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“Wonderfully comprehensive while focusing on the basics. In a time
when there is an increased understanding of the complexity of gender, it
can be overwhelming to introduce novice students to the topic.
However, Lips concisely outlines the key issues with excellent coverage
of current and classic theories and research from around the world while
using stimulating examples that will keep students engaged as they
develop the foundation needed in order to master the complexity of
gender.”
– Dr. Emily Keener, Slippery Rock University

“From first to last, this is a thoroughly scholarly and feminist review of

theory and research in the psychology of women and gender. Dr. Lips
has accomplished the difficult feat of providing a succinct overview that
is nevertheless impressive in scope. Topics will be engaging to students
at the introductory level and will be practical refreshers for more
advanced study. Importantly, chapters provide a structure for compari-
sons among perspectives that will facilitate civil and tolerant class con-
versations. Ultimately, students will gain intellectual maturity and a
more nuanced understanding of gender and feminism.”
– Dr. Cheryl Travis, University of Tennessee, Knoxville

“Gender: The Basics offers an excellent and comprehensive introduction

to gender and its intersections with other systems of power , privilege,
and oppression. Reading the second edition, I was reminded in vivid
detail of how gender is embedded in all aspects of biological, psycho-
logical, and social life, from the way in which our personal relationships
unfold to the power dynamics governing institutional practices. New to
the second edition is a chapter on theoretical frameworks regarding
gender that will delight students and scholars from multiple disciplines
for distilling many complex theories to an accessible level. Hilary Lips is
a magnificent writer, relying on a deep knowledge of gender as identity,
relationship, and social structure in lifespan and global contexts.”
– Katherine R. Allen, Ph.D., Professor of Human Development and
Family Science, Virginia Tech

“In Gender: The Basics, Dr. Hilary Lips outlines the major topics needed
to understand all things gender while bringing every page to life. She
uses her expertise to break down complicated theories and explain
empirical studies in an approachable and engaging manner. Plan to finish
The Basics with a thorough understanding of just how pervasive, and
complicated gender is in today's world.”
– Dr. Alynn Gordon, Research Consultant, Atlanta, Georgia
 Gender

Gender: The Basics is an engaging introduction to the influence of

cultural, historical, biological, psychological, and economic forces
on ways in which we have come to define and experience feminin-
ity and masculinity, and on the impact and importance of gender
categories. Highlighting that there is far more to gender than bio-
logical sex, it examines theories and research about how and why
gender categories and identities are developed and about how inter-
personal and societal power relationships are gendered. It takes a
global and intersectional perspective to examine the interaction
between gender and a wide range of topics including:

• Relationships, intimacy, and concepts of sexuality across the

lifespan
• The workplace and labor markets
• Gender-­related violence and war
• Public health, poverty, and development
• Gender and public leadership

This new edition includes increased coverage of trans visibility and

activism, LGBTQ studies and critical masculinity studies, global
developments in women’s political leadership, links between gender
and economic well-­being, and cyberbullying.
Supporting theory with examples and case studies from a variety
of contexts, suggestions for further reading, and a detailed glossary,
this text is an essential read for anyone approaching the study of
gender for the first time.

Hilary M. Lips is Emerita Professor of Psychology and Research

Professor at Radford University, USA, where she served for many
years as Chair of the Psychology Department, and Director of the
Center for Gender Studies.
THE BASICS

For a full list of titles in this series, please visit www.routledge.com/

The-Basics/book-series/B
SUBCULTURES WOMEN’S STUDIES
ROSS HAENFLER BONNIE SMITH

SUSTAINABILITY WORLD HISTORY

PETER JACQUES PETER N. STEARNS

TELEVISION STUDIES WORLD THEATRE

TOBY MILLER E. J. WESTLAKE

TERRORISM RESEARCH METHODS

JAMES LUTZ AND BRENDA LUTZ NICHOLAS WALLIMAN

THEATRE STUDIES (SECOND EDITION) CONTEMPORARY INDIA

ROBERT LEACH REKHA DATTA

TRANSLATION GENDER (SECOND EDITION)

