Infant & Child Development - Chapter 13: Gender Identity (Gender)
According to Maccoby, how do boys' and girls' play and interaction styles differ? How do these differences contribute to gender segregation in play?
According to Maccoby, boys' and girls' play and interaction styles differ by basically girls' interactions are more enabling - collaborative actions that support and sustain the interaction, while boys' interactions are more constricting - competitive actions to determine a victor. These differences contribute to gender segregation in play by basically when girls and boys play together, girls do not readily influence boys, girls' interactions with one another are typically enabling - their actions and remarks tend to support others and sustain the interaction, while in contrast, boys' interactions are often constricting - one partner tries to emerge as the victor by threatening or contradicting the other, by exaggerating, and so on, when these styles are brought together, girls find that their enabling style is ineffective with boys, the same subtle overtures that work with other girls have no impact on boys, and boys ignore girls' polite suggestions about what to do and ignore girls' efforts to resolve conflicts with discussion.
What is androgyny, and how is it related to traditional conceptions of masculinity and femininity?
Androgyny is basically having a combination of gender-role traits that includes both instrumental and expressive behaviors, and it is related to traditional conceptions of masculinity and femininity by basically traditionally, masculinity and femininity were seen as ends of a continuum: children possessing many traits associated with males were considered highly masculine, and youngsters possessing many traits associated with females were considered highly feminine, a newer view of gender roles is based on the independent dimensions of instrumentality and expressiveness, in this view, traditional males are rated high on instrumentality but low on expressiveness, whereas traditional females are low on instrumentality but high on expressiveness, and in other words, this approach recognizes that other combinations of traits are possible, as androgynous persons are rated high on both the instrumental and expressive dimensions, as androgynous individuals can be independent and emotional, self-confident and considerate, ambitious and creative.
How are boys and girls socialized differently? Consider influences from parents, peers, and the media.
Boys and girls are socialized differently (Consider influences from parents, peers, and the media) by basically Gender Role Socialization - Parents - Perceive boys and girls as different from birth, In several experiments, when observing the same baby, adults described behaviors and emotions differently when the baby was labeled as a girl or a boy -> girl = scared, boy = surprised (implicit), Socialize boys and girls differently in terms of gender roles, especially younger children, and Talk to boys and girls differently - Talk about numbers and counting twice as often with sons than daughters (Chang, Sandhofer, & Brown, 2011), Talk to sons in more detail about science than with daughters, and More likely to discuss emotions with their daughters than their sons, Peers - as early as/around age 3 - Tend to reinforce gender stereotypes, By 3 years of age, most children's play shows the impact of gender stereotypes: Boys prefer blocks and trucks, and Girls prefer tea sets and dolls, Once children learn rules about gender-typical play, they often harshly punish peers who violate those rules, and Children who are perceived as gender atypical (i.e., do not conform to gender stereotypes) are more likely to be bullied and rejected, Peer play with same and other sex - Preference for playing with same-sex peers -> Increases during childhood, and Children spontaneously select same-sex playmates -> Resist efforts to get them to play with members of the opposite sex, and Media - The media portrays gender stereotypes -> books, television, movies, commercials, and internet, Gender in Children's Books - portrayal of roles, females are underrepresented and passive, Gender Bias in 100 years of Children's Books (McCabe et al., 2011) - Males are central characters in 57% of children's books, females in only 31%, and Disparity between male and female characters is sending children a message that "women and girls occupy a less important role in society than men or boys;" activities such as playing with dolls, dressing up, or helping an adult are encouraged more often in daughters than in sons, rough-and-tumble play and playing with blocks are encouraged more in sons than in daughters, parents tolerate mild aggression more in sons than in daughters, and following the birth of a child (especially a firstborn), parents become more traditional in their attitudes regarding gender, fathers are more likely than mothers to treat sons and daughters differently, more than mothers, fathers often encourage gender-related play, fathers also push their sons to achieve more but accept dependence in their daughters, mothers are more likely to respond based on their knowledge of the individual child's needs, but fathers respond based on gender stereotypes, by the age of 3, most children's play shows the impact of gender stereotypes - boys prefer blocks and trucks, whereas girls prefer tea sets and dolls - and youngsters are critical of peers who engage in gender-inappropriate play, once children learn rules about gender-typical play, they often harshly punish peers who violate those rules, during the preschool years, children begin to prefer playing with same-sex peers, segregation of playmates by sex occurs spontaneously and children often resist playing with members of the other sex, even in gender-neutral activities such as playing tag or coloring, this preference increases during childhood, reaching a peak in adolescence, by age 10 or 11, the vast majority of peer activity is with same-sex children, and most of this involves sex-typed play, then the tide begins to turn, but even in adulthood time spent at work and at leisure is quite commonly segregated by gender.
