Sex-Role Development in Young Children: Relationships to Behavioral and Attitudinal Measures of Parental Gender Schemas

To explore early sex-role development, this study examined the gender schemas of parents in relation to the sex-typed toy preferences of their own young children. Subjects were 82 parents of children between the ages of 3 and 8. Test stimuli consisted of 2 equivalent lists of 24 occupations, each li...

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Bibliographic Details
Main Authors Perry, Louise C, Morgan, Amy K
Format Report
LanguageEnglish
Published 01.03.1993
Subjects
Child Development
Childhood Attitudes
Early Childhood Education
Gender Schema Theory
Instantaneous Report of Judgments
Parent Attitudes
Parent Child Relationship
Parent Expectations
Parent Influence
Reflective Judgment
Sex Role
Sex Stereotypes
Young Children
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Summary:To explore early sex-role development, this study examined the gender schemas of parents in relation to the sex-typed toy preferences of their own young children. Subjects were 82 parents of children between the ages of 3 and 8. Test stimuli consisted of 2 equivalent lists of 24 occupations, each list containing 8 occupations coded as typically male, female, or neutral. Each item was presented singly. In the immediate-response condition, subjects were asked to decide as quickly as possible whether each occupation was most appropriate for men, women, or both. In the delayed-response condition which followed, the second list of occupations was presented and subjects were asked to think over their response until a signal sounded (after a 2.5 second delay). Parents' judgments were compared with judgments about sex-typed toys made by their children in a separate study. Parents also completed questionnaires to measure personal sex-typing, general attitude towards women's roles, and views about prospective play activities and future career options of their children. Analysis showed that parents' gender-category judgments were not related to their children's judgments. However, there were a number of parent-child gender-schema links, including a relationship between mothers' judgments of previously sex-typed feminine occupations as appropriate for both men and women, and their sons' reduced avoidance of feminine toys. (MM)