Chapter 5 Flashcards
Headline: “Code Pink”
Journalist Lauren Sadler reported that the birth of her daughter initiated an avalanche of pink gifts, which made the sex of her child obvious to everyone.
Gender role:
socially significant activities that men and women engage in with different frequencies and become associated with sex and gender
Socially encouraged scripts of behavior
Social learning theory
Social learning theory
Importance of models and experiences in the development of gender identity
(learned from others, girls copy girls, boys copy boys, society reinforces this)
Gender Identity
How individuals come to identify themselves as male or female
Sigmund Freud
Instincts—dynamic forces underlying thought and action: Life (sexual) and death (aggressive)
Oedipus complex: Attracted to mother and hostile to father
Penis envy: Feelings of inferiority over their genitals
Horney
Argued against male bias in psychoanalytic theory
Replaced penis envy with womb envy
Penis envy as a longing for social prestige
Nancy Chodorow
Mother-infant relationship is key to personality development
Boys’ and girls’ experiences differ
Ellyn Kaschak
Female personality development in terms of Antigone (Oedipus’s daughter and half sister)
Oedipus symbolizes power and entitlement
Antigone symbolizes women’s self-sacrifice and devotion (subservient to man)
Kaschak’s Unresolved Men
Social power & status
-Proprietary over women
-Women: subservient
Patriarchal terrorism
-Systematic violence within the family
-Control, major goal
Sexually self- centered
Kaschak’s Resolved Men
Nonpatriarchal
Power: not major issue
Women: independent
Sexually unselfish
Kaschak’s Unresolved Women
Accept subservience
Passive, dependent
Accept male-defined sexuality and may limit their own (eating disorders)
Deny own needs
Few female friendships
Kaschak’s Resolved Women
Reject subservient role
Assertive, independent
Define own sexuality
Accept & express needs
Form female friendships
Social Learning Theory
Operant conditioning
Reinforcement/punishment
Observation of others (modeling)
Power and prestige
Positive and negative consequences
Cognitive development theory
Piaget & Kohlberg
Evidence suggests that children actively organize information about their gender
Emphasis on cognition:
Cognitive Developmental Theory
Gender Schema Theory
Children’s abilities develop in stages
Age ~1 – No concept of self or gender
Age ~2 – Cannot classify objects, fail at gender labeling (no concept of self) and lack gender constancy
Age ~4 – Lacks gender constancy, believes that one sex may become the other
Age ~ 5-6 – Can classify objects based on physical properties, concrete understanding of gender
Gender constancy (Belief that gender is consistent throughout lifetime)
Age ~6 – Inflexible application of concepts, stereotyping on the basis of gender