JULIANE HOUSE HILARY M. LIPS

WITCHCRAFT
MARION GIBSON
 Gender

The Basics
Second Edition

Hilary M. Lips
Second edition published 2019
by Routledge
2 Park Square, Milton Park, Abingdon, Oxon OX14 4RN
and by Routledge
711 Third Avenue, New York, NY 10017
Routledge is an imprint of the Taylor & Francis Group, an informa business
© 2019 Hilary M. Lips
The right of Hilary M. Lips to be identified as author of this work has been
asserted by her in accordance with sections 77 and 78 of the Copyright,
Designs and Patents Act 1988.
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reprinted or reproduced or
utilized in any form or by any electronic, mechanical, or other means, now
known or hereafter invented, including photocopying and recording, or in any
information storage or retrieval system, without permission in writing from
the publishers.
Trademark notice: Product or corporate names may be trademarks or
registered trademarks, and are used only for identification and explanation
without intent to infringe.
First edition published by Routledge 2014
British Library Cataloguing-­i n-Publication Data
A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library
Library of Congress Cataloging-­i n-Publication Data
Names: Lips, Hilary M., author.
Title: Gender : the basics / Hilary M. Lips.
Description: Second Edition. | New York : Routledge, 2019. | Revised edition
of the author’s Gender, c2014. | Includes bibliographical references and
index.
Identifiers: LCCN 2018013012| ISBN 9781138036888 (hardback) |
ISBN 9781138036895 (pbk.) | ISBN 9781315178233 (ebook)
Subjects: LCSH: Sex role. | Sex differences (Psychology) | Sex differences.
Classification: LCC HQ1075 .L578 2019 | DDC 305.3–dc23
LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2018013012

ISBN: 978-1-138-03688-8 (hbk)

ISBN: 978-1-138-03689-5 (pbk)
ISBN: 978-1-315-17823-3 (ebk)
Typeset in Bembo and Bliss
by Wearset Ltd, Boldon, Tyne and Wear
To Marian, Karen, and Tom: Siblings who are also friends.
 Contents

List of figures xi
Acknowledgments xiii
1 Gender: everybody has/does one 1
2 Theoretical frameworks for thinking about
gender 27
3 Power, inequalities, and prejudice 51
4 Relationships, intimacy, and sexualities 87
5 The gendered workplace 117
6 Gender, leadership, and public life 149
7 Global patterns of gender-­related violence 179
8 Global patterns of gender and health 213
9 The shape of our future: gender and the aging
population 249
Epilogue: the future of gender 285
Glossary 293
Index 299
 Figures

3.1 Power seeking and the backlash against female

politicians 61
3.2 Science faculty’s subtle gender biases favor male
students 68
4.1 Women’s and men’s expected and ideal outcomes of
hooking up 98
4.2 US and UK trends in mothers’ labor force participation
rates 105
5.1 Occupational segregation by gender in two Western
countries, 2016–2017 120
5.2 Women’s percentage of men’s gross median earnings 127
6.1 Representation of women in national parliaments and
upper houses or senates 151
6.2 Representation of women on corporate boards by
selected countries 156
7.1 Prevalence of intimate partner violence in England and
Wales among adults  183
7.2 US lifetime prevalence of types of physical violence by
an intimate partner 184
8.1 Leading causes of death in women and men in the
United States 215
xii figures

8.2 Patterns in lung cancer mortality rates by gender in four

countries 222
9.1 Life expectancy at birth for women and men 250
9.2 Ratio of men to women among people aged 60 years
and over and 80 years and over 251
 Acknowledgments

I am grateful to Gerhard Boomgaarden at Routledge, who first

suggested I should take on this second edition and provided initial
guidance. I have also much appreciated the help and encourage-
ment of Mihaela Diana Ciobotea. Thanks are also due to the
reviewers of the initial proposal and sample chapters, who provided
suggestions and insights to make this a better book.
I owe a special deep debt of gratitude to Wayne Andrew, who
designed all the charts and graphs for this book, and whose caring
and enthusiastic participation in this and so many other projects
over the years has made them better, more meaningful, and
more fun.
Finally, thanks go out to my colleagues, who have always been
supportive, and to my students, who inevitably asked tough ques-
tions, reminded me when things were not clear, and pushed me to
find out what I did not know.
Hilary Lips
June 2018
 1

