Chapter 8.PDF

Chapter 8 Gender and Peer Relationships: Middle Childhood Through Early Adolescence Learning Objectives After reading this chapter, you should be able to: 8.1 Describe biological processes in sex determination, differentiation...

Chapter 8 Gender and Peer Relationships: Middle Childhood Through Early Adolescence Learning Objectives After reading this chapter, you should be able to: 8.1 Describe biological processes in sex determination, differentiation in male and female prenatal development, sex-related vulnerabilities to hereditary diseases, and mortality rates. 8.2 Identify and describe key elements that contribute to gender role development and, having examined your own schemas about gender identity (stereotypes, expectations), respond effectively to children’s gender-associated needs and problems. 8.3 Recognize the role, influence, and relevance of peer relationships in childhood and adolescence, and analyze children’s functioning within their peer groups and structure interventions that meet needs for acceptance and belonging. It’s recess time for the third graders at Columbus Elementary. Nine-year-old Eloise and three of her girlfriends take turns jumping rope, while other small clusters of girls are playing hopscotch or sitting and talking. One pair whispers conspiratori- ally, occasionally giggling and glancing up at Eloise and her friends. Another girl, Shayla, skips across the grass alone and then sits on a swing, watching three friends play a climbing game on the modern jungle gym. The game has something to do with a TV show they saw the night before. Dmitri and a crew of boys are playing a vari- ant of tag, in which whoever is “it” must not only catch someone else (who will then become “it”) but also dodge the assaults of players who risk being caught as they race past and punch the boy who is “it” in the back or arms. Another boy watching on the sidelines, Jacob, suddenly jumps into the tag game, punching the player who is “it.” The others gather round, shoving and yelling at the intruder. When Jacob says, “I can play if I want to,” Dmitri shouts more loudly than the rest, “Let him play, but he’s gotta be it.” In the remaining 10 minutes of recess, Jacob catches three different boys, but the captives are forcibly freed by Dmitri and the others, and Jacob never escapes being “it” despite his bitter protests. Moments before recess ends, he stomps off in a rage, cursing at the others. As the third graders move off the playground, recess begins for the higher grades. Soon a group of sixth graders, seven boys and one girl, are playing basketball on the 296  Gender and Peer Relationships: Middle Childhood Through Early Adolescence 297 paved court; another larger group, all boys, is playing soccer on a grassy field. Most of the sixth-grade girls are standing around in circles, talking. We could watch a large assembly of elementary school children on any play- ground in the United States—the roof of a private Manhattan school; the small, fenced yard of a Chicago public school; or, as in this example, the ample playing fields, paved courts, and wood-chipped, well-equipped play area of a sprawling school in an afflu- ent Seattle suburb. Despite the constraints of the setting, some key elements of the children’s behavior would be strikingly similar. Like Eloise, most of the girls would be playing or talking in clusters of two or three, separately from the boys. The boys would be playing in larger groups, and often their play would consist of some mostly good-natured roughhousing. Some children would probably be alone. They might stand apart, like Shayla, or they might push their way into a group where they are not welcome and then find themselves in conflict with others, like Jacob. Occasionally, a child of one sex might play comfortably with a group of the opposite sex, but generally she or he will be a quiet, peripheral member of the group. More often than not, this child will be a girl. Sometimes, groups of boys will interfere with the play of a cluster of girls, most often to chase them or to upset their game. The girls might chase the boys back, always with their girlfriends along for support. These patterns will be familiar to anyone who has ever participated in, or observed, a children’s recess. In this chapter, we will examine two major features of child development that contribute to these patterns. The first is gender role develop- ment in childhood and early adolescence, including the formation of a gender identity and the acquisition of gender-related behaviors. (We will discuss a related but separate construct, the emergence of sexual orientation, in Chapter 9.) The second is the forma- tion and influence of peer relations in the lives of children and young adolescents, including both the degree to which children are able to establish satisfying relation- ships with their peers and the nature and influence of broader peer groups. Gender role development and peer relations have traditionally been separate disciplines in the developmental sciences, and to some degree we will discuss them separately here. It is becoming increasingly clear, however, that peer interactions differ as a function of gender and that peer processes contribute substantially in shaping gendered behavior. For helpers, understanding the processes of gender role development can be a key element in providing valid supports to children and adults as they struggle with identity issues, self-acceptance, and self-esteem. Many coping difficulties, both externalizing and internalizing problems, are more typical of either one gender or the other in our society, or they have different features and implications depending on the gender of the client. It also has become increasingly obvious that a major function of counselors, teach- ers, and other helpers who work with children and adolescents is to identify and intervene with individuals whose peer relationships are distorted. In fact, estimates suggest that up to 75% of children referred for counseling services experience difficul- ties getting along with their peers (Parker, Rubin, Erath, Wojslawowicz, & Buskirk, 2006). Many developments—including perspective taking, as we have already seen, and gender role development, as we will see in this chapter—are now recognized to be at least partly a function of peer group interaction. Establishing and maintaining satisfying relationships with peers and finding a place among broader peer groups are salient to children themselves and are considered central developmental tasks of middle childhood and adolescence. Victims, bullies, and loners in the world of child- hood are at risk for long-term social problems as well as emotional and behavioral difficulties (Rubin, Bukowski, & Bowker, 2015). The Biology of Sex 8.1 Describe biological processes in sex determination, differentiation in male and female prenatal development, sex-related vulnerabilities to hereditary diseases, and mortality rates. You may recall from Chapter 2 that humans have 23 pairs of chromosomes in the nuclei of their cells. In females, the 23rd pair, called the sex chromosomes, consists 298 Chapter 8 of two large X chromosomes. In males, the 23rd pair is mismatched: There is one X chromosome and one much smaller Y chromosome. (Go back to Figure 2.2 to see the difference.) When a woman produces an ovum (egg) with only half the typical number of chromosomes, one from each pair, the egg contains one of the woman’s X chromo- somes. Sperm also contain only one member of each pair of chromosomes, so half of the sperm a man produces will carry an X and half will carry a Y chromosome. The role of heredity in sex determination begins at conception. If an X-carrying sperm fer- tilizes the egg, the zygote will have an XX pair and will develop into a female. Fertil- ization by a Y-carrying sperm will give the zygote an XY sex-chromosome pair, and a male will be the outcome. Unlike other chromosome pairs, the X and Y differ not only in size, but also in function: Most of the genes on the X are not matched on the Y, and vice versa. The chromosomal differences have some impact right from the start. For example, cells carrying the XY chromosome pair have a higher metabolic rate than XX carrying cells, so they divide more quickly and their prenatal growth is faster (e.g., Pergament, Todydemir, & Fiddler, 2002). But the major differentiation of males and females begins at about 5 weeks after conception. By this point, the fetus has developed a pair of “indifferent” or unisex gonads that could become either ovaries or testes. We’ll begin by following the process of differentiation into male structures. The key is a gene located only on the Y chromosome, called the SRY gene (sex-determining region of the Y chromosome). The SRY gene codes for a transcription factor that binds to regulatory DNA, which turns on genes that start the production of other proteins responsible for the development of gonads into testes. The cells of the testes begin to produce many masculinizing hormones, including anti-Mullerian hormone (AMH) and testoster- one, one of several male hormones called androgens, which circulate throughout the body and influence the development of many different kinds of tissue. All fetuses develop two sets of ducts, called the Mullerian ducts and Wolffian ducts, which can differentiate into reproductive structures. Testosterone and other hormones stimulate the Wolffian ducts to develop into male structures, such as the seminal vesicles. AMH causes the deterioration of the Mullerian ducts, which could have developed into internal female parts: the fallopian tubes, uterus, and upper part of the vagina. By the third month, androgens are influencing the growth of male exter- nal genitalia from a whole set of “indifferent” structures. For example, the indifferent genital tubercle becomes a penis; in the absence of androgens it would have become a clitoris. Similarly, an area of genital swelling develops into a scrotal sac; without the androgens it would have become the labia majora (see Figure 8.1). You can see that the presence of the SRY gene in the male begins a cascade of changes that result in a male reproductive system. Much of the process depends on high levels of circulating androgens, produced by the testes. Without the SRY gene and the male hormones, the default developmental path for all the indifferent structures is in the female direction (ovaries, clitoris, and so on). In females, the Mullerian tubes survive and evolve into female reproductive structures, and the Wolffian tubes dete- riorate without androgens to stimulate their further development. Females produce some androgens (both in the ovaries and the adrenal glands), just as males produce the female hormone, estrogen (from androgens as it happens; females produce estrogen more directly in their ovaries). The key to the determination of physical sexual characteristics is the amount and timing of androgen production. “If these hormones are not present in adequate amounts or over the correct temporal intervals, the natural tendency to retain female characteristics prevails” (Ward, 1992, p. 158), which is what happens in individuals with two X chromosomes. Males’ andro- gen production begins surging at 5 weeks of gestation; the surge ends at about 28 weeks. There is another surge just after birth, peaking at 1 to 2 months, and then declining. Females’ estrogen production surges a bit during this same post-natal period, which is sometimes called “mini-puberty” (see Hines, Constantinescu, & Spencer, 2015). After 5 months, both androgen and estrogen production is equally low for boys and girls until actual puberty. After puberty, males produce high levels of testosterone through- out adulthood, much higher than females, until a gradual decline begins at middle age (andropause). Females generally produce higher levels of estrogen than males until menopause.  