How do boys and girls differ in physical development, intellectual abilities, and social behavior?
Boys and girls differ in physical development, intellectual abilities, and social behavior by basically girls generally mature faster, brain lateralization is earlier, reach puberty earlier, androgen may affect the prenatal development of brain regions associated with masculine gender-role behavior, behavior: no evidence for consistent gender related differences, differences in the reproductive system, differences in secondary sex characteristics such as lower voice and facial hair in boys and breast development and wider hips in girls, boys are usually larger and stronger than girls, which means that they often physically outperform girls, on tasks that involve fine-motor coordination, such as tracing and drawing, girls do better than boys, some of the gender differences in gross-motor skills that require strength reflect the fact that as children approach and enter puberty, girls' bodies have proportionately more fat and less muscle than boys' bodies, as infants, boys are more active than girls, and this difference increases during childhood, boys more often play vigorously and girls quietly, boys are three times more likely than girls to be diagnosed with attention deficit hyperactivity disorder, boys are physically more active than girls, girls tend to be healthier than boys, girls tend to have greater verbal skills but boys tend to have greater mathematical and visual-spatial skill, girls have larger vocabularies than boys and are more talkative, during elementary school and high school, girls read better than boys, more boys are diagnosed with language-related problems such as reading disability, during childhood and adolescence, boys tend to have better mental-rotation skill than girls, during the elementary-school years, girls are usually more advanced than boys in arithmetic and mastery of basic math concepts, a difference that may be a by-product of girls' greater language skill, during high school and college, boys used to get higher scores than girls on standardized math tests, but that difference has diminished substantially over the past 25 years, now boys have a negligible advantage, girls and women often remember the identity of objects as well as their location more accurately, when describing past events, girls tend to provide more elaborate and more emotion-filled descriptions, boys were more aggressive than girls, boys are more aggressive physically than girls, girls often rely upon relational aggression, in which they try to hurt others by damaging their relationships with peers, girls are better able to express their emotions and interpret others' emotions, girls are more likely to express happiness and sadness, but boys are more likely to express anger, adolescent girls report experiencing shame and guilt more often than boys do, females are more easily influenced by others - that is, that they are more persuadable, young girls are more likely than young boys to comply with an adult's request, and they are more likely to seek an adult's help, girls and women are also influenced more than boys and men by persuasive messages and others' behavior, especially when they are under group pressure, girls are just as likely as boys to recognize the flaws in a bad idea, but girls are more willing to go along simply because they don't want the group to start arguing, girls are more skilled at effortful control, boys are far more likely to be diagnosed with attentional disorders such as ADHD, during adolescence, girls are more likely than boys to report negative events such as fights with friends, and they report being more upset by these events than boys, such episodes can lead some teens - especially girls - to be depressed, they feel chronically sad and irritable and have low self-esteem, teenage girls are more prone to depression, they experience more frequent stressors, such as dissatisfaction with their appearance after pubertal change or conflict with close friends, girls are more apt to interpret these negative life events in harmful terms, emphasizing social-emotional consequences to a far greater extent than boys do, girls are prone to ruminate about their problems: thinking about them over and over, and talking about them with friends, teenage girls particularly vulnerable to interpersonal stressors.
How do different theories - social learning, biological, and cognitive - explain children's the development of gender identity? (Consider contributions of hormones, social learning theory, Kohlberg's stage model and gender schema theory.)
