In a society filled with gender stereotypes and biases, children often adopt gender roles that are not always equal to males and females. As children move on through childhood and later into adolescence, many factors influence their views and behaviors towards gender roles. These attitudes and behaviors are learned initially in the home and later reinforced by outside influences such as school experiences, friends, teachers, and television.
Children turn out to internalize many of the gender stereotypes and behaviors of the past. Where are these stereotypes coming from? The most decisive influence on gender development occurs in the home,
with parents passing on many beliefs about gender roles. Children learn what it means to be a boy or a girl in our society at a young age. Through
opportunities, encouragement and discouragement, obvious behaviors, covert suggestions, and
various types of guidance, children experience the formation of their gender role socialization. It
is hard for children to grow into adults without experiencing some form of gender bias or gender
stereotyping, whether boys are supposed to be harsh or better at math or that females
can only play with dolls. Sex Roles: A Journal of Research states, "parents, especially fathers,
tend to reward boys more than girls for displaying gender-congruent forms of play. They also
tend to punish boys more harshly than girls for deviations from prescribed gender role norms."
(McCreary 519). Often this punishment is mental, with boys being teased by their fathers
for acting like a "sissy" or not being "tough."
A child's earliest exposure to what it means to be male or female comes from parents.
From the time they are babies, parents treat sons and daughters differently, dressing infants in
gender-specific colors and clothing and giving toys based on gender. One study indicated that
parents have different expectations of sons and daughters as...