Gender Roles
What are gender roles?
Gender roles are the somewhat predetermined roles that men and women have in the mind of individuals and often in society as well. Gender, however, should not be confused with sex. Sex refers to a person's biological, anatomical makeup. Sex roles refer to activities that involve an individual being a male or female. For example, females are able to nurse infants and men cannot, therefore, nursing is a sex role. Gender roles, however, do not require a sex. These roles are typically established by society, but are not absolute. These roles depend on several variables: location, religion, ethnicity, etc.
Albert Bandura and Jerome Kagan
Bandura's Social Learning Theory proposes that we learn gender roles by watching, learning and imitating what we see in our everyday life. Bandura believed that young girls will imitate their mother, or other adult women, and young boys will imitate adult men like their father. Bandura labeled this exercise as "gender role modeling". Another theorist who agreed with Bandura's principles of gender role modeling was Jerome Kagan. Kagan theorized that we become aware of gender roles as early as infancy.
Cognitive Developmental Theory
According to cognitive development theorists, we develop our schemas by interacting with our surrounding environment. These theorists also use this approach when considering gender. Lawrence Kohlberg determined that three processes help an individual decide upon a gender role. Kohlberg's first process is gender identity, or the ability to determine whether an individual is a male or female. The second process is gender stability, which allows the a young male or a young female will remain a male or female. The third process is where the child begins to understand the idea of gender constancy. This is to understand that while things may change shape, they will remain the same in genetic makeup. This video touches on the ideas of Kohlberg's theories.
Bem Sex Role Inventory
Sandra Lipsitz Bem has provided evidence of specific gender roles by using her Bem Sex Role Inventory. Bem believes that since we are surrounded by gender from birth, gender effects every schema that any child may create. She disagreed with Kohlberg, and believed that an individual encountered gender much earlier than Kohlberg.
For my career...
For my career, understanding gender roles will not largely have an impact. Yes, it will be important for my career as an educator to understand specifics of gender identity and so on, but I do not see this being a large issue in my career as a coach. As an educator, it will be important to understand the specifics of gender identity in order to best relate to my students
Additional Video:
This video provides additional information on adolescent gender development.
http://study.com/academy/lesson/gender-identity-in-adolescent-development.html
http://study.com/academy/lesson/gender-identity-in-adolescent-development.html