Gender and Peer Relationships: Middle Childhood Through Early Adolescence 299 FIGURE 8.1 Prenatal differentiation of male and female external genitalia from the same structures. Indifferent stage Genital tubercle Genital swelling Urethral or genital fold Urogenital groove Perineum Anal membrane Anal fold Male development Female development Glans penis Genital tubercle Urogenital groove Genital fold Urogenital groove Urethral fold Scrotal swelling Genital Perineum swelling Perineum Anal fold Anal fold Urethral outlet Glans penis Clitoris Urethra Line of fusion of urethral folds Vagina Labia minora Labia majora Line of fusion of scrotal swelling SOURCE: Copyright 2009 From Psychology Press by Blakemore, J. E. O., Berenbaum, S. A., & Liben, L. S., Gender Development. Reproduced by permission of Taylor and Francis Group, LLC, a division of Informaplc. It is frequently reported that male conceptions far outnumber female conceptions (e.g., Pergament et al., 2002), though recent analyses with more comprehensive sam- ples indicate that the sex ratio at conception is likely to be equal for males and females (Orzack et al., 2015). The challenges in accurately estimating sex ratio at conception arise from changes over prenatal development in the likelihood of fetal death for males versus females. As previously understood, recent estimates indicate that more male than female embryos are spontaneously aborted during early pregnancy, often before the mother realizes she is pregnant, and that more male than female fetuses are miscarried late in pregnancy. In mid-pregnancy and overall, however, there are more females than males miscarried (Orzack et al., 2015), resulting in an actual birth ratio of about 105 males to 100 females. Much remains to be understood about these developmental changes in the pre- natal sex ratio, though the prenatal vulnerability of males at certain times is known 300 Chapter 8 to be partly a function of their susceptibility to hereditary diseases. This vulnerability continues into childhood. The problem for males is the mismatched sex chromosomes. The smaller Y chromosome does not carry most of the genes that the X chromosome does. There are a slew of X-linked recessive disorders, such as hemophilia, baldness, color blindness, night blindness, Duchenne’s muscular dystrophy, fragile X syndrome (which involves intellectual disability), and so on, and males are much more likely to have these disorders than are females. To understand why, consider color blindness. Normal color vision is influenced by a gene on the X chromosome that is ordinarily dominant over any defective allele. Thus, even if a girl (who has two X chromosomes) has a defective allele that could cause color blindness on one of her X chromosomes, she will not be color-blind as long as she has a normal color-vision allele on her other X chromosome. If she happens to inherit defective alleles from both parents, then she will be color-blind. In other words, for females only, color blindness, and all of the other X-linked recessive disorders, function like all inherited diseases caused by reces- sive, defective gene alleles (see Chapter 2). For males, the process is different. If a boy inherits a defective gene allele for color vision on the X chromosome, which comes from his mother, he will be color-blind because his Y chromosome, inherited from his father, bears no matching gene. This is true for all the X-linked recessive diseases. The result is that females tend to be carriers and males are more likely to be affected. MyLab Education Self-Check 8.1. Gender Role Development 8.2 Identify and describe key elements that contribute to gender role development and, having examined your own schemas about gender identity (stereotypes, expectations), respond effectively to children’s gender- associated needs and problems. Let’s now take a look at the development of cognitive, social, and behavioral phenom- ena related to one’s gender. The first part of our discussion of gender role development deals with gender identity, a person’s awareness of his or her own gender assignment and understanding of its meaning. It is often assumed in both society and psychologi- cal research that a child’s gender identity, or sense of self as a girl or boy, will align with her or his assigned biological sex based on XX or XY chromosomes at birth (Fast & Olson, 2018; Lee, Houk, Ahmed, & Hughes, 2006). However, we will also discuss circumstances such as those for intersex and transgender individuals when this may not be the case. The second part of our gender role development discussion centers on gender differences in behavior. We will consider some of the processes that might account for these phenomena, and later we will examine how a helping professional could use this information to benefit clients. Gender Identity Augustina was the youngest girl in a family of nine children. Her parents had emi- grated from Italy to the United States before she was born in 1913. When she was an elderly woman, Augustina recalled that as a young child, she had firmly believed she would be a man when she grew up. She remembered that sometime in her preschool years she was aware of being a girl, but she was excited about the prospect of becom- ing like her older brothers, whom she saw as confident, swaggering, well-dressed young men to whom her mother deferred and who could stand toe-to-toe with her imposing father. (In the cultural tradition of her family, men were more privileged and powerful than women.) She could also remember a feeling of bitter disappointment that hung with her for many months after she realized, sometime later, that she was destined to remain female and that she would inevitably become a woman. Augustina’s story illustrates some elements in the progress of gender identity for young children, although most children do not associate negative feelings with the  Gender and Peer Relationships: Middle Childhood Through Early Adolescence 301 process but seem to wholeheartedly accept their status. The first step in the process is learning to categorize oneself as male or female. By late in their first year, babies seem to make perceptual distinctions between the sexes. They can distinguish pictures of men from pictures of women (Poulin-Dubois & Serbin, 2006), and they can distinguish the voices of men from those of women (even when the voices are matched for pitch; Miller, 1983). Toddlers (about age 2) begin to show signs that they can discriminate some actions as more typical of one gender or the other. For example, they look longer (as if surprised) at a man putting on makeup than a woman doing so (Hill & Flom, 2007). Children show some skill at labeling males and females and at understanding labels such as lady or man, girl or boy late in their second year (e.g., Zosuls, Ruble, Born- stein, & Greulich, 2009). Some children produce a gender label for themselves before age 2. The majority know a self-label by age 2½, and they can identify others who fit into the same category as they do (Maccoby, 1998; Martin & Ruble, 2009). Furthermore, children around age 2 show preference for objects and people associated with their own gender (Zosuls et al., 2009). As Augustina’s experience illustrates, however, knowing your gender category today may not mean that you understand that it will stay that way forever. A second step in the process of identity formation is gender stability––the understanding that over time, one’s gender category usually stays the same: Boys grow into men, girls grow into women. A third step appears to be recognizing that gender category mem- bership is permanent, that it could never change, even if one’s behavior or appearance were changed to resemble the other gender. This is called gender constancy (Slaby & Frey, 1975). Most children seem to have gender stability by 3 to 4 years old—a girl knows she was a girl yesterday and expects to be one again tomorrow. But even older preschoolers may not understand gender constancy. For this, children must realize that even if major surface changes were made—in hairstyle, dress, and behavior—the gender of the individual would not also change. Controversy swirls around the question of when gender constancy develops. In some studies, preschoolers who are shown pictures of, say, a boy dressed up like a girl, with a long-haired wig and a dress, often express the belief that the boy has changed into a girl (DeLisi & Gallagher, 1991; Fast & Olson, 2017; Kohlberg, 1966). In other studies, even some 3-year-olds seem to have a pretty clear sense of gender con- stancy (e.g., Bem, 1989; Johnson & Ames, 1994). But it is safe to say that until about the time of school entry, a child’s understanding of this concept can be fragile, and he can show uncertainty about the permanence of gender categories. This uncertainty