenges GST

• Inaccurate 

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Research support in memory ✅

• Gender schemas to do with ingroup gender means that children pay more attention to information that identifies with this

• Martin and Halverson found when children were asked to recall pictures of people, under 6 identified more gender-consistent ones

• Children aged 4-9 payed more attention to toys labelled as ingroup rather than neutral

• Memory organisation support 

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Gender schemas distort information ✅

• Distorts gender-inconsistent informations due to schemas

• Martin and halverson found that when children were shown consistent or inconsistent pictures, the distorted the picture eg remembering a girl holding a doll when it was a boy

• Children have strong understanding of gender-consistent and inconsistent behaviours and distorts their memories 

• Fundamental to development 

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Children are sexist ✅

• Despite parents effort such as gender neutral toys 

• Children seek out toys that match gender stereotypes and disregard others eg barbies for girls

• However children with working mums have less stereotyped views about men which shows that they can be receptive to some gender-inconsistent ideas

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