Where does the sexism and toxic behavior start?

                                                                       Typical expected desk of a female

                                                                            Typical expected desk of a male

“Boys are not supposed to cry”

“Girls should not go in engineering”

“Boys should not wear pink”

“Girls should not have short hair “

            We hear these statements in our society from time to time. Even if we claim our society has changed a lot, we still are bombarded the unwritten rules to be followed to be accepted in the society. As a girl who has chosen a bob cut for hair, I face unfair and harsh remarks such as being called ‘unfeminine ‘and advised to grow out my hair. I hear these, right from women of all ages. It shows how deep-rooted our ideals are and how difficult it is to uproot them.

            Therefore, today I am focusing on tracing back the time where these toxic behaviors start.

Contents:

Stages of Development:

1. Infancy

• Gender Differences
• Gender Roles

2. Preschool Years

• Gender Identity
• Perspectives on it: Psychoanalytical, Social and Cognitive

1. Infancy

Gender Difference: It all starts with the birth. The first statement ever given after birth is the revelation whether the infant is a boy or a girl. The information leads people to treat the infant according to its gender. It is seen that infants are given different dresses, different-coloured blankets and different toys (Bridges, 1993; Coltrane and Adams, 1997; Serbin, Poulin-Dubois and Colburne, 2001).  It is seen that the interaction between parents and children is largely determined by the infant’s gender with fathers interacting more with the sons as compared to daughters while mothers interact more with daughters. The activity and play style also differs with fathers engaging in more physical activities such as running around while playing with child while mothers engage with more sit-down and peaceful games such as peek-a-boo. Interestingly, this happens because of parent’s gender and not because of the infant’s gender (Laflamme, Pomerleau and Malcuit, 2002; Clearfield and Nelson, 2006; Parke, 2007)

            Since the treatment of the infant is largely decided because of its gender, boys and girls experience different worlds because of their gender. However, it is seen that when they are born, male infants tend to more active, fussy and their sleep tends to be more disturbed than female infants (Eatons and Enns, 1986; Guinsburg et al. 2000; Losonczy-Marshall, 2008).

Gender Roles: As difference in the treatment due to gender is so apparent, it is seen that infants themselves are able to distinguish between male and female by age one. Girls prefer playing with dolls and soft toys while boys play with blocks and trucks (Cherney, Kelly-Vance and Glover, 2003; Alexander, Wilcox and Woods, 2009). In general, however, parents of boys are more seen to be concerned about choice of child about toys than parents of girls. Boys are encouraged to play toys for boys and this encouragement increases with age. So, it can be seen while young they are given cars to play and when they are older they collect action-figures. It is more of a worry when a boy plays with doll than a girl playing with truck (Martin, Ruble and Szkrybalo, 2002; Schmalz and Kerstetter, 2006; Hill and Flom, 2007). This explains why parents chose gender-specific toys for their child.

            Another interesting phenomenon which explains the fear of girls to be independent is when a boy takes his first step, his parents encourage him to go out and explore the place he is in while in the case of a girl child, parents hug the girl and keep the girl close to them when she takes her first step. Due to this, it is seen that by the age two, boys exude more independence and less compliance as compared to girls and girls exhibit lesser amount of these two traits (Kuczynski and Kochanska, 1990; Poulin-Dubois, Serbin and Eichstedt, 2002).

2. Preschool Years

Gender Identity: It is seen that from preschool years, girls and boys are applauded for different traits. While boys are praised for being hard-working, scientific attitude, competence i.e. their ability to be intellectual and analyze, girls are praised for being sweet, charming, friendly i.e. their warm personalities (Deveny, 1994)

            It is also seen preschoolers have quite pronounced expectations of how a girl or a boy should act according to their gender at age five. Even though their expectation of gender appropriate behavior is quite gender-stereotyped even by traditional societal standard at age five and becomes less flexible by age of seven, they do not completely disappear. In fact they stay with the individual forever and resemble those held by society (Serbin, Poulin-Dubois and Eichstedt, 2002; Lam and Leman, 2003. Ruble et al, 2007).

• Psychoanalytical Perspective: According to Sigmund Freud’s psychosexual development theory, children pass through series of stages in which pleasure is focused on a particular biological function and body part, where in preschool years pleasure is focused on genital sexuality. Boys feel sexual attraction for their mothers and fear of castration by their powerful fathers which leads them to fear their father and try to be more like them. Girls feel sexual attraction for their fathers, which leads them and try to be more like their mothers. This process of trying to be similar to the same-sex parent known as identification, could lead to adaptation of parent’s personalities.
• Social Learning Perspective: It is seen that children learn gender-related behavior from their parents, teachers, neighbors and even peers. The children often emulate the behavior because they see that such behaviors get rewarded such as boys get glorified at sports and girls watching older girls in cheerleading (Rust et al, 2002). It is seen that television perpetuates traditional gender-related behavior and the ratio of male characters to female characters is 2: 1 (Calvert et al., 2003). It is also seen that females are not portrayed at productive decision-makers instead are domesticated with needs of romance, home and family (Scharrer et al., 2006; Hust, Brown and L’Engle, 2008; Nassif and Gunter,2008)
• Cognitive Perspective: It is seen that preschoolers develop gender schemas i.e. a mental framework of organizing gender-related information and build their gender identity around it (Barbera, 2003; Martin and Ruble, 2004; Signorella and Frieze, 2008). Girls set rules in their minds for themselves such as wearing pants is inappropriate and boys refuse to wear make-up in school plays as they believe that only women wear make-up (Frawley, 2008).It is seen that preschoolers erroneously believe that genders are based on appearance and behavior rather than biology which explains their strict adherence to gender-appropriate behavior (Kohlberg, 1966). But it I seen that even though children later learn that people are permanently males or females unless biological changes occur i.e. gender constancy, children still adhere to gender-appropriate behavior (Martin and Ruble,2004; Ruble et al,2007; Karniol, 2009)

                        The post ends here. In the next post, I will be focusing on the gender and friendships during middle childhood and teenagers and how toxic behaviors are further solidified.

Typical expected desk of a female: Image courtesy: Unsplash /@emmamatthewsdigicontent 

Typical expected desk of a male: Image courtesy: Unsplash / Jan De Keijzer

Thumbnail Image Courtesy: Unsplash /Markus Spiske