may be more common, and not necessarily inappropriate, among children who are trans- gender themselves or siblings of transgender children, which we discuss more in a later section (Fast & Olson, 2017). By school age, children know their gender, and they understand that it is consistent across situations and permanent over time (e.g., Ruble et al., 2007). Still, there are many other dimensions to gender identity that continue to evolve, like the child’s comfort with his gender, as you will see in Box 8.1. Box 8.1: Beyond Gender Constancy: Gender Identity, Social Adjustment, and Ethnicity Sebastian is a boy and he knows it. He understands that this or “Do I act like the other boys in my class?” Besides developing gender category is essentially immutable. But at age 6, his gen- a more detailed and complex sense of himself as a boy, he will der identity is only beginning to develop. As he gets older, his integrate much of this information into more general consider- self-knowledge will grow in many ways, as we saw in Chapter 7. ations of his gender typicality, such as, “Overall, am I a good fit This growth in self-awareness will come partly from his own with my gender category?” (Egan & Perry, 2001; Martin, Andrew, active social comparisons and partly from the input and feedback England, Sozuls, & Ruble, 2017). that he receives from others. In this process, Sebastian’s sense Do these more complex gender identities have any effects on of himself as a member of the “boy” category will differentiate. He children’s psychosocial adjustment? Perry and colleagues (e.g., will identify and evaluate his gender-typical behavior in many are- Egan & Perry, 2001) set out to study this. They discovered that nas, for example, “Do my interests match those of other boys?” in the United States, the impact of gender identity on adjustment (continued  ) 302 Chapter 8 can depend on whether children are members of the White Longitudinally, there was some tendency for children to majority or an ethnic/racial minority. increase in felt gender typicality over time; boys also showed Let’s begin by considering what the researchers learned a tendency to increase in gender contentedness, but girls did about White children. In studies of hundreds of third to eighth not. Girls at all ages felt less typical and less content with their graders, they measured various dimensions of gender (Carver, gender than boys did, but they also reported less pressure Yunger, & Perry, 2003; Egan & Perry, 2001; Yunger, Carver, & to conform than boys. Yet for both boys and girls, the con- Perry, 2004). Three turned out to be especially important: felt nections between gender identity and social adjustment were gender typicality (compatibility), contentedness with gender largely the same. Youngsters who reported feeling that they assignment, and felt pressure to conform to social expectations were not very typical of their gender had lower self-esteem for one’s gender. These dimensions were related to children’s than those who felt more compatible with their gender. Perhaps psychosocial adjustment, including peer acceptance, internaliz- children with low felt gender typicality fear rejection by peers or ing problems, and self-esteem. others, or they might just feel inadequate and out of step. Such To measure children’s self-perceptions on dimensions of feelings seem warranted: Children who felt less typical both gender identity, researchers met with each child individually and considered themselves less socially competent and were less read a set of statements, asking the child to rate how true the well liked by peers than youngsters who felt more typical. statements were. To assess Sebastian’s felt gender compatibility, We might expect that children who are dissatisfied with for example, one of the statements he would have rated is as their gender assignment would be especially prone to social follows: adjustment problems, such as depression or low self-esteem. This is often the case, especially among children who fall at “Some boys don’t feel they are BUT Other boys do feel they are a the extreme end of gender discontent (e.g., Martin, Andrews, a good example of being a boy, good example of being a boy.” England, Zosuls, & Ruble, 2017; Pauletti, Menon, Cooper, Aults, Very true Sort of true Sort of true Very true & Perry, 2017). But in the Perry studies of White children in the for me for me for me for me United States, and with more recent investigations building on n n n n this work, the determination of whether dissatisfaction with gender assignment was problematic depended on if children To measure his contentedness with his gender assignment, felt pressured by others (adults or children) to conform. In one Sebastian would rate statements like “Some boys wish it’d be study, children who scored low on gender contentment also okay for them to do some of the things that usually only girls do tended to have internalizing problems, like self-deprecating BUT other boys never wish it would be okay for them to do some behavior and social anxiety, but only if they felt that they were of the things that only girls do.” A statement about felt pressure under pressure by others to conform to gender stereotypes for sex-typing would be “Some boys think their parents would (Yunger et al., 2004). In recent studies, rejection and bully- be upset if they wanted to learn an activity that only girls usually ing by peers that was related to gender nonconformity partly do BUT other boys don’t think their parents would be upset if accounted for links between low gender typicality and negative they wanted to learn an activity that only girls usually do” (Egan & social and emotional outcomes, especially for boys (Jewell & Perry, 2001). Brown, 2014; Smith & Juvonen, 2017). Other measures focused on children’s interest in stereotypi- Some theorists have argued that when acceptance cal male (e.g., “using tools to make things”) and female (e.g., depends on fitting gender stereotypes, children are likely to “baking”) activities and traits, their “intergroup bias” (whether limit the range of activities they explore and the talents that and how strongly they valued their own gender over the other), they choose to develop (e.g., Bem, 1981). As a result, children their global self-esteem, and their perception of their own social who feel strong pressure to conform have less opportunity to competence. As a sociometric assessment of peer perceptions, develop in ways that are maximally satisfying—that fit their pref- classmates of participants indicated which children they liked the erences and inclinations—and they tend to be unhappy, anx- most and which they liked the least. In one study, peers indicated ious, and discontented with themselves. Although the research whether statements representing internalizing problems (e.g., “He by Perry and colleagues supports this position to some extent, says bad things about himself”) or externalizing problems (e.g., it also makes clear that felt pressure for gender conformity “She hits and pushes others around”) were true of participants. interacts with other aspects of gender identity in complex ways. Children varied widely on how they perceived their own High felt pressure is most problematic for children who sense gender typicality, how satisfied they were with their gender, and that they do not fit in, either because they perceive their talents how much pressure they felt to conform to gender stereotypes. and interests to cross gender boundaries or because they are As you might expect, how typical children felt and how content not as comfortable with their gender assignment as other chil- they were with their gender were both correlated with their actual dren. Later in this chapter we further discuss issues related to gender-typical activities and traits. But you might be surprised to gender nonconformity and transgender identity. learn that the correlations were only modest. Children do not all Egan and Perry (2001) argued that “children’s adjustment use the same criteria to judge what is typical for their gender and is optimized when they (a) are secure in their conceptions of how closely they personally match gender norms. They construct themselves as typical members of their gender yet (b) feel free their own meanings for gender categories. These meanings are to explore cross-sex options when they so desire” (p. 459). In certainly affected by cultural stereotypes and norms, but they are addition, children who describe their identities as consistent also somewhat unique for each child. with both male and female qualities, sometimes referred to as  Gender and Peer Relationships: Middle Childhood Through Early Adolescence 303 androgynous, also tend to show healthy adjustment (Martin et al., up with minority status, many features of experience, and many 2017; Pauletti et al., 2017). But do the same gender identity pro- aspects of self-concept development, are different than for chil- cesses affect social adjustment for children in minority groups? dren with majority status (see Chapter 9). Even though gender Corby, Hodges, and Perry (2007) investigated, using the mea- seems important to all groups (e.g., minority children also feel sures from Perry’s earlier studies with White, Black, and Hispanic pressure to conform to gender expectations), in different devel- fifth graders from lower middle class neighborhoods. opmental contexts it may not have the same meaning or power. In general, gender identity seemed to have less impact on For example, formulating a racial or ethnic identity or coping with social adjustment for the minority group children. For example, minority status may have more influence on adjustment for some although gender contentedness was just as important for Black groups than gender identity dimensions or they may interact in children’s adjustment as it was for White children, it was not complex ways with developing gender identity (Leaper, 2015; especially important for Hispanic children. Also, even though Rogers, Scott, & Way, 2015; see Chapter 9). Clearly, we have Black and Hispanic children felt more pressure for gender confor- much more to learn about the ways that culture moderates the mity than White children did, it did not seem to cause adjustment effects of gender identity on children’s social adjustment. problems. In fact, Hispanic