GENDER
EVERYBODY HAS/DOES ONE

Years ago, Ursula LeGuin (1969) described a fictional world in

which there were no “women” or “men,” but only individuals.
Gender categories were absent from this society—except for a few
days in each individual’s monthly cycle when sexual desires became
insistent and individuals became “female” or “male” for the time it
took to establish a sexual relationship. Even then, no persistent bio-
logical or social tendency toward maleness or femaleness was estab-
lished: one individual could be the father of some children and the
mother of others.
My students have been intrigued but discomfited by this fantasy.
Most say they cannot imagine a world without gender categories. It
would be boring, bland, they protest. Everyone would be the same;
relationships would be uninteresting. And how would anyone
decide who was supposed to do what? Most react with similar per-
plexity and stubbornness when I ask them to “imagine yourself as
still ‘you,’ but as a different gender.” They argue that they would
not, could not, be the same person if they were a different gender—
and anyway they would be unskilled and awkward at doing what
the other gender is supposed to do.
These responses provide some clues to the pervasive importance
of gender categories in our lives. They also suggest that we view
2 Gender: everybody has/does one

gender not as a category that someone simply biologically “is” but

as something that individuals do or act out. So what exactly is
gender?

GENDER AND SEX: IS THERE A DIFFERENCE?

Most of us are used to dividing people into two categories: female
and male. If pressed, we might say the distinction is based on simple
biology: male and female individuals look different, have different
reproductive organs. Women have breasts. Men can grow beards.
A woman can get pregnant and give birth. A man can inseminate a
woman—even against her will.
However, we also know that individual women and men vary a
great deal in how close they are to society’s ideals of femininity and
masculinity. Simply being biologically female does not ensure that a
person is “womanly,” and being biologically male does not mean
that an individual is “manly.” Some people who are clearly men are
described as not very masculine; some women are termed unfemi-
nine. Clearly, there is something more complicated going on than
placing people into well-­defined biological categories. In fact, with
respect to these issues, there seem to be two broad dimensions on
which individuals might be categorized: biological and socio-­
cultural.
In recognition of these two dimensions, people who study the
differences and similarities between women and men have some-
times made a distinction between sex and gender. They may use
the term sex to mean biological femaleness and maleness, and the
term gender to refer to culturally-­mediated expectations and roles
associated with masculinity and femininity (e.g., Oakley, 1972;
Unger, 1979). Although this is the general approach taken in this
book, it must be acknowledged that the biological and social
dimensions that define women and men cannot be cleanly sepa-
rated. For example, the biological fact that women can become
pregnant helps shape social expectations for femininity. Men’s bio-
logically based propensity to have larger, stronger bodies is
enhanced by social norms that encourage men to work at becom-
ing strong and reward them for doing so. Thus sex and gender
are intertwined, and it is usually impossible to separate them
 Gender: everybody has/does one 3

c­ ompletely. In fact, one researcher has suggested using gender/sex as

“an umbrella term for both gender (socialization) and sex (biology,
evolution) […] [that] […] reflects social locations or identities
where gender and sex cannot be easily or at all disentangled” (van
Anders, 2015, p. 1181). Furthermore, gender itself is multi-
dimensional. One dimension is gender identity: thinking of oneself as
male, female, or as someone who does not fit neatly into these cat-
egories. Another is gender role or gender expression: behaving in ways
considered appropriate for women or men in the surrounding
culture. Still another is sexual orientation: attraction to members of
one’s own and/or other genders.

IS GENDER “BUILT IN,” OR DO WE

CONSTRUCT IT?
As will be obvious in the discussion of theories about gender in
Chapter 2, one key to the arguments surrounding gender is the
debate about how strongly it is rooted in biology. Do our bodies
predispose us to be, feel, and behave differently as males and
females? How much are such differences affected by the way we
are raised, by the culture in which we grow up? This nature-­versus
nurture question has haunted researchers who study every aspect of
human behavior; however, it is particularly perplexing and compli-
cated in the realm of gender. And the more we explore the role of
nature and nurture, the more we confront the conclusion that vir-
tually nothing in gender development is the result of only one or
the other of these forces. Nature and nurture cannot be separated:
they are intertwined and work together at every stage of human
development. Thus, most people who have studied these issues
deeply claim an interactionist position: they do not argue about how
much nature or nurture influences particular aspects of development,
but try instead to figure out how the two sets of influences interact
to produce certain results.
4 Gender: everybody has/does one

