The acquisition of gender labels in infancy: Implications for gender-typed play.

Abstract

Two aspects of children's early gender development -the spontaneous production of gender labels and sex-typed play -were examined longitudinally in a sample of 82 children. Survival analysis, a statistical technique well suited to questions involving developmental transitions, was used to investigate the timing of the onset of children's gender labeling as based on mothers' biweekly reports on their children's language from 9 through 21 months. Videotapes of children's play both alone and with mother at 17 and 21 months were independently analyzed for play with gender stereotyped and neutral toys. Finally, the relation between gender labeling and sex-typed play was examined. Children transitioned to using gender labels at approximately 19 months on average. Although girls and boys showed similar patterns in the development of gender labeling, girls began labeling significantly earlier than boys. Modest sex differences in play were present at 17 months and increased at 21 months. Gender labeling predicted increases in sex-typed play, suggesting that knowledge of gender categories might influence sex-typing before the age of 2.Keywords gender development; self-socialization; language development; play; sex differences A growing body of research in social and developmental psychology demonstrates that the salience of social categories and, in particular, the verbal labeling of social groups, affect perceptions of social category distinctions. Category labels signal the importance of categoryrelevant information and influence inferences made about social group members (e.g., Bigler, 1995;Diesendruck & haLevi, 2006;Gelman & Heyman, 1999;Katz & Seavey, 1973). From a developmental perspective, it is important to examine children's understanding of gender as Address for Correspondence: Kristina M. Zosuls, Psychology Department, New York University, 6 Washington Place, New York, NY 10003, E-mail: kmz205@nyu.edu. NIH Public Access NIH-PA Author ManuscriptNIH-PA Author Manuscript NIH-PA Author Manuscript a social category because it is typically the first collective social identity that children learn and is associated with a range of stereotypes used by children and adults to make inferences about others . Even as early as preschool, children demonstrate knowledge of gender stereotypes (Martin, Ruble, & Szkrybalo, 2002), and use gender category information to make inferences about ambiguous behavior (Giles & Heyman, 2004). It is therefore important to ask: When do children first label gender categories? What are some consequences of this ability?In addition to visual cues, such as physical appearance, verbal labels might be important cues for learning social categories at a very young age (Baron, Dunham, Banaji, & Carey, 2007;Gelman, Taylor, & Nguyen, 2004). For instance, when parents use gender labels when they point out the actions of other people (e.g., "See that boy running fast!") rather than gender neutral labels (e.g., "child"), they make gender category information salient. Thus, an examination of childre...

Male more than female infants imitate propulsive motion

“…First, male infants may consciously label themselves and the adults by gender then selectively imitate the motions of the male adult that are associated with male behavior (Zosuls et al, 2009). Although infants do learn implicitly to categorize adults by gender as early as 3 months of age (Quinn, et al, 2002), no evidence exists that infants younger than 17 months can consciously label themselves or others by gender or conclude that propulsive movement is associated with male behavior.…”

“…Further, even without a model, boys exhibited more propulsive movements than girls, such as hitting, punching, and gun play. The predominant interpretation has been that boys imitated the male model's aggression because they understood conceptually that they are male and males behave aggressively (Bandura & Bussey, 1999;Kohlberg, 1966;Martin, Ruble, & Szkrybalo, 2002;Zosuls et al, 2009). An alternative, but not mutually exclusive interpretation however, is that boys find males' propulsive movements more appealing than females' movements.…”

“…According to the first, children learn to categorize themselves as male or female, then preferentially imitate same-sex adult and peer models. Between 17-21 months, when gender self-labeling begins to emerge, use of gender labels is associated for boys with play with a truck over a doll and for girls with the reverse (Zosuls et al, 2009). Even before boys could label themselves by gender however, they preferred trucks more than girls did (Zosuls et al, 2009).…”

Invisibility of Racial/Ethnic Minorities in Developmental Science: Implications for Research and Institutional Practices

“…There has been limited attention paid to the development of sexual minority youth in the developmental sciences, with research on gender-related traits, concepts, and attitudes often examined from the perspective of sexual-dominant youth (Zosuls et al, 2009). During a 2017 peer research pre-conference meeting related to gender and LGBTI youth preceding the meeting of the Society for Research in Child Development, scholars noted that we, in fact, are not even sure how to ask developmentally appropriate and gender-inclusive questions about sexuality to children and youth in the general population.…”

Gender development research in sex roles: Historical trends and future directions

“…These controversies have been important for driving new research. For example, researchers have increased efforts to understand early origins of gender differences and have done so by focusing research on younger ages, when gendered cognitions and behaviors first emerge (e.g., Zosuls et al 2009). More research has also turned to focusing on links among various cognitive and socialization processes, thus leading to more complex models and studies of gender development (for example, see Tobin et al 2010).…”