boys who felt a great deal of pressure What influences affect the formation of a gender identity? to conform had fewer internalizing problems than other boys! How do children come to make gender a part of their self-con- What can we make of these differences across U.S. sub- cept? Like every other important behavioral development, many cultures? Corby et al. (2007) remind us that for children growing factors contribute: social, cognitive, and biological. THE ROLE OF SOCIAL PROCESSES IN GENDER IDENTITY When babies are born, adults assign them to gender categories based on their genital characteristics. From the first, young children hear themselves described as male or female. They are told, “You’re a big girl to help Daddy like that,” “Mommy loves her sweet boy,” or “You don’t want to be a mean girl who makes her friend cry!” Children are literally surrounded by verbal reminders of their assigned gender. It’s not surpris- ing, then, that between 2 and 3, at the same time that they are learning other labels for themselves such as “naughty” or “nice” (see Chapter 5), nearly all children have learned their own gender label. Research with intersex children suggests that social assignment to a gender cat- egory can influence gender identity. Intersex children have either ambiguous genitalia or genitalia that are inconsistent with their sex chromosomes. These individuals are described medically as having Disorders of Sexual Development (DSD), a controver- sial term that refers more broadly to congenital conditions in which development of chromosomal, gonadal, or anatomic sex is atypical (Anderson, 2015; Hughes, Houk, Ahmed, & Lee, 2006; Sandberg, Gardner, Collen, & Mazur, 2017). In one example, bio- logically male children, with one X and one Y chromosome, have suffered surgical damage to their genitals during infancy, sometimes as a result of a botched circumci- sion. Faced with this difficult situation, some parents have raised these children as girls from infancy onward. One boy was reassigned by his family as a “girl” at age 7 months (Bradley, Oliver, Chernick, & Zucker, 1998). Physicians provided treatments with female hormones at puberty so that female secondary sexual characteristics would develop, such as enlarged breasts. At the most recent follow-up, in early adult- hood, the young woman still accepted her female identity and was comfortable with her female role. (Note that the results in this case do not indicate that such a solution would be right in all cases. See the discussion below of another boy whose penis was ablated in infancy, and the very different outcome he experienced.) Another type of intersex condition, congenital adrenal hyperplasia (CAH), occurs when biological females with two X chromosomes are exposed to high levels of andro- gens during prenatal and postnatal development. The overproduction of androgens by their own adrenal glands is caused by a defective gene. Although CAH females usually have the internal organs of a girl, their external genitalia may be masculinized. They may, for example, have an enlarged clitoris that looks like a penis, and they have sometimes been misidentified at birth as boys. When they are properly diagnosed, a set of medical interventions can minimize the overproduction of androgens postnatally, and the genitalia can be surgically altered to resemble those of a girl. But John Money and his colleagues, who did extensive studies of children with CAH, concluded that 304 Chapter 8 if the diagnosis is not made before the age of 2½ to 3, a child’s gender identity can be very difficult to alter (Erhardt & Baker, 1974; Money & Dalery, 1977; Money & Erhardt, 1972) and more recent studies seem to confirm this finding (Endendijk, Beltz, McHale, Bryk, & Berenmaum, 2017). Critics of Money’s research program have questioned some of his evidence for the social construction of gender and caution against early gender assignment without the possibility of individual choice (Reis, 2007). Today, early misidentification of CAH girls is much less likely, and the American Academy of Pediatrics recommends that CAH girls identified as such in infancy should be raised as girls. It should be noted that sexual assignment or reassignment in infancy that involves surgery is becoming more and more controversial (see further discussion in the upcoming section “The Role of Biology in Gender Identity”). When CAH females are raised as boys their gender identity is inconsistent with their biological sex, and yet most accept their gender assignment. Of course, their social assignment to the status of male may not be the only factor that supports their acceptance of a male identity. Their exposure to androgens appears to have a mascu- linizing effect on their behavior as well as on their genitalia, and this biologically gen- erated difference in behavior may make a male identity a comfortable “fit” for some CAH females. Indeed, as you will see shortly, research with intersex children demon- strates that nature and nurture operate in tandem with regard to the development of gender identity. THE ROLE OF COGNITION IN GENDER IDENTITY Forming a concept of oneself as either a boy or a girl is a cognitive task. Some theo- rists have argued that one’s gender identity changes partly as a function of general developments in cognitive ability, especially logical thinking (e.g., Kohlberg, 1966). As we have seen, when children first categorize themselves as boys or girls, they may have done little more than learn a label. Their understanding of the implications of that label is limited. Gradually, they begin to recognize that there is stability to their category membership and, finally, that their category membership is constant, based on underlying properties that do not change when superficial perceptual character- istics alter. In a sense, gender is something that is conserved (at least under normal circumstances), much like number is conserved when candies in a pile are made to look different by spreading them out in a row. We have seen (Chapter 3) that a full understanding of number conservation typically is achieved between 5 and 7 years and seems to be based on the development of logical thinking. Gender constancy may also be dependent on the logical thinking skills that emerge as children reach middle childhood. Although developments in logical thinking may be important, there are other cog- nitive factors that can influence the progress of gender identity, such as having accu- rate information about how gender is decided. As we pointed out earlier, adults assign babies to a gender category based on their genitalia. But unless young children are explicitly taught about the importance of genitals to gender assignment, they are likely to be unaware of the typical genital differences between the sexes. References to gen- der categorization are pervasive in our society, and they are a large part of children’s daily experiences. Not only do children frequently hear themselves being categorized, but also they witness many references to other people that contain gender labels, such as “This man will help us find the toy department.” However, most of these references are not based on observation of people’s genitals. They depend on people’s other physical attributes, such as size and shape, and on more superficial characteristics, such as clothing and hairstyle. It’s not really surprising, then, that young children are sometimes oblivious to the genital basis for gender assignment or that they might ini- tially assume that gender categories are determined by superficial properties. Researcher Sandra Bem (1989) tells the story of her son, Jeremy, who was informed about genital differences between boys and girls and about the importance of genita- lia in gender assignment. One day, he chose to go off to nursery school wearing bar- rettes in his hair. When another little boy repeatedly insisted that Jeremy must be a girl because he was wearing barrettes, Jeremy just as vehemently insisted that he was a boy, because “wearing barrettes doesn’t matter; being a boy means having a penis and  Gender and Peer Relationships: Middle Childhood Through Early Adolescence 305 testicles.” Jeremy was even provoked enough at one point to pull down his pants to demonstrate. The other boy was not impressed. He said, “Everybody has a penis; only girls wear barrettes.” A study by Bem (1989) illustrates that when children do have knowledge of the genital basis of gender assignment, as Jeremy did, they are fortified with information that may help them to avoid some confusion about gender constancy. She presented 3- to 5-year-olds with two large photographs of nude toddlers. One was a boy (Gaw), and one a girl (Khwan; see Figure 8.2). Bem gave the pictured toddlers Thai names so that most North American youngsters would find them unfamiliar and would not associ- ate them with gender. Children were asked to say whether a pictured toddler was a boy or a girl, and then were asked to explain how they knew. If no genital information was offered, the researcher probed by asking questions such as, “Can you point to any- thing about Gaw’s body that makes Gaw a boy?” Nearly half of the children showed no awareness of the relevance of genitalia for specifying sex. The children who did know about genitals also seemed to have a better grasp of gender constancy. When they were shown pictures of Gaw or Khwan with cross-gendered clothes or hairstyles, they asserted that their genders had not changed. It appears, then, that when adults provide appropriate s­ caffolding, giving chil- dren accurate information about how g ­ ender is assigned, children’s understanding of their own gender identity is more advanced. THE ROLE OF BIOLOGY IN GENDER IDENTITY If children are assigned to a gender based on their genitalia and if genitals are usually a product of underlying biological processes, then biology plays at least an indirect role in gender identity. But does biology have any other influence, beyond affecting the geni- talia? That has proven a difficult question to answer, but there are some indicators that “feeling like a male” or “feeling like a female” may to some degree be related to factors other than social assignment to a gender category, and these factors could be biological. Again, research on intersex individuals provides some clues. Consider the case of another