Biological Influences on Gender Typing

(Hormonal Influences)

• Experimental animal studies indicate that exposure to androgens (male sex hormones):

– Increases active play in male and female mammals

– Promotes male-typical sexual behavior and aggression and suppresses maternal caregiving behavior in a wide variety of species

Humans:

• Cannot do experimental research for ethical reasons

– Correlational research

• In boys, naturally occurring variations in androgen levels are positively correlated with

– Amount of rough-and-tumble play

– Levels of physical aggression

• Congenital Adrenal Hyperplasia (CAH)

– Disorder in which child is exposed to high levels of androgens from the prenatal period onward

– Compared to girls without CAH, girls with CAH show

• Higher activity levels• Greater interest in “male-typical” toys, activities,

and occupations• Better spatial/mathematical abilities

Environmental Influences on Gender Typing

• Social Learning Theory

– Gender typing results from

• imitation of same-sex models and reinforcement for this behavior

Parental Beliefs

• Describe achievement, competition, and control of emotion as important for sons

• Describe warmth, “ladylike” behavior, and closely supervised activities as important for daughters

Parental Behavior

• On average, differences in parental treatment of boys and girls are not large

• Does not mean that parental behavior is unimportant because:

– Younger children receive more direct training in gender roles than older children

– Some parents probably practice differential treatment more intensely than others

• Parents create different environments for boys and girls beginning in infancy (e.g., bedrooms, toys)

• Parents give toys that stress action and competition to boys (e.g., guns, cars, tools, footballs)

• Give toys that emphasize nurturance, cooperation, and physical attractiveness to girls (e.g., dolls, tea sets, jewelry, jump ropes)

• Parents reinforce independence in boys – React more positively when boys demand

attention, run and climb, or try to take toys from others

• Parents reinforce closeness/dependency in girls– More likely to direct play activities, provide

help, encourage participation in household tasks, and refer to emotions

• Fathers tend to treat boys and girls more differently than do mothers

– Engage in more physically stimulating play with infant sons than daughters

– Less likely to give “girl toys” (e.g., dolls) to sons

Pasterski et al. (2005)

• Comparison of toy choices in girls and boys with CAH and their siblings (without CAH)

– Girls with CAH played with “boys’ toys” more and “girls’ toys” less than their unaffected sisters

– No differences between boys with CAH and their unaffected brothers

• Parental Behavior

– Parents gave more negative responses to their unaffected sons than to their unaffected daughters for play with “girls’ toys”

– Parents gave more positive responses to daughters with CAH than to unaffected daughters for play with “girls’ toys”

• Parental Behavior and Children’s Toy Choices

– For unaffected children, parents’ positive and negative responses to children’s toy choices were related to children’s play behavior

• Positive responses to children’s play with certain toys related to more play with those toys (and vice versa for negative responses)

– For children with CAH, parental behavior was not related to children’s toy choices