THE ROLE OF BIOLOGY

The steps in human sexual differentiation

The path to joining the category of male or female begins at con-

ception. Through a series of developmental steps, a fertilized egg
moves toward developing a body that will be classified as male or
female:

• Step 1: Chromosomes. When sperm meets egg to produce fertil-

ization, each normally contributes a set of 23 chromosomes,
which pair up to form the genetic basis for the new individual.
The twenty-­third pair, known as the sex chromosomes, is the pair
that initially determines sex. Normally, this pair comprises an
X chromosome contributed by the mother’s egg and either an
X or Y chromosome contributed by the father’s sperm. If the
pair is XX, the pattern of development is predisposed to be
female; if it is XY, the pattern is predisposed to be male. If
some unusual combination, such as XO or XXX, occurs,
development tends to proceed in a female direction—as long as
no Y chromosome is present. Only the sperm, not the egg, can
contribute a Y chromosome. Thus the genetic basis of sex is
determined by the father.
• Step 2: Gonads. During the first seven weeks after conception,
the embryo develops “neutral” gonads (proto-­gonads) and the
beginnings of both female and male sets of internal reproductive
structures. Up until this point, the embryo has the potential to
go either way, to develop either female or male reproductive
equipment. In the eighth week, if a Y chromosome is present,
the SRY gene on that chromosome promotes the organization
of the neutral gonad into an embryonic testis. If there is no Y
chromosome, a neutral gonad will start to become an ovary.
• Step 3: Hormones. Once formed, the testes or ovaries begin to
secrete sex hormones, and these hormones influence the
remaining steps in sexual differentiation. Testes secrete both
testosterone, which influences the male reproductive tract to
develop, and Mullerian Inhibiting Substance (MIS), which
causes the female reproductive tract to atrophy and disappear.
 Gender: everybody has/does one 5

Ovaries secrete estrogens and progesterone, which organize the

development of the female reproductive system.
• Step 4: Internal reproductive tract. Over the next four weeks, the sex
hormones gradually organize the internal reproductive structures
in a male or female direction. Under the influence of testos-
terone, these internal ducts become the vas deferens, epididymis,
seminal vesicles, urethra, and prostate. If no significant amount of
testosterone is present, the internal structures differentiate in a
female direction: as fallopian tubes, uterus, and vagina.
• Step 5: External genitalia. Also by the end of the twelfth week,
the external genitalia, which are indistinguishable by sex at
eight weeks, differentiate as either male or female. Under the
influence of testosterone, the “neutral” genitalia develop into a
penis and scrotum; without the influence of testosterone, the
genitalia develop as a clitoris and labia.

A careful reader may have noticed an overall pattern in these steps:

at each stage, without the effect of a Y chromosome or male sex
hormone, development apparently proceeds in a female direction.
This is also true in other mammals. Some biologists like to say that
the basic pattern of mammalian development is female—unless
testosterone interferes.
Although we tend to think of female and male as two distinct,
non-­overlapping categories, the fact that sex develops through a
series of sequential steps shows that there are some possibilities for
these categories to be fuzzy. If, for example, a genetic male (XY)
reaches step 3, in which testosterone is being secreted, but happens
to have an inherited condition (androgen insensitivity syndrome)
that makes cells unable to respond to testosterone, step 4 will not
proceed in a male developmental direction. At birth, the baby will
probably appear female and be classified as such; the male genetic
configuration and testes may well not be discovered until young
adulthood. There are varieties of ways in which the steps of sexual
differentiation may be inconsistent, producing an individual whose
indicators of biological sex are mixed. Such intersex individuals
make up between 1 and 4 percent of the population.
There are two other aspects of the journey toward maleness or
femaleness which appear even more complex than the development
6 Gender: everybody has/does one

of a body that may be classified as male or female. One concerns

the sexual differentiation of the brain. The other concerns the
different ways in which individuals are treated and taught once they
have been classified as female or male.

Female brains and male brains?

