Gender And Gender Differences

‘‘Sex’ is a biological term; ‘gender’ a psychological and cultural one’ (Oakley 1972, p.158). To further expound on Oakley, ‘sex’ refers to the biological framework a person is born with while ‘gender’, an identity that we acquire as a result of social and cultural influence. Sex is naturally constant throughout an individual’s life whereas gender is a variable. Via gender socialisation, men and women constantly learn to adapt to society’s expectations associated with their biological form as society changes. This very concept clearly elucidates the dichotomy between sex and gender. Therefore, coming from such a perspective, it is true to say that we are born as human beings (males, females or intersex) who formulate socially accepted gender identities as a product of social and cultural implications (Abbott, Wallace & Tyler 2005). Conventionally, societies associate the male and female sexes with their definitions of masculinity and femininity respectively.

One theory that many psychologist and scientist are trying to prove is that homosexuality has a fundamental biological basis. Similar to most mammalian species, humans at conception are females (McKnight 22). Toward the end of the first trimester is when the babies with a “male genetic message” begin to have small doses of two hormones, chorionic gonadotropin and luteinizing hormone, which start the altering process of the gonads into testes (McKnight 22). The hormones two jobs are to control the sexual development and control their function (McKnight 22). When the brain starts to develop masculine characteristics and lose the feminine characteristics, the processes are separate and occur at different

In many shops, there seems to be an obvious separation between boys and girls items, for example, the birthday cards, books, clothes, and toys. This is shown in a variety of ways the boy's items are mainly the color blue and the books have pictures of either action figures, superheroes or tools. Whereas the girl's items are mainly the color pink. The books show pictures of fairies, princess, and Bratz. The cards also have the theme of the color pink for girls and blue for boys. The girl's cards have a lot of sparkles and pretty pictures whereas the boy's cards are covered in camo kind of illustrations and also have action figures on the covers. The children's clothes are separated into sections where there are labels for the boy's clothes and labels for the girl's clothes. The girl's clothing is all pretty and pink, it is covered in sparkles. Whereas boys clothing has camo patterns, blue colors, and pictures of action figures.

In present day all around the world, society has certain expectations for the actions and behaviors of males and females. There are many factors in our everyday lives that contribute to the gender norms that society has set. This essay will discuss how situations in life can play a part in how people treat other people based on their gender. It is believed that males are the leaders of our world, but in present day woman can do as much as men can do. From The Journal of Marriage and Family, Hu states, “Differentiated gender roles in adulthood are rooted in one’s gender role socialization. In order to understand the persistence of gender inequalities in the domestic sphere, we need to examine the gendered patterns of children’s housework time.”(2015, P.1). Gender roles are society’s expectations of the proper behavior, attitudes, and activities of males and females that they must be taught. These roles define how females and males are viewed in society, their household, and workplace. In The Journal of Sports behavior by Hardin, he states, “Although gender role differences from biological and “Natural” exists in popular consciousness, research has long demonstrated that instead, many are long time socially constructed… Individuals understand their gender because they are given names and treated in particular ways, such as dress in pink for girls and blue for boys, that reflect social construction of gender. Bandura's social cognitive theory is key in understanding the factors in socialization”(2009, P.3). Bandura's theory of of social cognition is that behavior, environmental events, and cognitive factors are the main keys that shape attitudes and actions of an individual. Although, gender roles play a very big part in our society, specific genders are treated differently while dealing with peer influence, media influence, as well as employment.

Sex and gender play a big part in american society today and are often misconstrued. These two topics have become progressive as people are starting to express their gender and sexuality in ways other than what is and has been considered the norm. Many people believe that sexuality and gender are synonymous with one another. Gender is socially constructed while sex is biologically determined. In society’s past, Americans often strayed away from discussing controversial topics, but with the rise of different ways of addressing people, it is deemed more important to understand. Along with the blurred lines of gender and sex comes sexuality, who someone is attracted to sexually. When people stray from society’s heteronormative mindset, they are often faced with many more challenges than the average hetero man or woman. People often have the preconceived notion that if something does not concern them, then they should not be involved in it. A person who could be your neighbor, co worker, or even child, may have to deal with the troubles of people confusing their gender identity with their sex. While also facing challenges that deal with the sex of the person they choose to love. Learning the difference between gender and sexuality will open the eyes of many people and see how the two are different but relate to one another very much.

There are difference between sex and gender, and as time passes they become better known. Sex is known as male or female. Sex refers to the biology, the differences of chromosomes and hormones; internal and external sex organs of individuals. Gender is known by the terms “masculine” and “feminine”. Gender refers to the characteristics of a society or culture that are defined as either masculine or feminine. Gender roles refer to the characteristics and behaviors that different cultures attribute to the sexes. The evolution of gender norms happens by culture and region, and over time, there has been less of an emphasis on biology so much to explain differences between men and women, just know society shapes different outcomes and expectations

Evolution or trade over the years takes place through the methods of natural and sexual selection. In response to troubles in our environment, we adapt each physically and psychologically to ensure our survival and replica. Sexual selection principle describes how evolution has shaped us to provide a mating advantage rather than just a survival advantage and happens via two wonderful pathways: intrasexual competition and intersexual choice. Gene choice concept, the modern rationalization behind evolutionary biology, takes place thru the desire for gene replication. Evolutionary psychology connects evolutionary ideas with present day psychology and focuses in general on mental variations: adjustments within the manner we think with the intention to enhance our survival.