biological male who had an identical twin, but suffered surgical damage to his penis in infancy (Colapinto, 2000; Diamond & Sigmundson, 1997; Money & Tucker, FIGURE 8.2 Photographs used to measure gender constancy in Bem’s (1989) study. “Gaw” “Khwan” SOURCE: Bem, S. L., (1989). Genital knowledge and gender constancy in school children. Child Development, 60, pp. 653, 654. Used by permission of John Wiley and Sons. 306 Chapter 8 1975). As with the child we described earlier (Bradley et al., 1998), the parents raised this twin as a girl. Yet by age 10, unlike the child described by Bradley and colleagues, the girl twin was expressing dissatisfaction with her female gender assignment. At age 14, when she was told of her medical history, she took a stand: She refused hormone treatments that feminized her appearance. Instead she received male hormone treat- ments and surgical reconstruction of the penis. By the time he was 25, the former girl was a married man. Tragically, he committed suicide at age 38, having experienced a long history of adjustment-related difficulties (Colapinto, 2000). The case of the identical twin is no more than suggestive that biology can outdo social influences in affecting gender identity. First, this child’s parents did not commit to a gender change until he was 17 months old. By puberty, this child had a somewhat masculinized appearance, despite receiving female hormones. Because of her appear- ance, she experienced substantial bullying by her peers, a social factor that could have influenced her gender uncertainty and distress. Further, we cannot say how effective her own family had been in accepting her status as a girl and thus how unambiguous her socialization experiences had been. However, cases such as these raise the pos- sibility that biology can exert an influence on how “male” or “female” one feels, or at least on how comfortable one is with a particular gender assignment. We should note that the results of this case appear to be quite different from the one reported earlier (Bradley et al., 1998). Intersex children sometimes undergo gender assignment or reassignment at birth because of conditions that cause malformations of genitalia. Large-scale studies of such children have produced conflicting results. In some, social reassignment of XY males to female identities, or of XX females to male identities, seems to work well (see Zucker, 1999, for a review). In more recent studies, although the majority accept reassignment comfortably, a sizeable minority of children have been reported to reject reassignment by the time they reach adolescence (Dessens, Slijper, & Drop, 2005; Kolesinska et al., 2014; Meyer-Bahlberg, 2005; Reiner & Gearhart, 2004; Sandberg, Gardner, Callens, & Mazur, 2017), suggesting that socialization may not be as powerful as once thought in the development of gender identity. As such, ongoing controversy surrounds decisions about if and how to assign gender for intersex individuals at birth, and whether and how to intervene medi- cally, though recommendations incorporating ethical principles and current knowl- edge have been put forth (Anderson, 2015; Lathrop et al., 2014; Lee et al., 2016). Many researchers and theorists have argued for recognition and cultural acceptance of inter- sex statuses (Diamond & Butterworth, 2008; Savin-Williams & Ream, 2007; see also Byne et al., 2012). Blackless and colleagues (2000) report that some type of sexual non- dimorphism is present in up to 2 out of every 100 live births. For many people, gender identity simply does not conform to the dichotomous model of gender as either male or female. Models and theories that account for continuous variation in gender iden- tity and gender differences may better describe the broader picture of gender devel- opment across individuals (Diamond & Butterworth, 2008; Reis & Carothers, 2014; Savin-Williams, 2016). GENDER NONCONFORMITY AND TRANSGENDER CHILDREN As introduced in Box 8.1, an important aspect of gender identity involves the extent to which individuals feel they are typical of their assigned gender. Some children feel so different from their biological sex and assigned gender that they believe they are or wish they were the opposite gender. When these feelings involve extreme dissat- MyLab Education isfaction with and distress related to their gender, children may be diagnosed with Video Example 8.1 gender dysphoria, which was previously called gender identity disorder (APA, 2013). For By the age of two or three years, example, James was born male based on genes but insisted beginning at the age of 2 conflict can emerge between biolog- that she was a girl, choosing to go by the name of “Nora” and insisting on wearing ical sex assigned at birth and gender identity. Though skepticism regard- girl’s clothing and growing her hair long. Though they were unsure of the best way to ing transgender identity exists respond, Nora’s parents accepted her identity as female and did their best to warmly among the general public, helping support her choices. Nora maintained this belief and more female-stereotypical behav- professionals need to understand iors throughout childhood and puberty into adolescence, when she and her parents diverse aspects of gender identity. began considering medical interventions.  Gender and Peer Relationships: Middle Childhood Through Early Adolescence 307 The term transgender refers to individuals like Nora, who believe that their bio- logical sex does not correspond to their gender identity. For many, this means that they describe their gender identity as “opposite” that of their biological sex. Recent stud- ies suggest that about 0.3% of people in the United States are transgender according to this definition (Russo, 2016). This conflict between biological sex assigned at birth and gender identity can emerge as early as 2 or 3 years of age. In addition to describ- ing oneself as the opposite gender, earliest signs of developing transgender identity involve gender nonconformity, or failing to adhere to gender-based societal expecta- tions for feelings, behaviors, and appearance (Martin-Storey, 2016). Considering the development of gender identity, it is essential to recognize that many young children demonstrate gender nonconformity to some degree, and that even among those who describe themselves as feeling “opposite” to their assigned biological sex at some point as young children, only a small minority continue to identify as transgender fol- lowing puberty, like Nora. (Some other children who show gender nonconformity— but not all, by any means—later have homosexual or bisexual orientations, which we discuss in Chapter 9.) Those children who do persist in transgender identity through adolescence and into adulthood are described as “insistent, consistent, and persistent” in their firmly held belief that their gender identity differs from their assigned biologi- cal sex (Olson, 2016; Steensma, McGuire, Kreukels, Beekman, & Cohen-Kettenis, 2013). While recent attention to transgender children in the media, legal proceedings, and school board rulings have increased their visibility, much skepticism regarding transgender identity exists among the general public and some professionals. Critics question whether these young children are confused about or delayed in their gen- der development, and whether they simply may be pretending when they describe their genders as opposite (McHugh, 2014; Zucker et al., 1999). Researchers seeking to address these questions recruited a sample of transgender children ages 5 to 12 who had “socially transitioned” such that they were living according to their gender iden- tity rather than their natal sex (Olson, Key, & Eaton, 2015). The researchers compared transgender children to cisgender (non-transgendered) youth on measures of both implicit and explicit gender cognitions. Results showed a clear pattern: The trans- gender children looked the same as peers when matched by expressed gender, and very different from peers when matched by natal sex (Olson et al., 2015). In a similar study, preschool-aged transgender children did not differ from controls matched by age and expressed gender on any measures of gender preferences, beliefs, or behaviors except cognitions about gender constancy. Interestingly, the transgendered children’s cisgender siblings also differed from controls on gender constancy, as they were more likely to say that other people’s gender may not be stable over time (Fast & Olson, 2017). Based on these studies, the researchers concluded that transgender children are unlikely to be confused, delayed, or pretending in reference to their gender develop- ment or gender identity. Transgender youth face approximately two to three times the risk of psychologi- cal difficulties such as depression, anxiety, and suicidality or self-harm compared to their cisgender peers (Martin-Storey, 2016; Russo, 2016), presumably resulting from distress related to many factors such as feeling or being treated differently from oth- ers, or lack of acceptance from family, peers, or society more broadly. As described in Box 8.1, children who experience bullying related to gender nonconformity face risk for social and emotional difficulties (Jewell & Brown, 2014; Smith & Juvonen, 2017). This victimization may be even more severe for transgender children. While knowl- edge of the long-term outcomes for transgender children is currently limited, available research indicates that transgender children do best when their parents, schools, and peers accept their gender identities (Martin-Storey, 2016; Olson, 2016). Furthermore, some medical interventions that temporarily and reversibly delay changes associated with puberty may alleviate distress for transgender youth in early adolescence (Spack et al., 2012). In the Applications section of Chapter 9, we discuss additional concerns about, and interventions for, transgendered youth. Overall, you should note that our understanding of the developmental trajectories of transgender children requires much more research to arrive at recommendations for best supporting their healthy development. 