If different levels of prenatal hormones can affect the development

of internal and external genitalia, might they not also affect the
developing brain—producing different kinds of brains in females
and males? For decades, popular books and articles have argued that
women and men think and behave differently because their brains
are different. In general terms, this notion is not new. Late in the
nineteenth century, women were said to be intellectually inferior
to men because they had smaller brains. When it was demonstrated
that women’s brains were proportionately larger than men’s by
weight, the argument shifted to the size of particular areas of the
brain—first, the frontal lobes, then, when that proved untenable,
the parietal lobes—that were said to be smaller in women. More
recently, researchers have examined the size, shape, and density of
various brain structures in women and men and have found some
evidence for sex differences, for instance, in the corpus callosum
(the structure that connects the right and left hemispheres of the
brain). Since there is a tremendous amount of individual variation
in brain size and shape, it is difficult to draw definitive conclusions
about sex differences in brain morphology. Furthermore, it is not
clear what functional significance these differences may have.
Finally, it is uncertain whether the differences are “built in” or are
the results of different life experiences—since brains are very plastic
and responsive to experience.
The complexity of the issues is illustrated in the story of one set
of researchers (Wood, Heitmiller, Andreasen, and Nopoulos, 2008)
who set out to find a brain difference that would mesh with the
often-­reported finding that women show more interpersonal
awareness than men. After using magnetic resonance imaging
(MRI) to examine the brains of 30 women and 30 men matched
on age and IQ, they concluded that one particular brain structure,
the straight gyrus (SG)—part of a brain region that had already been
 Gender: everybody has/does one 7

linked to the ability to interpret nonverbal cues—was proportionately

larger in women than in men. Furthermore, size of the SG was
correlated with scores on a test of interpersonal perception. Thus far,
this may sound like a clear case of sex differences in brain structure
causing sex differences in a particular ability. It turns out not to be so
simple, however. In this study, both the size of the SG and the inter-
personal perception scores were also correlated with a third variable:
respondents’ scores on a measure of psychological femininity and
masculinity. Respondents (both female and male) who described
themselves as having more “feminine” qualities tended to have larger
SGs and higher interpersonal perception scores. Furthermore, a sub-
sequent study that examined the brains of children aged 7 to 17
found a surprising result: the SG was larger in boys than in girls, and
interpersonal awareness scores were associated with smaller, not
larger, SGs (Wood, Murko, and Nopoulos, 2009). In this younger
sample, both higher interpersonal awareness and smaller SGs were
associated with higher scores on psychological femininity. This com-
plicated set of findings illustrates how perilous it can be to try to draw
sweeping conclusions about sex differences in the brain and their
relationship to female–male differences in behavior. It suggests, for
example, the possibility that children’s experiences as boys or girls
may affect brain development. It leaves us wondering whether
women’s larger SGs come from many years of being socially sens-
itive, or whether their social sensitivity stems from their larger
SGs—or whether both things may be true.
Another research emphasis has been on exploring possible sex
differences in the organization of various cognitive abilities within
the brain. Researchers cannot discern this organization by exam-
ining brains directly; rather, they ask respondents to perform spe-
cific tasks, such as reading, listening, and recognizing objects, and
they use various methods to determine which part of the brain is
activated and used to accomplish these tasks. Using this approach,
some investigators have found results consistent with the idea that
women and men may differ in how basic abilities, such as language,
are distributed across the two hemispheres of the brain or among
the different areas within hemispheres. The findings often involve
small differences, are complex, and often contested, so it is not pos-
sible to sum them up in brief generalizations. This complexity has
8 Gender: everybody has/does one

