Gender Development
Possible topics
	-- Beliefs about men and women
	-- Myths: Maccoby & Jacklin (1974)
	-- The androgenous individual
	-- The role of biology
		-- Study of infants
		-- Cross-cultural invariants
		-- Study of biological mechanisms:
			-- manipulation of hormones (John Money)
			-- brain lateralization and math skill
	-- The role of culture
		-- Social learning theory
			-- blanket color, etc.
			-- Study by Langlois & Downs
			-- Gender models
		-- Cognitive developmental theory
			-- knowledge of gender stereotypes
			-- Application of gender labels
			-- Implication of gender label


	As Mussen (1969) -- an old time expert in the field -- states it: 
“No other social role directs more of an individual's overt behavior, 
emotional reactions, cognitive functioning, covert attitudes, and general 
psychological and social adjustment.”

A taxonomy:
	A trend to use gender, rather than sex to refer to maleness and 
femaleness (see footnote 1 on p. 281); sex is used to refer to biological 
gender.
	Gender role:  cultural expectations of behavior, characteristics, and 
social status of males versus females.  The public face of gender.
	Gender identity (or orientation):  the individual's perception of his or 
her own consistency with these cultural expectations.  The more private face of 
gender.
	Gender stereotypes:  beliefs about how men and women differ.

True myths 
(based upon Maccoby & Jacklin’s analysis of over 1,500 studies):   
	female have greater verbal facility; girls are more responsive to 
babies
	males have greater visual/spacial ability and arithmetic reasoning; 
males are more aggressive (accept for some forms of interpersonal 
aggression that have been recently termed “relational aggression) and 
active; more prone to have problems in adjustment;. 
	Even for these behaviors, we would not do a very good job of 
predicting someone’s score from only knowing their gender!

Social learning theory
	Tends to emphasize reinforcement and modeling in the development of 
gender roles.  Some examples of differences in the ways girls and boys 
are treated:
Gender labeling Theory
	sits midway between social cognitive and cognitive developmental 
perspectives.  
	Because of the ubiquitousness of gender labeling in our society -- 
family, TV, stories, etc. -- children learn gender concepts early.  This 
learning is much like any other language concept learning.  These schemas 
or concepts have been hypothesized to exert substantial control over 
information-processing systems (see Martin & Halverson's gender schema 
theory).  
	Once a gender schema is formed -- and the evidence suggest that it 
is in formation at an early age -- children are biased to attend to and 
recall gender congruent information.  
Cognitive developmental theory
	Emphasis on developmental changes, primary mediated by changes in 
cognition.  So timing of changes -- and experiences -- very important. 
	Pivotal questions addressed by theory:  when do different kinds of 
gender knowledge develop?  In what ways does this knowledge structure 
sex-role choices and behavior?

Conclusions
	The literature on sex differences suggests that male and females 
are more similar than is commonly believed.
	Girls and boys possess both male and female stereotypic 
characteristics.
	Nonetheless, sex role differentiation remains strong throughout the 
life span.
	Extensive history of research and speculation on how sex 
differentiation occurs:
	--  biological approach:  hormonal levels present at sensitive 
periods during development have been implicated in the emergence of 
sex-typed sexual and social behavior of animals, and possibly humans.
	--  social learning theory:  Clearly boys and girls are treated 
differently, and are exposed to a variety of models depicting sex-role 
stereotypes.
	--  cognitive developmental theory:  cognitions regarding gender do 
affect children's reactions (information processing) to gender-related 
phenomena.
--  From Ruble, p. 450-451:
no doubt the development of sex roles...is multiply 
determined.  Prenatal hormonal variation and other biological 
factors may create predispositions...toward masculine or 
feminine characteristics.  At the same time, sex-stereotypic 
expectations...exert shaping influences.  These biological and 
social forces may interact at various points in development.  
Small sex differences in, for example, activity level may be 
exacerbated by parents' willingness to play roughly with boys 
but not girls.  By age 3, children begin to construct 
organizing principles and seek to generalize the sex-role 
rules they are learning.  Thus, at this point, children's 
internal motivations to act appropriately are added to 
external pressures toward sex-typing...	
 

 
 
Psychology 326 (Social and Personality Development:
HARTMANN), 97Sp., GENDER DEVELOPMENT, p. 2