Different theories - social learning, biological, and cognitive - explain children's the development of gender identity (Consider contributions of hormones, social learning theory, Kohlberg's stage model and gender schema theory) by basically Biological - Money - Genetic, neurobiological, and hormonal activity - Many behavioral differences between the sexes can be traced to biological differences, Biological Approach: Hormone Effects - Research on girls exposed to androgen in fetal development: Congenital adrenal hyperplasia (CAH) -> exposed to male hormones and see if behavior becomes more 'masculine' - Androgenized girls were less stereotypically female than their sisters, Androgen may affect the prenatal development of brain regions associated with masculine gender-role behavior, and Not conclusive, Study of 16 genetically male children born with cloacal exstrophy (Reiner & Gearhart, 2004) - lack of a penis, but presence of normal testicles, and prenatal exposure to normal male hormones, 14 were reassigned as female, surgery performed to reinforce assignment - 8 of the 14 assigned "reassigned" themselves back to males between 5 and 16 years, and 3 remained female, 3 had unclear identity, and Concluded that male gender identity is related to male hormone exposure in utero, biology contributes to gender roles and gender identity, sex hormones are key players, for both boys and girls, exposure to testosterone during prenatal development leads to greater interest in masculine sex-typed activities during the elementary-school years, this link is particularly vivid in studies of children with congenital adrenal hyperplasia (CAH), a genetic disorder in which, beginning in prenatal development, the adrenal glands secrete large amounts of androgen, during childhood and adolescence, girls with CAH prefer masculine activities (such as playing with cars instead of dolls) and male playmates to a much greater extent than girls not exposed to these amounts of androgen, despite strong encouragement from parents to play with feminine toys, apparently, the androgen affects the prenatal development of brain regions critical for masculine and feminine gender-role behavior; Socialization: Social cognitive theory - Albert Bandura, Eleanor Maccoby - Modeling, reinforcement, and teaching - Gender typing is a result of interpretation and internalization of socially transmitted standards, children learn gender roles in much the same way they learn other social behaviors - by watching the world around them and learning the outcomes of actions, thus, children learn what their culture considers appropriate behavior for males and females simply by watching how adults and peers act; Cognitive: Cognitive-developmental theory - Lawrence Kohlberg - Self-categorization - Once a child learns s/he is a girl/boy, child sorts information about behavior by gender and acts accordingly, toddlers know that they are either boys or girls and label themselves accordingly, during the preschool years, children begin to understand that gender is stable, boys become men and girls become women, not until about 5 or 6 years do come to understand that maleness and femaleness do not change over situations or according to personal wishes, they understand that a child's sex is unaffected by the clothing that a child wears or the toys that a child likes, Cognitive Approach to Development of Gender Identity - Emphasizes children understanding of gender - Knowledge about gender, and Beliefs and attributions about gender-related behavior and roles, and Cognitive Developmental Theory: Kohlberg - Labeling - 2 years - Labels self as male or female, Stability - 3-4 years - Understanding that gender is stable, boys grow up to be men and girls grow up to be women, and Constancy - 4-7 years - Understanding that gender is biologically based, does not change with different clothing, hair, toy choices etc., and Explains age-related patterns of gender-related behavior - rigid sex stereotypes during preschool years (before gender constancy is achieved); and Cognitive: Gender-schema theory - Sandra Bem, Carol Martin - Self-categorization based on processing of cultural information - Child organizes information about gender appropriate behavior based on cultural norms and acts accordingly, children first decide whether an object, activity, or behavior is female or male, then use this information to decide whether or not they should learn more about the object, activity, or behavior, once children know their gender, they pay attention primarily to experiences and events that are gender appropriate, children first establish gender identity, then begin actively learning about gender roles, shows that "male" and "female" become much more salient in children's worlds after they understand gender, Cognitive-Developmental Theory: Gender Schemas - A schema is...a mental representation of some aspect of the world, an organized cluster of information, and used to interpret new information and draw inferences, and Gender schemas - Expectations regarding male and female roles, interests, behaviors, appearance, etc., Categorize self as male or female -> Actively learn about gender roles -> Use gender as a schema to organize and guide learning -> Pay more attention to gender appropriate objects and activities, and Gender schemas are like filters for viewing the world, and Affect what children notice and remember - When shown pictures of men and women in traditional and non-traditional occupations, children are likely to remember men, and forget women, who are firefighters, and People remember schema-consistent behaviors and attributes better than schema-inconsistent behaviors and attributes.
How does exposure to television affect children's gender stereotypes and choice of activities?