Thus, concluding that the explanation of biological, psychodynamic and learning approaches does influence on gender development. Each of these approaches explains how gender is developed in their own way. From the biological approach, we found out that gender differences are seen as resulting from sex differences. In other words, women and men act, think and feel differently because of differences in how their brains work. These brain differences may result from chromosomal differences and may also be the result of hormonal differences.

Societies today are highly affected by the way people are believed to act. Gender roles are created by society, and they are a way to define how a gender should or shouldn't act. In “Answers” by George Singleton, there is a husband and wife thinking about getting divorced, and they begin answering questions in a book, and realize that the other turned out to be less manly or trustworthy, than they believed to be. In “Public Relations” by George Singleton, a man and his wife are out eating with his boss and his wife. While eating he gets fired for talking about how women should act, and how they will amount to nothing without an education. In both of these stories, men and women act differently than the stereotypes put on them by their

Men and women are sexually dimorphic: they possess characteristics that differ on average for males and females of a given species. These attributes can be physical, but are also seen in behaviour. This is also known as a sex difference. Given that differences in behaviour between the sexes have long been the subject of social discourse , it is paramount to examine to what extent these differences are dependent on society, or whether they have a basis in biology. Here, it is beneficial to observe the behaviour of children, instead of relying on self-reporting- this provides empirical evidence for a sex difference. They will not have been exposed to as many potentially gender-shaping stimuli as adults have, and so their observation can provide more accurate results when examining phenomena that cannot normally be seen. Therefore, it is also of particular use to investigate why some children show more gender-typical behaviour than others. As all behaviour is controlled by the brain, the terms “sex” and “gender” will be used interchangeably, despite some convictions that the term “gender” has more social connotations than the term “sex”.1

As we have begun to discuss culture, we have come to the realization that culture can take many forms. People who have different ethnicities or grew up in different countries will most likely have different cultures along with different values. Although we inherently want to say that out own culture is the “right” culture, we have to realize that not everyone has been rraised the same or shared the same experiences as us. In Lareau’s reading, the cultural upbringing of different children of different races illustrates how culture and values will vary from person to person. The children are brought up in a middle-class or working class/ poor class, but

Accordingly, there are two assumptions that certain scientists claim who are conducting research on sex and gender, namely a so-called ‘sex difference’ regarding (1) that all females and males behave and act differently according to their sex (2) psychological patterns are based on their biology and, therefore, genes (Caplan & Caplan, 2007). Both assumptions are built upon binaries and are rather alarming and very dangerous. Moreover, further issues with these assumptions are that (1) they argue through a calculated average referring to performances of participants which leaves out individual performances (2) it is rather unfounded hence genes can be changed and differ between individuals. Accordingly, both assumptions are based on biological

In this essay I discuss that "doing gender means creating differences between girls and boys and women and men...." (West & Zimmerman 2002:13) I am concentrating on the female perspective, how societyputs forth expectations of what is 'natural' or biological even though, in some cases, it can be quite demeaning and degrading. I am using some examples from the local media and also a few childhoodexperiences that have helped me to now strongly suspect that the quote from Simone Beauvoir (1972) "One is not born a woman, but rather becomes one" most likely has quite a bit of truth to it.

Although some evidence is indisputable, such as women becoming pregnant, evolutionary psychologists need to update their theories to align with recent findings.

As evident from the generalized patterns found in differences in behaviour and outlook observed between the sexes, it may be tempting, as has been done in the past, to conclude that gender is an unavoidable aspect of human existence as determined purely from one 's genes. Indeed, human physiology is subject to sexual dimorphism; statistically significant differences in brain size and rate of maturation of specific substructures in the brain exist between males and females (Giedd, Castellanos, Rajapakese, Vaituzis, & Rapoport, 1997), yet these physical differences fail to explain how individuals form their concept of their own gender, and why they tend to conform to their perceived gender roles as defined by the society in which they live, when these roles are ever-changing. Thus, it is important to differentiate between the physical and nonphysical traits, and how the labels of femininity and masculinity should not confuse the two aspects. As defined by Unger (1979), “sex” would be used to refer to the biological differences in males and females, while “gender” describes socioculturally determined, nonphysiological traits which are arbitrarily designated as being appropriate for either females or males. With more recent awareness and interest in matters of gender nonconformity and individual gender identity, new research now explains how these concepts of gender are shaped by social influences (Perry