not prevented media commentators from trumpeting misleading

headlines such as “Women are significantly more right-­brained
than men.”
If there were differences in the organization of female and male
brains, how might this occur? For decades, there have been efforts
to understand the extent to which prenatal hormones may be
involved and may organize the developing brain in ways that
produce average differences between girls and boys in certain inter-
ests and social behaviors. This too is a complicated area, but a
reasonable amount of evidence suggests that levels of prenatal
androgens are associated with later levels of certain kinds of inter-
ests (e.g., interest in babies) and behaviors (e.g., rough-­and-tumble
play) which are more strongly associated with one gender than with
the other. For example, one study measured testosterone levels in
amniotic fluid (the fluid that surrounds the fetus in the womb), and
tested the association between those levels and the levels of
masculine-­typical play, measured when the children were aged 6 to
10 years (Auyeung et al., 2009). For both boys and girls, parents
reported more masculine-­typical activities and interests for children
whose samples of amniotic fluid in utero had shown higher levels of
testosterone. The association between prenatal hormone levels and
later behavior does not prove definitively that one causes the other.
However, this and other studies have been used to suggest that pre-
natal concentrations of sex hormones may contribute to female–
male behavioral differences, and that, to the extent that hormones
are responsible for these differences, they may also contribute to the
large individual differences in such qualities among both girls
and boys.
When we learn about scientific findings of differences in the
brains of men and women in any particular sample—findings that
involve sophisticated techniques such as neuroimaging—it is tempt-
ing to conclude that something really definitive has been proven
about brain sex differences. However, experts caution that it would
be wise to remain skeptical. Neuroimaging results can be affected
by extraneous variables such as breathing rates or caffeine intake—a
problem if samples are small. Furthermore, it is difficult to interpret
the functional significance of differences in the size of brain struc-
tures or of more or less activation of a certain area of the brain. And
 Gender: everybody has/does one 9

if scientists are trying to link brain differences to behavior that is

“feminine” or “masculine,” they have to define what behaviors fall
into these categories—a daunting and controversial task.
The role of biology in producing gender-­related behavior is
complex and fascinating; we have only scratched the surface of it
here, and much more research remains to be done. However,
biology always works in interaction with the environment, and that
interaction is always a “work in progress” as each individual
develops (Berenbaum and Beltz, 2016). As one eminent group of
reviewers noted (Berenbaum, Blakemore and Beltz, 2011: 814),

biology is not destiny. Genes are activated or suppressed by environ-

mental factors. Hormones and brain functioning are almost certainly
influenced by the different environments in which girls and boys are
raised, by their different behaviors, and by joint effects of genes and the
social environment.

THE ROLE OF CULTURE

Socialization: learning to be gendered

By the age of 6 months, infants can distinguish women’s from

men’s voices; by 9 months, most can discriminate between photo-
graphs of men and women—and sometime between the ages of 11
months and 14 months, they show the ability to accurately pair
women’s voices with pictures of women and men’s voices with
pictures of men (Martin and Ruble, 2004). Clearly, children learn
very early on of the existence of gender categories and quickly
become competent at figuring out who fits into which category.
Not only do children discern these categories very early, they
also quickly become adept at associating activities and items with
the appropriate gender. By the middle of their second year, infants
reliably look at a female face when presented with images of items
such as ribbons and dresses, and at a male face when presented with
pictures of things such as fire hats and hammers (Eichstedt, Serbin,
Poulin-­Dubois, and Sen, 2002). By this age, too, children have
learned to link more metaphorical, abstract qualities with gender.
Infants in this same study associated bears, fir trees, and navy blue
10 Gender: everybody has/does one

with men, and hearts, cats, and bright pink with women. Children
are unlikely to have seen all these items with women and men (for
example, most infants will not have seen men with bears); however,
they may have learned to connect the attributes of these things with
gender. For example, a bear may be seen as strong and fierce; a cat
may be seen as soft and quiet. Even very young children have
absorbed the message that these characteristics connect to gender.
Young children also seem to absorb cultural stereotypes that link
very high intellectual ability more with men than with women.
One US study found that, among 6-year-­olds, girls were less likely
than boys to believe that members of their own gender were
“really, really smart.” In contrast to boys, girls at this age also began
to avoid activities that were described as being for “really, really
smart” children (Bian, Leslie, and Cimpian, 2017).
How do children arrive at these conclusions? According to psy-
chologists, they respond to instructions, rewards, and punishments
from people such as parents, teachers, and peers, who let them
know how to act as girls or boys and try to shape their behavior to
fit gender expectations. A boy may be praised for acting “like a
little man”; a girl may reap approval for behaving “just like
Mommy.” Peers may tease a boy for “throwing like a girl”; teach-
ers may criticize a girl for being “unladylike.” To cultivate approval
and avoid criticism, children bring their behavior into line with the
gendered expectations communicated to them. However, children
do not simply react to rewards and punishments; they are not mere
putty in the hands of socializing agents. On the contrary, it is clear
that children are active searchers for cues about how to behave in
gender-­appropriate ways.
Once children figure out that there are two gender groups and
that they belong to one of them, there appear to be some important
consequences. They begin to evaluate their own group as better
than the other group (although this effect may be limited to qual-
ities thought to be gender-­appropriate): children as young as 3 years
old like their own gender group more, attribute more positive
qualities to members of that group, and show a strong preference
for same-­gender playmates. They also display more interest in
information about their own group, and tend to use gender stereo-
types to form impressions of others. They do not seem to need
 Gender: everybody has/does one 11

