ABSTRACT
This chapter documents two studies that were attempts to bring together two methodologies: cognitive development and social learning. Sex differences in child behavior do not begin to appear with any regularity until about the first birthday, and even then the differences are few in comparison with the similarities observed between such young boys and girls. Information provided by the child's environment is not always consistent and there may be fairly long intervals between presentations of similar events, yet children develop categories or gender schemata which allow them to classify behaviors, attitudes, and themselves as male or female. Parental interventions and environmental factors may punctuate the process of growth, but the child, too, must be studied in terms of its own developing capabilties. In 1979, Perry and Bussey presented a modified social learning theory view of how imitation contributes to sex role development. With recent attempts to study the interface between cognition and affect, new methods are being developed.