308 Chapter 8 Gender and Behavior Many of us believe that males and females have at least some different behavioral tendencies, and some people believe that there are major differences in the distribution of personality traits between the sexes. Such beliefs about sex differences are called gender stereotypes. Researchers have found evidence for some of the differences that people believe in, but other stereotypes seem to arise from expectations that have no basis in fact. In this section, we will first take a look at some of the gender differences that have been found, especially in children. Then, we’ll consider some of the theoreti- cal explanations that have been proposed for gender differences. That is, when they actually exist, how do they develop? GENDER DIFFERENCES IN BEHAVIOR, PERSONALITY, AND PREFERENCE In 1974, Maccoby and Jacklin did a careful review of the scientific literature on gender differences. They surprised most observers by concluding that there were only four behaviors, skills, or tendencies that clearly differed for males and females: physical aggression, language skills, math skills, and spatial skills. Even in these domains, some behaviors differed across the life span (e.g., aggression) and others only during certain developmental periods, such as after puberty (e.g., certain math skills). Since 1974, researchers have acquired a valuable analytic tool for assessing the effects of variables such as gender. In a meta-analysis, the results from a large number of studies on the same question—such as, “Are there gender differences in physical aggression?”—can be combined to produce an average estimate of the magnitude of difference in a popu- lation (Glass, 1976). The results of many meta-analyses are now available, and the list of “real” gender differences has lengthened (see Table 8.1). In addition, our knowledge of gender differ- ences is now more fine-tuned. With regard to math, for example, among top-perform- ing students, boys have an advantage over girls in complex problem solving. This is more likely to be true when problems can be solved using spatially based strategies. Yet, boys are also more numerous than girls among underperformers in math, and girls tend to outperform boys on computation (see Halpern et al., 2007, for a comprehensive review). We also have been collecting data for long enough, and in enough circum- stances, that we know that these differences can change historically; that is, there are cohort effects. To add to the complexity, these effects can vary from one context to another. For example, historical change has affected math skills such that males and females in the United States today do not differ on most tests of math achievement before grade 12 (e.g., Hyde, 2014), even though they did differ over two decades ago (e.g., Hyde, Fennema, & Lamon, 1990). The gender gaps that continue to exist seem to vary from one culture to another. The male advantage in complex problem solving (which has reduced in magnitude but continues in the United States today as a gender difference on math SAT test performance) differs by country and culture. The more a country is characterized by a cultural acceptance of male privilege, the more boys out- number girls among top performers in that country (Bergold et al., 2017; Guiso, Monte, Sapienza, & Zingales, 2008; Reilly, Neumann, & Andrews, 2015). In countries where cultural attitudes strongly favor gender equality, such as Iceland, there are as many (or more) girls as boys among top math performers. One very large meta-analysis included the test data of nearly 500,000 14- to 16-year-olds in 69 nations. The analysis identified specific societal indicators of equality that are linked to disappearing math performance differences between boys and girls (Else-Quest, Hyde, & Lynn, 2010). These indicators are equal enrollment in school; larger shares of research jobs held by women; and larger numbers of women lawmakers (parliamentary representatives). It is just as interesting to note the differences that have not been found as those that have. Among the common gender stereotypes, for example, are that females are more sociable, more dependent, and more prosocial than males and that males are more competent at analytical tasks. Although occasional studies have reported findings that are consistent with these expectations, in most studies such differences have not been found. Similarly, arguments that males and females differ in moral reasoning have received a great deal of popular and scientific attention. As we mentioned in Chapter 7, Gilligan (e.g., 1977, 1982) proposed that males are more likely to focus on issues of  Gender and Peer Relationships: Middle Childhood Through Early Adolescence 309 TABLE 8.1 A Sampling of Gender Differences TRAIT OR QUALITY MORE TYPICAL OF TIME OF ONSET Developmental vulnerability (learning disabilities, illness, accidents, etc.) Boys Prebirth Activity level Boys Infant Happy, excited mood Boys Infant/toddler Risk taking Boys Infant/toddler Physical aggression Boys Toddler Faster reaction time Boys Preschool Competitive play Boys Preschool Domineering discourse style Boys Preschool Dominance seeking; clear group hierarchy Boys Preschool Spatial skill: mental rotation Boys Middle childhood Antisocial aggressive disorders Boys Middle childhood Satisfaction with one’s gender assignment Boys Middle childhood Math problem solving Boys Middle childhood Homosexuality, bisexuality Boys Adolescence Preference for gender-typed toys Both Toddler Preference for same-gender playmates Both Toddler Quiet, calm mood Girls Infant Language onset (vocabulary) Girls Toddler Collaborative discourse style Girls Preschool Empathy and compliance Girls Preschool Academic achievement Girls Middle childhood Emotional expressiveness Girls Middle childhood Relational aggression (refusing friendship, exclusion from group) Girls Middle childhood Depression Girls Adolescence Social sensitivity Girls Adulthood KEY: Prebirth—Conception to birth; Infant—0 to 1 year; Toddler—1 to 3 years; Preschool—3 to 6 years; Middle childhood—6 years to puberty; Adolescence— Puberty to 18 years; Adulthood—18 years onward. justice or fairness in their moral reasoning, but females are more concerned with issues of interpersonal responsibility and compassion. However, the evidence indicates that boys and girls show no differences in their tendencies to focus on such issues and that both men and women raise both kinds of issues when they solve moral problems or judge moral maturity (e.g., Walker & Pitts, 1998). Occasionally, adolescent and adult females have been found to raise more concerns about people’s needs than adolescent or adult males in addressing real-life dilemmas, but people of both genders raise such concerns quite frequently (Baez et al., 2017; Capraro & Sippel, 2017; Turiel, 2006). When gender differences arise consistently, they tend to be minor. For example, gender differences in emotional expression overall are significant but small, with girls demonstrating more positive expressiveness and internalizing emotions like anxiety and sadness while boys demonstrate more externalizing emotions, like anger (Chaplin & Aldao, 2013). Figure 8.3 illustrates the considerable overlap between males and females on those traits that show some gender difference. Some researchers have argued strongly that gender differences are too small to be important in development, especially considering that the average difference between genders is much smaller 310 Chapter 8 FIGURE 8.3 Typical pattern of differences for characteristics that show a sex difference. –2.5 –2 –1.5 –1 –0.5 0 0.5 1 1.5 2 2.5 3 –3 Depending on the characteristic, either boys or girls might have the higher average scores. than the range of differences within each gender (Hyde, 2014). Furthermore, some researchers argue that gender differences should be conceptualized as more dimen- sional, differing across all people, than categorical, differing between just male and female groups (Reis & Carothers, 2014). However, average individual differences between the genders may not be the important story in gender role development. More and more, developmentalists are recognizing that although boys and girls do not behave much differently in laboratory measures of personality or on individual abilities, they do spend their time differently. Specifically, girls spend their time interacting primarily with girls, and boys spend their time mostly with boys. In settings where there are both males and females of similar ages available, such as schools and playgrounds, and where there is freedom to choose one’s companions, this gender segregation process begins by about age 2½ for girls and by about age 3 for boys, and it increases with age (see Martin, Fabes, Hanish, & Hollenstein, 2005). Gender segregation characterizes children around the world, in both industrial- ized and nonindustrialized societies (e.g., Omark, Omark, & Edelman, 1973; Whiting & Edwards, 1988). When children are about 4, the time they spend with same-sex peers is triple the time they spend with other-sex peers (Fabes, Martin, & Hanish, 2003). By the time children are 6, they spend 11 times more time with same-sex peers! During ele- mentary school, sex segregation intensifies, and it begins to ease off only after puberty, when, drawn together by sexual interest, children begin to participate more readily in mixed-gender activities. During middle childhood, mixed-gender interactions, called borderwork, tend to be quite limited (Maccoby & Jacklin, 1987; Thorne, 1986, 1994). In fact, there seem to be unwritten “rules” that govern when it is acceptable for boys and girls to engage in mixed-gender interactions. Alan Sroufe and his colleagues (Sroufe, Bennett, Englund, Urban, & Shulman, 1993) observed 10- and 11-year-olds at a sum- mer camp, for example, and identified a set of six rules that seemed to determine when children would cross the boundaries of their single-sex groups (see Table 8.2). When children segregate by gender, other behaviors also tend to diverge. For example, suppose that Carissa and Duane, both 6 years old, are equally active when they play alone on the playground. They climb on the jungle gym with about average vigor for children their age, and they are more inclined to skip and jog from place to place than either to walk or to run full tilt. When Carissa plays with her girlfriends, her activity level stays about the same. But when Duane plays with a group of boys, he is notably more active than when he plays alone: He moves more vigorously on the jungle gym or