Psychology2016

Sexuality and Gender 399

CULTURE AND GENDER A person’s culture is also an environmental influence. Although
initial cross-cultural studies suggested that cultural differences had little effect on gender
roles (Best & Williams, 2001), more recent research suggests that in the past few decades,
a change has occurred in cultures that are of different “ personalities.” Cultures that are
more individualistic (those stressing independence and with loose ties among individuals)
and have fairly high standards of living are becoming more nontraditional, especially for
women in those cultures. Research has shown that more traditional views of gender seem
to be held by collectivistic cultures (those stressing interdependence and with strong ties
among individuals, especially familial ties) that have less wealth, although even in these
cultures, women were more likely to be less traditional than men (Forbes et al., 2009; Gib-
bons et al., 1991; Li & Fung, 2015; Shafiro et al., 2003). Other studies have found that the most
nontraditional ideas about gender roles and gender behavior are found in countries such as
the Netherlands, Germany, Italy, and England, whereas the most traditional ideas predomi-
nate in African and Asian countries such as Nigeria, Pakistan, and Japan (Best, 2013; Best &
Williams, 2001). The United States, often seen as very nontraditional by researchers, actually
was somewhere in the middle in these studies, perhaps due to the large variation in subcul-
tures that exists within this multicultural country. Environment, even in the form of culture,
seems to play at least a partial and perhaps dominant role in gender behavior.
The Gender and Sexuality Survey asks you about your own views on gender and
what factors influence gender roles.

Although Asian cultures are often more

traditional in the roles that men and women

play within society, even in these cultures

gender roles are becoming more flexible,

as this male preschool teacher in a Chinese

classroom demonstrates. Why might

gender roles in these traditional countries be

changing?

Simulate the Experiment Gender and Sexuality Survey

Survey GENDER AND SEXUALITY SURVEY

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INTRODUCTION SURVEY RESULTS

Interactive

This survey asks you about your attitudes

toward and experiences with a broad range of

psychological principles and theories.

Click Next to begin the survey

Gender-Role Development

10.4 Compare and contrast different views of how gender roles develop.

How do children acquire the knowledge of their society or culture’s gender-role expecta-
tions? How does that knowledge lead to the development of a gender identity? Although
early psychodynamic theorists such as Freud ( to Learning Objective 13.2)
believed that children would learn their gender identities as a natural consequence of
resolving the sexual conflicts of early childhood, many modern theorists focus on learn-
ing and cognitive processes for the development of gender identity and behavior.

SOCIAL LEARNING THEORY Social learning theory, which emphasizes learning through
observation and imitation of models, attributes* gender-role development to those pro-
cesses. Children observe their same-sex parents behaving in certain ways and imitate that
behavior. When the children imitate the appropriate gender behavior, they are reinforced
with positive attention. Inappropriate gender behavior is either ignored or actively discour-
aged (Bussey & Bandura, 1999; Fagot & Hagan, 1991; Mischel, 1966; Wiggert et al., 2015).

*attributes: explains as a cause.

As children develop the concept of gender,

they begin to imitate the behavior of those

they see as similar to themselves.