Sex, Gender and Socialization
Introduced| English | Meaning |
|---|---|
| Sex/seks/ | Biological characteristics associated with sexual development, including chromosomes, hormones and reproductive anatomy. |
| Gender/ˈdʒendə/ | The social and cultural expectations attached to them. |
| gender role/ˈdʒendə rəʊl/ | The set of expectations a culture attaches to a group. |
| Socialization/ˌsəʊʃəlaɪˈzeɪʃn/ | The process of learning a society's expectations and roles. |
A child learns what is expected long before anyone explains it
- Children pick up expectations from what they see rewarded, imitated and assumed.
- Nobody has to state a rule for the rule to be learned.
- This topic is about how those expectations enter development.
Two different terms
- Sex 生理性别 refers to biological characteristics.
- Gender 社会性别 refers to the social and cultural expectations attached to them.
- The CED keeps them separate because they can influence development through different routes.
Sex, gender, and two explanations of how gender roles 性别角色 are learned
In the CED's terms, gender refers to...
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Sex is biological; gender is the social layer built on it.
Socialization
- Socialization 社会化 is the process of learning a society's expectations and roles.
- It runs through family, peers, school and media rather than through explicit instruction.
- The CED's claim is that sex and gender influence socialization — one factor among several, not a determinant.
Biological, social, or a process?
Sort each item by the category the CED puts it in.
The process of learning a society's expectations and roles is called ____.
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Socialization runs through family, peers, school and media.
An average difference between two groups says nothing reliable about any individual — the same statistical point the intelligence topic makes. An answer that moves from a group average to a claim about a person has made an error the course explicitly warns against.
Gender roles are identical across all cultures and time periods.
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They vary, and that variation is the evidence that they are social rather than fixed.
Match each term to its definition.
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Biological, social, and the specific package of expectations a society holds.
Roles and norms
- A gender role is the set of expectations a culture attaches to a group.
- Roles vary between cultures and change over time, which is the evidence that they are social rather than fixed.
- Because they vary, a claim about a role is always a claim about a particular society at a particular time.
Select all the cautions the CED's framing requires.
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Treating one study as universal is the error the other three cautions prevent.
Writing about this carefully
- Describe what research observed, in the society and period where it was observed.
- Distinguish an average difference between groups from a claim about any individual.
- Where the CED says "influence", do not upgrade it to "determine".
Toy preferences studied in one country in one decade are often reported as a general finding. Repeat the study in another culture and the pattern shifts — which is exactly what makes the expectations social rather than fixed.
Sex is biological and gender is social. Socialization teaches a society's expectations through family, peers, school and media. Gender roles vary across cultures and time, and the CED's verb is influence — never "determine".
Write from 18 of 20 and 7 of 20
- In school A, 18 of 20 girls choose a cooking corner. In school B, 7 of 20 do. Biological sex is the same classification in both schools.
- Say what changed.
18 of 20 girls in school A choose a cooking corner, and 7 of 20 in school B do. What does the difference suggest about gender?
The schools differ in the social pattern, not in the biological classification.
What changed between the schools?
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The same sex classification produced different choice rates, so the expectation is social.