ABSTRACT
Gender serves as one of the most significant identifying labels throughout the life span. While originally a child' s sex is based primarily on chromosomal and genital distinctions, this category will follow the child from the birthing room, operating as a life-long functional tag that will influence virtually every aspect of her or his experience. Our society uses sex categories to divide names, public restrooms, pronoun usage, school lines, toys, room decor, clothing and appearance options, hobbies, and occupa tions, Given societies insistence on the functional use of sex categories (Bern, 1981), a child’s physical, social, cognitive, and emotional milestones will all develop under a gendered umbrella. During some aspects of development, a child s gender tag will be at the forefront of experience while, other times, it will fade into the backgrou nd providing minimal cues an d effects to the situation . Regardless of the degree of salience, an individuals gender1 has meaningful consequences that need to be considered when tackling issues related to child development,
An empirical and theoretical exploration of gender development can take many different forms. For example, researchers have recently highlighted the need to consider the multidimensionality of gender development {Eckes & Trautner, 2000; Hort, Leinbach, & Fagot, 1991; Huston, 1983; Liben & Bigler, 2002; Martin, 2000; Ruble & Martin, 1998; Signorella, 1999), This framework was first outlined in Hustons (1983) comprehensive review of the sex-typing literature and later modified in Ruble and Martins (1998) updated chapter on gender development. This view recognizes the many distinct and possibly unrelated features of gender development (e.g., knowledge of gender stereotypes, gender attitudes, sex-role identity, sex-typed preferences) and allows researchers to locate their specific issue with in a common frame of reference (Eckes & Trautner, 2000),
In the matrix outlined by Huston (1983) and Ruble and Martin (1998), this includes making a distinction between gender constructs and gender content areas. The content areas are divided ac cording to biological/categorical sex, activities and interests, personal-social attributes, gender-based social relationships, styles and symbols, and gender-related values,2 Within each of the six content
areas, the four constructs that are considered include concepts or beliefs, identity or self-perception, preferences, and behavioral enactment. Thus, this matrix consists of twenty-four potential ways to locate specific research and theoretical issues related to gender development. This division is especially important because it allows researchers to consider developmental changes and possible relationships between dimensions for each of the u nique facets of gender. For instance, research has proposed that knowledge of gender stereotypes increases with age while rigidity of gender attitudes decreases with age (see Signorella, Bigler, 8c Liben, 1993, and Ruble 8c Martin, 1998). Moreover, it has been suggested that there is little relationship between different preference areas such as same-sex peer preference and sex-typed toy preference (e.g., Campbell, Shirley, 8c Caygill, 2002; Shirley 8c Campbell, 2000). Nevertheless, increasing knowledge of the gender stereotypes associated with toys can influence preferences for those same toys (see Aubry, Ruble, 8c Silverman, 1999). It, therefore, seems clear that there are many facets to gender development and that a comprehensive and accurate picture would include an assessment of how each dimension is similar and different from the others, and how they influence each other.