much of a push to conform to gendered expectations; rather, they

seem to be motivated to learn as much as they can about this signi-
ficant social category—gender—which is so important to their
social identity. Thus the instructions, the presence of adult or peer
models who can be imitated, rewards, and punishments are all used
by children as sources of guidance to doing the best possible job of
fitting into the “girl” or “boy” category. In fact, children become
quite rigid for a while as they try to work this out. During early
childhood, children try to consolidate their knowledge about
gender into hard-­and-fast categories; these categories can be very
inflexible, particularly between the ages of 5 and 7 years. During
this period, children are prone to make quick and strong judgments
about people based solely on gender, and they are likely to be
“sure” that women and men cannot do certain things (Martin and
Ruble, 2004). After the age of 7, children tend to relax the cat-
egories a little and become more flexible.
Socialization does not end with childhood. It is a continuing
process that affects how individuals understand and enact gender at
each life stage. As children approach adolescence, they fall more
and more under the influence of peers and less under the influence
of parents. Older children and adolescents who are not “typical”
for their gender often feel peer pressure to conform to gender
norms; when this happens, they are vulnerable to low self-­esteem
and depression. Adolescents who view themselves as gender-­
atypical but feel accepted by their peers are less likely to face such
difficulties. Through the media, children, adolescents, and adults
are presented with a continuous stream of gendered expectations
and models to imitate. One study, for example, examined the por-
trayals of male and female characters in 500 top-­grossing US films
released across the 5-year period from 2007 to 2012. They found
that, in 2012, male characters outnumbered females 2.51 to 1—the
lowest percentage of females on screen over the 5 years (S.L. Smith,
Choueiti, Scofield, and Pieper, 2013). In 2015, male characters had
twice as much screen time and spoke twice as often as female char-
acters in the 100 top-­grossing US films (Geena Davis Institute,
2016). Researchers studying US films have also found that female
characters were more likely than males to be depicted as young, as
parents, and as being in a married or committed relationship (S.L.
12 Gender: everybody has/does one

Smith, Pieper, Granados, and Choueiti, 2010). Males were more

likely than females to be portrayed as strong and funny; females
were more likely to be presented as physically attractive. Both male
and female characters were likely to be in gender-­traditional occu-
pations. Another study (Paek, Nelson, and Vilela 2011), which
examined gender portrayals in television advertising across seven
countries, found that males were reliably shown in more prominent
visual and auditory roles than females, and that both women and
men were used to advertise gender-­typed products. A study of
women’s portrayal in 15 Arab and 3 Turkish television dramas
found women underrepresented, less likely to have recognizable
jobs, and more likely than men to be shown in gender-­typed occu-
pations, activities, and settings (Kharroub and Weaver, 2014). In
general, research shows that in television programs and commer-
cials, video games, and popular films, whether created for children,
adolescents, or adults, male characters are portrayed more often
than females and gender stereotypes are very common (Collins,
2011). We swim in a cultural sea of gendered images and, at every
stage, a desire to “fit in” pushes individuals to conform to those
images.