runs with greater intensity. Boys tend to increase their activity level in the company of other boys (Maccoby, 1998). Children do somewhat different things in their same-gender groups. Perhaps most notable is that boys’ play in groups is more physical and more aggressive than girls’ play. This is true in all primate species, across cultures, and from the earliest ages  Gender and Peer Relationships: Middle Childhood Through Early Adolescence 311 TABLE 8.2 Rules Governing Mixed-Gender Interaction, or Borderwork Rule: The contact is accidental. Example: You’re not looking where you are going and you bump into someone. Rule: The contact is incidental. Example: You go to get some lemonade and wait while two children of the other gender get some. (There should be no conversation.) Rule: The contact is in the guise of some clear and necessary purpose. Example: You may say, “Pass the lemonade,” to persons of the other gender at the next table. No interest in them is expressed. Rule: An adult compels you to have contact. Example: “Go get that map from X and Y and bring it to me.” Rule: You are accompanied by someone of your own gender. Example: Two girls may talk to two boys, though physical closeness with your own partner must be maintained and intimacy with the others is disallowed. Rule: The interaction or contact is accompanied by disavowal. Example: You say someone is ugly or hurl some other insult or (more commonly for boys) push or throw something at them as you pass by. SOURCE: Sroufe, L. A., Bennett, C., Englund, M. and Shulman, S. (1993). The significance of gender. Child Development, 64, p. 456. Reproduced with p ­ ermission by John Wiley and Sons. that youngsters play together (Ruble, Martin, & Berenbaum, 2006). When Carissa and her friends ride the wheeled vehicles in the play yard of their after-school child care center, they ride around carefully to avoid hitting each other. But when Duane and his friends are in the drivers’ seats, their favorite thing to do is ram into each other—the harder the better (e.g., Dunn & Morgan, 1987; Fabes et al., 2003). Good-natured physical roughness is called rough-and-tumble play, an almost exclusive property of boys’ play with boys. Most boys are not consistently aggressive across situations. That is, physical aggressiveness is not so much a personality trait that you see when a child is in any situation—with adults, girls, or boys—although it can be for some children. More typically, it emerges when boys are with boys. Thus, it becomes an important defining feature of boys’ social groups, which differ in specific ways from girls’ social groups. Boys often use rough-and-tumble play to help estab- lish dominance hierarchies within their groups, with more dominant boys less likely to back down and less often aggressed against. Generally, boys play in larger groups than do girls, who are more likely to play in twos and threes, and the boys’ groups are more clearly structured hierarchically. Although girls’ groups usually have their more and less dominant members, the rankings are not very stable, and leadership does not depend on toughness as much as on other leadership qualities, such as social skill (Maccoby, 1998; Martin & Fabes, 2001). Girls’ and boys’ groups differ on other dimensions as well (Ruble et al., 2006). Boys compete with each other more than girls do. As preschoolers they compete for resources, such as attractive toys, and in middle childhood they compete in structured games. Girls’ interactions tend to be more cooperative and to involve much more turn taking. These characteristics of gendered groups are integrally related to the kinds of activities that bring boys and girls together. In particular, boys seem to spend time with other boys who have shared interests, especially starting in middle childhood, and they are more likely than girls to be interested in sports and games and in adven- ture. For example, when boys pretend, their play tends to involve heroic or warlike themes (e.g., Coyne, Linder, Rasmussen, Nelson, & Collier, 2014). Girls often seem to get together just to be together, and their choice of companions is based more on personality (Erwin, 1985). On the whole, they tend to have broader interests than boys, and they are more interested in boys’ activities than boys are in girls’ activities. Girls do have stronger tendencies than boys to enact family or school experiences in their play, and increasingly from preschool onward, girls’ pretend play themes have to do with adornment and beauty—being models or brides, doing glam- orous or romantic things (Storli & Sandseter, 2015). 312 Chapter 8 As you can see, girls’ groups and boys’ groups have different cultures to which the members, regardless of their individual characteristics, must adapt. A good example of this difference is the degree to which they use collaborative versus domineering discourse techniques (Leaper & Smith, 2004). In collaborative or affiliative speech, more often used in girls’ groups, children’s responses are keyed to what someone else has said, expressing agreement or making further suggestions, often in the form of a question rather than declarative or imperative sentences, which seems to soften the suggestion. For example, Carissa might say to a friend as they plan a game, “You want to be the mommy. Why don’t we both be the mommy sometimes?” In domineering or power- assertive speech, more typical of boys’ groups, commands and restrictions are common, as when Duane says, “Don’t move that block; build the road there!” It is important to note that both boys and girls will use both kinds of discourse. It is the predominance of one type over the other that differs between their groups. On the whole, girls’ discourse strategies are more “conflict mitigating” and boys’ strategies are more “egoistic”— threatening, demanding, interrupting, or ignoring of another’s remarks (Maccoby, 1998). Where do gender differences in behavior come from? There are theories that emphasize the importance of biology, of cognitive processes, and of socialization pres- sures. As always, all three are important. Some theorists emphasize the interaction of the three as children spend time in same-gender peer groups. It seems that gender segregation in childhood, perhaps the most pervasive gender difference, may be both an outcome of some gender differences and a source of others. THE ROLE OF BIOLOGY IN GENERATING GENDER DIFFERENCES You learned earlier in this chapter that genetic differences between males and females normally influence the differential development of reproductive organs. You have seen that the prenatal release of masculinizing hormones (androgens) plays a major role in this process. Do masculinizing hormones also affect the developing nervous system, thus influencing postnatal behavior? In animals, there is evidence that prena- tal hormones do affect neural structures (e.g., Martel, 2013), and in both animals and humans, there appear to be effects on early behavior. For example, male rats whose exposure to prenatal androgens is delayed not only show a slight demasculinization of their genitalia but they also show more feminized play behaviors as pups (e.g., Ward, 1992; Ward & Stehm, 1991). In humans, girls with CAH who are overexposed to prenatal (and sometimes post- natal) androgens have been found to exhibit more tomboyism—playing with boys and preferring boys’ toys and activities—than non-CAH girls (for reviews see Berenbaum, 2004; Constantinescu & Hines, 2012). Findings such as these are open to several inter- pretations. For one, parents of girls with CAH may have doubts about their daughters’ sexual identity that could affect their daughters’ behavior; for another, these girls have many unusual experiences, such as genital surgeries and ongoing medical treatments, that could affect their behavioral development, and so on (see Collaer & Hines, 1995). However, the somewhat masculinized behaviors of CAH girls may also indicate a role for prenatal (or postnatal) hormones in some of the typical behavioral differences found between boys and girls. Two studies provide somewhat more convincing demonstra- tions of a role for prenatal androgens in the masculinizing of girls’ behavior. The first is a large study of normally developing children. At 8 years old, both boys and girls were rated as more masculine in their activities if their mothers had had higher than average amounts of testosterone (an androgen) in their blood during pregnancy (Auyeung et al., 2009). The second is a study of 3- to 10-year-old CAH girls and their unaffected (non- CAH) siblings (Pasterski et al., 2005). The children were observed in toy play alone and also with each of their parents. The CAH girls made more spontaneous male-typical toy choices (e.g., trucks) than their unaffected sisters, even though their parents encouraged sex-typical toy play with their children and actually provided more positive feedback to CAH girls than to unaffected girls for play with female toys (e.g., dolls). At puberty, hormonal changes and hormonal differences between boys and girls may cause some behavioral differences that emerge at about that time. For example, although depressive symptoms increase for both girls and boys after puberty, they increase more for girls; boys show more increases in aggressive, delinquent behaviors  Gender and Peer Relationships: Middle Childhood Through Early Adolescence 313 than girls (see Table 8.1 and Chapter 9). Could these differences in problem behavior be linked to hormones? It is a sensible question to ask, and some connections have been identified. For example, there is a link between boys’ androgen levels and their aggres- siveness (Buchanan, Eccles, & Becker, 1992). But androgens appear to more directly affect attempts to achieve social power (dominance seeking), which leads to aggres- sion only in some people and some situations (Josephs, Sellers, Newman, & Mehta, 2006; Rowe, Maughan, Worthman, Costello, & Angold, 2004). Another complication in interpreting hormone–behavior connections is that whereas androgens may increase aggressiveness, one’s experiences, such as bullying, may change hormone levels (e.g., Vaillancourt, deCatanzaro, Duku, & Muir, 2009). In particular, for males, aggression and dominance seeking can increase testosterone, an androgen (see Cacioppo & Bern- tson, 1992). So it is still