Exposure to television affects children's gender stereotypes and choice of activities by basically Gender Roles in Television (Common Sense Media Report, 2017) - Women on television tend to be cast in romantic, marital, or family roles -> Depicted as emotional, passive and weak, Men on television tend to be cast in leadership or professional roles -> Depicted as rational, active, and strong, and On TV shows and movies specifically aimed at children, boy characters outnumber girls by a ratio of roughly 2 to 1, Male characters tend to be older and in more powerful roles, Females tend to be young, attractive, and provocatively dressed, How Stereotypes in Movies and on TV Impact Children's Development - There is a relationship between the media kids watch and the careers to which they aspire - Girls who consume more traditional TV programs express more interest in traditional careers for women (Wroblewski & Huston, 1997), and Girls shown TV clips featuring stereotypic female behavior (e.g., talking about their outfits) express less interest in STEM careers (e.g, scientist, architect) than girls who are shown no content or clips featuring female scientists (Bond, 2016), and How Stereotypes in Movies and on TV Impact Children's Development (Ward & Aubrey, 2017) - Children who watch a lot of television - Have more stereotyped views of males and females, and Prefer gender-typed activities to a greater extent than do children who are less avid viewers, and Gender Roles in Television - TV Programming is not the only source of gender-related information children see on television; colors, choices, roles; for decades, males and females have been depicted on TV in stereotypical ways, women tend to be cast in family roles, they are depicted as emotional, passive, and weak, men are more often cast in management roles and are depicted as rational, active, and strong, children who watch a lot of TV end up with more stereotyped views of males and females, TV viewing causes children to adopt many of the distorted portraits of males and females that dominant television programming.
What are gender stereotypes, and how do they differ for males and females? How does knowledge of gender stereotypes develop?
Gender stereotypes are basically beliefs and images about males and females that are not necessarily true, and they differ for males and females by basically men are said to be independent, competitive, aggressive, outgoing, ambitious, self-confident, and dominant, these male-associated traits are called instrumental because they describe individuals who act on the world and influence it, women are said to be emotional, kind, creative, considerate, gentle, excitable, and aware of others' feelings, female-associated traits are called expressive, because they describe emotional functioning and individuals who value interpersonal relationships. Knowledge of gender stereotypes develop by basically Learning Gender Stereotypes - By age 5: U.S. children judge 33% of traits as stereotypically as adults do, By age 11, children judge 90% of traits as stereotypically as adults do, and Older children: see stereotypes as general guidelines that are not necessarily binding -> Begin to understand that gender stereotypes do not always apply; TV, books, socialization (modeling, imitation, reinforcement), and interaction styles; children don't live in a gender-neutral world for long, although 12-month-old boys and girls look equally at gender-stereotyped toys, 18-month-olds do not: girls look longer at pictures of dolls than pictures of trucks, but boys look longer at pictures of trucks, by 4 years, children's knowledge of gender-stereotyped activities is extensive, they've begun to learn about behaviors and traits that are stereotypically masculine or feminine, during the elementary-school years, children expand their knowledge of gender-stereotyped traits and behaviors, they learn stereotypes about personality traits and about academic subjects, by the time they enter middle school, their ideas of gender stereotypes are virtually as well formed as those of adults, as children develop, they also begin to understand that gender stereotypes do not always apply, older children are more willing than younger children to ignore stereotypes when judging other children.
What is known about the development of transgender children?
What is known about the development of transgender children is that basically a child who is persistently gender non-conforming may choose to "transition," or begin to live as his or her self-identified gender instead of the gender assigned at birth, and the transitioning process is different for everyone, and is often initiated by the child; Gender Non-Conforming Children - Some children have a gender identity that is different from their sex assigned at birth, Some children do not identify with either gender, Many, but not all, gender non-conforming children grow up to identify with a gay, lesbian, or bisexual sexual orientation, and Gender identity and sexual orientation cannot be changed, Research Findings, 1985-2004 - Studies of children diagnosed with gender identity disorder (GID), now termed gender dysphoria (GD) -> Children with behavioral preferences and identities (or desires to be) the "other" gender, High rates of psychopathology, especially anxiety and depression, and BUT conducted at a time when parental support and affirmation of children's gender nonconforming behaviors and identities were uncommon, and Recent Research: Olsen et al., 2015 - Examined anxiety and depression in transgender children who socially transitioned with support from their families -> 73 transgender children, 3 to 12 years old, and 73 typically developing children the same ages and gender, from the same communities, No significant difference in anxiety or depression between socially transitioned transgender children and control group, and Family support for social transition may lead to better mental health outcomes among transgender children.
How can you explain why preschool children tend to have more rigid gender stereotypes than older children?
You can explain why preschool children tend to have more rigid gender stereotypes than older children by basically Cognitive Developmental Theory: Kohlberg - Explains age-related patterns of gender-related behavior - rigid sex stereotypes during preschool years (before gender constancy is achieved), Kohlberg - label, stable, constant, in preschool = only gone through labeling and stable so as a preschooler = gender is rigid and stable and they will grow up to be what they are labeled, after that = when they realize constancy, until you reach constancy = stable and rigid, and preschool = only reached stable.
