Children, Gender, and Social Structure: An Analysis of the Contents of Letters to Santa Claus

An important aspect of the link between childhood socialization and the adult social structure is the development of gender identity. The present study analyzes children's letters to Santa Claus, focusing on the elements of children's preferences which link gender to social structure. Find...

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Bibliographic Details
Published inChild development Vol. 53; no. 2; pp. 429 - 436
Main Authors Richardson, John G., Simpson, Carl H.
Format Journal Article
LanguageEnglish
Published Chicago, etc University of Chicago Press 01.04.1982
University of Chicago Press for the Society for Research in Child Development, etc
Subjects
Adults
Automobiles
Children
Dolls
Games
Gender roles
Racing cars
Social structures
Socialization
Toys
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Summary:An important aspect of the link between childhood socialization and the adult social structure is the development of gender identity. The present study analyzes children's letters to Santa Claus, focusing on the elements of children's preferences which link gender to social structure. Findings show boys' and girls' requests to be similar when aspects of the child's world are measured and quite different when qualities representing the adult social order are measured. Girls' requests generally fall into an "inner" dimension, while boys' requests fall into an "outer" dimension, especially for representational items. Little gender effect is found in cases of nonrepresentational items. Findings qualify recent work emphasizing the role of early childhood play in determining gender differences and later adult statuses.
ISSN:0009-3920
1467-8624
DOI:10.2307/1128986