not clear whether hormone levels cause or result from behavior and experience during and after puberty. Research on brain structures has identified some sex differences (e.g., Ruigrok et al., 2014), supporting the idea that brain differences may underlie some gender dif- ferences, but many of the findings are controversial (see Grabowska, 2017). Among the differences for which there is some evidence is the presence of greater lateraliza- tion in males than in females, that is, greater differentiation in the functioning of the two hemispheres of the brain, with language functions more clearly governed by the left hemisphere in males (e.g., Friederici et al., 2008). Even in children as young as 16 months, patterns of brain activation appear to be more lateralized for word com- prehension in boys than in girls (as measured by functional magnetic resonance imag- ing, or fMRI; Molfese, 1990). But here again, findings are unclear. For example, one large fMRI study of older children found no sex difference in lateralization of language processing (Plante, Schmithorst, Holland, & Byars, 2006). If females are less lateral- ized, using more of both hemispheres for language functions, it could account for the female advantage in language. But this, and other brain differences, if they exist, could just as easily be the result of different experiences. That is, when behavioral differences develop, they may cause differences in brain function rather than being the result of such differences. Given what we have learned about brain development (see Chapter 3), it seems likely that the causal links work both ways. One other note of caution about relating brain differences to gender differences in behavior should be presented. Sometimes brain differences clearly are not related to behavioral differences (see Grabowska, 2017 for a review). For example, in one study, intelligence as measured by standardized intelligence tests was correlated with more gray matter (thicker cortex) in the frontal and parietal lobes for men, but in women intelligence was correlated with more gray matter in different parts of the frontal lobes. There were no differences in these same men and women on intelligence. As the authors put it, “men and women apparently achieve similar IQ results with different brain regions, suggesting that... different types of brain designs may manifest equiva- lent intellectual performance” (Haier, Jung, Yeo, Head, & Alkire, 2005, p. 320). THE ROLE OF COGNITION IN GENERATING GENDER DIFFERENCES When Ben was 5 years old, he loved to sit with his mother early in the morning while she dressed for work. He especially enjoyed watching her comb her hair and tie it back with a ribbon. One day he asked if he could have a ribbon in his own hair. His mother, who tried to encourage nonsexist ideas in her children, tied a ribbon in Ben’s hair, and he spent some happy moments admiring himself in the mirror. But soon he grew still, staring at his image, and he finally asked, “Do boys wear ribbons in their hair?” to which his mother responded, “Not usually.” Ben grasped the ribbon and tore it off his head, pulling strands of hair along with it. Then, bursting into tears, he ran from the room. Despite his mother’s neutrality, Ben was angry and humiliated that he had done a “girl” thing. Several cognitive theories of gender differences have been proposed to explain behaviors such as Ben’s. We will examine them next. Cognitive-Developmental Theories. Cognitive-developmental theorists such as Kohlberg (1966) have argued that when children acquire an understanding of gen- der constancy, partly as a function of advances in their logical thinking skills, they 314 Chapter 8 are intrinsically motivated to learn all they can about what it means to be male or female, and they are eager to behave in gender-appropriate ways. In other words, children actively seek to act in accordance with their gender identity, whether or not they experience social pressure to do so. This process is often referred to as self-socialization. The anecdote about Ben illustrates the power of such a cogni- tively based motivational system. There is also research evidence to support a cogni- tive basis for at least some of children’s gendered behaviors, although contrary to Kohlberg’s notion, a full understanding of gender constancy does not seem to be required. Rather, establishing basic gender identity (i.e., learning one’s own gender category) seems to be sufficient to foster a drive to learn about gendered behavior and a tendency to make gender-typical choices (Weinraub et al., 1984). Once gender stability is established, children are increasingly likely to make gender-based choices over what may be more attractive choices, as Ben did (Martin, Ruble, & Szkrybalo, 2002; Ruble et al., 2006). Cognitive-developmental theories also suggest that when children achieve gen- der constancy, their thinking about gender differences should become more “flexible” and less stereotyped. They now understand that superficial characteristics can change without changing one’s underlying gender category. Therefore, children should be able to see that gender role stereotypes, such as girls wearing dresses and boys wear- ing pants, are social conventions, not moral imperatives or requirements for main- taining gender identity. Indeed, children’s thinking about gender does become more flexible in middle childhood, as you will see in a later section (Conry-Murray & Turiel, 2012; Halim, 2016). Some researchers theorize that young adolescents become some- what more rigid in their thinking about what’s permissible for people of different gen- ders (Ruble et al., 2006). The gender intensification hypothesis suggests that one way young teens cope with the demands of establishing an adult identity is to fall back on stereotyped notions of masculinity or femininity (Hill & Lynch, 1983), but there is little evidence for this position, especially for U.S. adolescents today (Priess, Lindberg, & Hyde, 2009). Gender Schema Theories. Cognitive theorists in the information processing tradi- tion emphasize the role of gender schemas in influencing the behavior of children and adults (Bem, 1981; Markus, Crane, Bernstein, & Siladi, 1982). A gender schema is a net- work of expectations and beliefs about male and female characteristics. Schemas affect what we pay attention to, what we interpret, and what we remember about events. So, for example, if elementary school children hear stories or see pictures of men or women engaged in behaviors typically associated with the other gender—such as a woman doing carpentry work—they are likely to remember the pictures later in ways more consistent with their gender schemas. In this example, they might later remem- ber that they heard about, or saw, a man working as a carpenter (Liben & Signorella, 1980, 1993; Welch-Ross & Schmidt, 1996). Gender schemas affect both how children evaluate behavior and the kinds of behaviors they choose for themselves. In one study, when preschoolers were told either that a boy or a girl had spilled some milk, they judged the behavior more negatively if they believed the child was a boy, apparently based on a “boys are bad” stereotype (Giles & Heyman, 2004). Many studies demonstrate the power of stereotypical beliefs on children’s behavior. For example, when children are shown novel toys described as “girl” toys, girls play with the toys more and remember them better than if the same toys are described as “boy” toys; the reverse is true for boys (Martin et al., 2002). Recent studies of preschool-aged children have demonstrated that children who con- sider their gender identity both very important and very positive are most likely to insist on wearing gender-typed outfits, such as pink frilly dresses for girls and sports- themed shirts for boys (Halim et al., 2014). Gender schema theorists suggest that the schemas children have for their own gen- der affect what behaviors they choose to learn about and what behaviors they choose for themselves, but they do not account for the exact mechanisms by which schemas are constructed. Social experiences and available role models presumably affect gen- der differences by affecting what children know or believe to be gender appropriate.  Gender and Peer Relationships: Middle Childhood Through Early Adolescence 315 But, according to these theorists, it is the schemas, not the social experiences directly, that motivate children to adopt sex-typed behavior. In the studies of gender-typed out- fits described above, differences in children’s tendencies to dress in a gender-typical manner were unrelated to their parents’ preference for such dress (Halim et al., 2014). There is evidence that knowledge of stereotypes influences children’s interests and judgments about what they are good at even when the gender difference is not real. For example, in a large U.S. sample of 6- to 10-year-olds, by second grade children endorsed the stereotype that boys are better than girls in math. Soon after, boys were more likely than girls to see themselves as good at math, even though gender differ- ences in math achievement were absent or even favored girls (Cvencek, Meltzoff, & Greenwald, 2011; Voyer & Voyer, 2014). Research has not yet established clear links, however, between cognitive schemas and actual behavior. Children’s Knowledge of Gender Stereotypes. In general, cognitive theorists assume that the acquisition of knowledge about gender stereotypes influences the feminization and masculinization of children’s behavior, regardless of whether oth- ers reward or otherwise pressure children to adopt gender-typed behavior. From this perspective, it is important to learn what children know about gender stereotypes and when they know it if we want to understand the development of gender differences. Two-year-olds show little awareness of gender stereotypes. For example, Gelman, Taylor, and Nguyen (2004) recorded parent–child discussions of pictures depicting children and adults engaged in various activities. In the following exchange between a 2-year-old girl and her mother about a picture of a child playing with a toy truck, the little girl attributes ability not to gender categories but to individuals: Mother: Who can play with toy trucks? Mother: Hm? Child: Um, you. (Later... ) Mother: Yeah, well who else? Child: Maybe Daddy. Mother: Dadd