The influence of the gender hierarchy

It may appear that gender socialization involves fitting people into a

relatively arbitrary division of activities and qualities labeled mascu-
line and feminine. Indeed, a look at varying gender prescriptions
across cultures or historical eras does suggest a strong streak of arbi-
trariness. In some cultures, men wear long, flowing garments as a
matter of course, but in some the idea of a man in a “dress” is
viewed with alarm. In some cultures, men who are good friends
walk down the street holding hands, but in others, that behavior is
considered a violation of masculinity norms. There was a time in
North America when the now-­familiar mantra that “pink is for
girls, blue is for boys” was reversed and pink was considered a
strong, “masculine” color.
However, not all gender prescriptions are arbitrary. Many, in
fact, help maintain a hierarchy in which men hold more power
than women do. If we consider the behaviors, personal qualities,
 Gender: everybody has/does one 13

and appearances that are considered desirable for men, many

involve strength, dominance, and leadership; those considered
desirable for women encompass delicacy, flexibility, and agreeable-
ness—and a willingness to bend to a situation rather than take
charge. A man often demonstrates his masculinity by wielding
power; a woman can often indicate her femininity by behaving
submissively. Thus, when people violate gender norms, they are
sometimes also challenging the gender hierarchy.
For example, traditional gender roles tend to be entwined with
the kinds of work women and men do. The expectation that
women will be warm and nurturing means that they are considered
a good fit for jobs or tasks that emphasize caretaking and supporting
others. The expectation that men will be achievement-­oriented and
assertive implies that they will be viewed as good candidates for
positions that involve taking charge and making decisions. Alice
Eagly’s (1987) social roles theory proposed that we expect women to
be warm and compassionate and men to be tough and decisive
because we so often observe them performing roles that require
these very qualities. The gendered division of labor is both based
on, and gives credibility to, gender stereotypes. Furthermore, Eagly
argued, the requirements of the roles reinforce these qualities:
women in “feminine” roles have more opportunity to practice
compassion and so develop in that direction; men in “masculine”
roles have more scope for decisiveness and so become more used to
such behavior and better at it. Thus gender stereotypes reproduce
themselves: people are selected for roles congruent with gender
stereotypes, and they learn to perform the requirements of these
roles, thereby enacting the gender stereotypes and helping maintain
both the stereotypes and the gendered division of labor. In main-
taining the gendered division of labor, this circular process also
maintains the gender hierarchy, since roles requiring masculine-­
stereotyped qualities such as leadership abilities are almost guaran-
teed to involve more status and higher pay than those requiring
feminine-­stereotyped qualities such as warmth and flexibility.
Another approach, social dominance theory (Pratto and Walker
2004), suggests that in societies that emphasize hierarchical social
arrangements, the values toward which men are socialized are
hierarchy-­enhancing—values that emphasize the promotion of the
14 Gender: everybody has/does one

interests of powerful groups. Women, on the other hand, are

encouraged to adopt hierarchy-­attenuating values—values that stress
equality and minimize intergroup status and power differences. The
expectation that women and men will hold different values pro-
motes their perceived suitability for different kinds of occupations:
men for roles that involve wielding power and influence, women
for roles that involve supporting and empowering others. Indeed,
even a cursory examination of labor statistics in Western countries
indicates that men are far more likely than women to be in
powerful, high-­status positions such as corporate, professional, and
political leadership, whereas positions such as social worker, coun-
selor, secretary, and nurse, which involve helping and supporting
others, are dominated by women.
Gender stereotypes and roles, then, represent more than the
expression of biologically based sex differences and more than an
accidental or random division by societies of qualities and behaviors
into “feminine” and “masculine.” They are expressions of cultural
values, social constructions that help organize behavior and main-
tain a society’s power structures. Since gender is socially con-
structed, there is room for variation in the ways it is defined.

Does gender have to be a binary?

Historically, cultures have differed in their accommodation of indi-

viduals who are uncomfortable with the gender assigned to them or
who do not fit neatly into either the feminine or the masculine
gender. Among many Native Amer­ican groups, for example, there
is a tradition of categorizing such individuals as “two-­spirit” people.
Two-­spirit people may be individuals with male bodies who
identify and live as women, people with female bodies who identify
and live as men, individuals of either sex who are sexually attracted
to same-­sex others, or anyone who lives outside the traditional def-
initions of gender and combines elements of both female and male
genders. Having two spirits has traditionally been considered a
special gift in these cultures. Two-­spirit persons have been respected
and, in some groups, given special roles in religious ceremonies.
Formal exceptions to a simple two-­gender system and fluid
gender categories have a long and varied history. Scholars note that
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