Gender, gender role identity, and children's reported feelings toward the same and opposite sex

Abstract

The present study explored the relative importance of gender role identity, gender role attitudes, and biological gender in determining the intensity of anger, disgust, hurt, envy, fear, pity, and liking reported toward same-and opposite-sex children. Sixty male and 60 female 6-12-year-old children reported on the intensity of emotions that a hypothetical child would experience toward same-and opposite-sex children in various situations. The Children's Personal Attitudes Questionnaire, the Children's Attitudes toward Women Scale, and a self-reported toy preference measure were used to assess gender role identity and attitudes. The results indicated that girls were more angry at males than at females, and that both sexes tended to be more hurt and disgusted by opposite-sex than by same-sex children. Girls also tended to report more fear than did boys, and both sexes tended to report more fear of males than of females. Most importantly, gender role identity and attitudes accounted for more of the variance in predicting the quality of reported emotions than did biological gender. Biological gender predicted to only one feeling: pity toward males, after the variance accounted for by the gender ~This research was supported by a Gender Roles Grant from the Rockefeller Foundation. We are grateful for their support. The authors wish to thank the parents, teachers, and children in the Milton, Norwood, and Watertown school systems, and especially Frank Guiliano, Rod Smith, and Daniel O'Connor. We are also grateful for the computer and statistical expertise of Robert H. Harrison, John Houlihan, and Lance S. Davidow, and for the editorial comments made by Robert H. Harrison.

Gender Role Orientation and Anxiety Symptoms Among African American Adolescents

“…These findings were consistent with previous studies conducted with child samples (Brody et al, 1990;Muris et al, 2005) and have several implications. For instance, socialization of feminine traits focuses on relatedness, emotional expressiveness, empathy and caring.…”

“…This finding is consistent with gender role theory and empirical studies with children (Brody, Hay, & Vandewater, 1990;Ginsburg & Silverman, 2000;Muris, Meesters, & Knoops, 2005) and adults (e.g., Carey et al, 1988;Dillon et al, 1988;Gallacher & Klieger, 2001) and confirms that among African American adolescents in an inner city community, girls see themselves as possessing more feminine traits, such as caring, warmth, empathy and kindness, compared to their male counterparts.…”

Subjective anxiety and behavioral avoidance: Gender, gender role, and perceived confirmability of self-report

“…Among children, greater fear reporting has been associated with higher levels of femininity (Brody, Hay, & Vandewater, 1990;Muris, Meesters, & Knoops, 2005) and lower levels of masculinity (Ginsburg & Silverman, 2000). Similar findings are seen in adults, with some studies showing that fear relates positively with femininity (Tucker & Bond, 1997), others showing a negative association with masculinity (Arrindell, 2000;Arrindell et al, 1993), and others finding that both high femininity and low masculinity are related to elevated fear (Carey, Dusek, & Spector, 1998).…”

“…In fact, gender roles appear to be more closely related to fear and anxiety than biological sex (Brody et al, 1990;Moscovitch, Hofmann, & Litz, 2005;Palapattu, Kingery, & Ginsburg, 2006), though a subset of these studies has found that biological sex significantly predicts reported fear even after controlling for gender role (Arrindell et al, 1993;Dillon et al, 1985).…”

Ethnicity and Gender Stereotypes of Emotion

“…Communion has been associated with sympathy and the expression of more sadness, guilt, fear, jealousy, and less anger (Bander & Betz, 1981;Bem, Martyna, & Watson, 1976;Brody, Hay, & Vandewater, 1990;Dillon, Wolf, & Katz, 1985;Kopper & Epperson, 1991;LaFrance & Carmen, 1980;Shaffer, Pegalis, & Cornell, 1981). In contrast, agency has been associated with the expression of less fear and shame, but more disgust, anger, and happiness (Brody, Hay, & Vandewater, 1990).…”