Gender IdentityCASSIDY WILLETTS

The textbook definition of gender is “The psychological and social associates of gender.”

In todays society there are many arguments of nature vs nurture and what makes a boy a boy and a girl a girl

Most preschoolers are able to identify whats “Girly” and whats for “boys”

Social Cognitive theory

Parents help form sex roles by buying certain clothes and encouraging play with certain toys(I.e Having a female toddler play with dolls)

Parents enforce these sex roles as young as 18 months old One study has found an infants sex is affected by the way the mother

interacted with them

Cognitive Development

Kohlberg’s theory suggest that there are three stages for a child coming to understanding gender development

The first stage is gender identity. This is the childs ability to label themselves according to sex correctly and to correctly label adults correctly . By age 2 most children are able to do this.

The Second stage is gender stability which is the understanding that they will stay the same gender throughout their entire life

The third stage is gender constancy which is the understanding that the gender is the component of the self that is not altered but the external appearance.

Gender Schema theory

Information-processiong theorists use the term schema to refer to mental frame works.

Gender Schema is the assumption that the development of a framework for a gender underlies the gender development

Gender Schema begins as soon as the child is able to notice the difference between male and female, knows his own gender and is able to do so with clear consistency

Biological

For a king time it was believe that the biological differences between males and females is what cause the psychological differences

Some studies have been done find that some experiences when they took boys and force them to have surgery to have female appearing gentils at a young age. And were raised as females.

Dr.Money and the Boy without a Penis

The BBC documentary of the same title follows the story of two twins boys, one was raised as a female(David) and the other was raised as a male(Bruce) to test the theory that nurture played a large part of ones gender identity.

While Dr.Money published the results as a positive interviews with boys and their fates showed the project was a failure

Bruce ended up committing suicide and later David followed. Both made accusations of different abuse occurring while under his care Dr. Money

Despite the failure of the experiment many see it was necessary or worth it.

Sex Role Knowledge

A study done by Serbin, Powlishta, & Gulko in 1993 shows that by age 3 most children are able to identify some sex roles i.e “Mommy uses the oven and Daddy use the grill.”

By age 4 they can make comparisons such as “Daddies are better at fixing things then mommies.

Sex Typed Behavior

As early as 18 months of age children will start to show preference in toys geared towards their sex such boys playing blocks or girls playing with dolls, this is months before they can consistently identify gender.

By age 3 they start to show prefence in playing with same sex playmates

Preschoolers is the age group where children are started to be taught certain behaviors are “manly” or “Lady-like”

Whether the way a child perceives gender and the gender around them is strictly nature or nature we aren’t entirely sure.

We do know that raising a child as the incorrect gender can have long term effects on their mental health.

References

Lifespan DevelopmentFIFTH CANADIAN EDITIONDenise BoydPaul JohnsonHelen Bee

“DR. Money and The Boy with No Penis” BBC 2004

References(images)

http://i.telegraph.co.uk/multimedia/archive/02183/baby-max_2183067b.jpghttp://www.google.ca/imgres?imgurl=http://25.media.tumblr.com/tumblr_mblyrxfgJq1qhbl6ao1_500.png&imgrefurl=http://imsuchanafroholic.com/tag/gender-roles/&h=222&w=500&tbnid=IcoKuH3_IAR3iM:&docid=Qoau7dx87Z7ciM&ei=h105VsXEJ4HFogSiwpyIDQ&tbm=isch&ved=0CB0QMygBMAFqFQoTCIWknJvN9cgCFYGiiAodIiEH0Q

http://www.bricks4kidz.com/maryland-ellicottcity-columbia/files/2010/07/2.15.13-Preschool-children-2-kids.jpg

https://www.cartoonstock.com/directory/w/wearing_the_trousers.asp https://www.google.ca/url?

sa=i&rct=j&q=&esrc=s&source=images&cd=&cad=rja&uact=8&ved=0CAcQjRxqFQoTCLmSju7_9cgCFQ8tiAodKkIMqg&url=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.duelinganalogs.com%2Fcomic%2Frejecting-gender-identity-roles%2F&psig=AFQjCNFH9A_p8nxILUJX75iyNV9aWeOU2A&ust=1446699999643421