Psychosocial

Psychoanalytic

Psychoanalytic model

Psychoanalytic theory pioneered by Sigmund Freud in 1895, suggests that the development of identity is a dynamic process involving powerful conflicts between an individual’s instinctual desires and the demands of society which occur within the framework of an internal developmental timetable. Contemporary Psychoanalytic thinking emphasises the development of the ego and the differentiation and individuation of the self. (Corey, 1991) Later developments in theory stress social and cultural influences which can be seen in the well known work of Erik Erikson. He focused on the role of psychosocial conflicts within the social environment and argues that a child is largely working towards trying to understand their own identity and their place in society. (Perlman and Cozby, 1983) Erikson’s model of Psycho-social Development is an extremely valuable framework for understanding the development of gender identity. His presupposition is that an individual possesses "...inner laws of development which create a succession of potentialities for significant interaction with those who tend him." (Erikson, 1980:54) At each stage of development, we see that a healthy sense of gender identity will allow the individual to progress to the next stage. Therefore identity formation is an "....evolving configuration...gradually integrating constitutional givens, idiosyncratic libidinal needs, favoured capacities, significant identifications, effective defences, successful sublimations, and consistent roles." (Erikson, 1980:125) This model is also valuable in understanding how early ‘unresolved’ developmental wounding or confusion in the area of gender identity, as a result of faulty identifications, will ‘set up’ the individual for difficulties in later stages of development. (Erikson, 1980)

Cognative

Cognative Development model

Cognitive Developmental Theory which grew out of the work of Jean Piaget (1932) assumes that a child’s thought process about his identity undergoes predictable qualitative changes with development. (Perlman and Cozby, 1983) Lawrence Kohlberg in 1966 put forward his theory of gender development which suggests there are three stages through which emerges gender constancy. Gender constancy refers to the understanding that one’s own sex will remain constant; "Once a boy, always a boy." (Dworetsky, 1982) Firstly there is Gender Labelling, secondly Gender Stability and finally in late pre-school and primary years where there is situational constancy, gender Constancy is stabilised. Piaget suggests this would occur at the same time that children develop the ability to ‘conserve’ which is when they understand that the qualitative aspects of an object will not change, no matter how it appears. For example a boy will understand that even if he makes a cake or wears lipstick, he will not turn into a girl. (Dworetsky, 1982) This theory suggests children must attain gender constancy before they select attitudes, values and role models for later life. (Berk,1991) and argues that children play a very active role in their socialisation in that the effect of any socialisation experience will depend on how the child interprets his experience.

Learning

Social Learning model

Social Learning Theory suggests that behaviour is learnt before gender constancy is obtained. This theory developed by Albert Bandura in 1977 holds that the vast majority of human behaviour is learned through observation. The observer acquires symbolic representations of a model’s action which are stored as memory. Behaviour is then acted out based on a person’s knowledge of rewards, punishments and consequences. (Perlman and Cozby, 1983)

Weinraub et al in 1984 found at as early as two years of age children apply gender linked labels to categorize themselves and others, and associate toys, games and occupations with gender. (Berk 1991) O’Brien and Huston in a 1985 study also found that children match up objects and games with a male or female stimulus figure, before they can even verbalize their own gender. (Berk, 1991)

Schema

Gender Schema model

The Gender Schema Theory developed by Bem in 1981 states that children learn definitions of male and female and incorporate them into cognitive categories or mental representations called Gender Schemas through which they interpret the world and then select a set of attributes for the self. Schemas are self perpetuating and filter out unwanted sex-inappropriate behaviour or opposite sex behaviour for the self. (Berk, 1991) There is also the process of ‘complementation’ where a child learns reciprocate complimentary behaviour of the opposite sex, knowing they are different. (Arndt, 1991)

Sociocultural

Social Cultural model

It is useful to consider some of the cultural perceptions of masculinity and femininity which are common to the West, with a view to examining how these understandings are constructed. Some views have not dramatically changed from the 1960’s to the 1990’s despite a number of quite significant changes which have taken place. Now, more than ever many elements of popular culture and the media represent the interests of homosexuals, transgenderists and feminists, amongst others, who wish to blur and ‘transcend’ the boundaries of gender as it is expressed personally, socially and culturally. We now have the ‘macho, womanising, performance orientated stud’ and the ‘glamorous but submissive babe’ juxtaposed with the ‘sensitive, New Age, creative guy’ and the ‘career minded, self sufficient, sexually aware woman’; all within the one cultural setting. In large capital cities there is an incredible diversity of expressions of masculinity and femininity, reinforcing the idea that gender roles are largely an expression of the environment in which an individual is socialised.

Through research done at Monash University, Melbourne, it was found that by year twelve in every state girls outnumber boys, gain more academic prizes and win more places at universities. Also, not only do more women than men enrol in higher education, they also generally out-perform men in their studies and seem to be advancing beyond them in gaining key professional credentials. In 1991 for the first time, women were the majority qualified in law in the 20-30 age group. The only fields they have not managed to reach or exceed men in are the fields of computer science and engineering. (Maslen, 1995) The latter finding may point to the fact that women will always be hampered by a lack of biological predisposition for mathematical skill and spatial orientation. In light of the other findings, however we may suggest that the gradual change in the socialisation process is allowing women to reach their biological potential to fare relatively equally with men in areas once understood, even by the medical sciences as ‘the male domain.’ It will be interesting to keep our eye on the more male dominated arenas in the following decades, to evaluate the influence changing sex-role definitions have on vocational choice and performance.