GENDER DIFFERENCE

Infants are classified as male or female at birth. From this moment on, their sexual identity plays an important role in the way they are treated by society. Difference bt sex and gender: Sex refers to sexual behaviour Gender refers to the sense of maleness or femaleness related to our membership in a given society

GENDER DIFFERENCES IN SOCIAL BEHAVIOUR

Traits like sensitivity and nurturance are attributed to females and aggressiveness and dominance are attributed to males (Eagly, 1987; Friedman & Zebrowitz, 1992).

GENDER DIFFERENCES IN SOCIAL BEHAVIOUR

1. EMOTIONAL EXPRESSION: SENDING AND RECEIVING NON-VERBAL CUES Non-verbal Cues facial expression, eye contact, body posture or movements, tone of speech, dressing style, etc.

GENDER DIFFERENCES IN SOCIAL BEHAVIOUR

1. EMOTIONAL EXPRESSION: SENDING AND RECEIVING NON-VERBAL CUES Females are generally better at both sending and receiving non-verbal cues than males (Dik Browne, 1984; DePaulo, 1992; Rosenthal & DePaulo, 1979). In social situations females know what to expect from others and hence they do not get surprised by others behaviour

GENDER DIFFERENCES IN SOCIAL BEHAVIOUR

2. EMOTIONAL EXPRESSION: THE CRYING GAME (Hindustan Times Sunday Magazine, March 6, 2011) Gwyneth Paltrow went in for full-on sobbing, giving effusive thanks to an endless list of people, hot tears running down. Julia Roberts, Sandra Bullock, etc.

GENDER DIFFERENCES IN SOCIAL BEHAVIOUR

2. EMOTIONAL EXPRESSION: THE CRYING GAME (Hindustan Times Sunday Magazine, March 6, 2011) Reasons Social conditioning women are brought up to believe that it is all right to cry to express emotion, be it joy, sorrow or pain. Men, on the other hand, are brought up to regard crying as a mark of weakness, something that they must never be seen doing.

GENDER DIFFERENCES IN SOCIAL BEHAVIOUR

3. SOCIAL INFLUENCE: EVALUATION FEEDBACK Males tend to view situations in which they receive feedback on their performance as competitive ones. As a result, they view such feedback with skepticism. In contrast, females view such situations as leading opportunities and therefore pay greater attention to the feedback they receive (Roberts, 1993).

GENDER DIFFERENCES IN SOCIAL BEHAVIOUR

4. LEADERSHIP: PERFORMANCE AND EVALUATIONS Males and females differ but in smaller magnitude Research studies suggest that female leaders often receive lower ratings than male leaders, even when their performance is the same. This finding is especially strong in situations where the raters are males. Female leaders face disadvantage in social settings.

 5. AGGRESSION: WHAT KIND AND HOW MUCH Gender stereotypes and crime statistics support the view that males are more aggressive than females. Females use indirect mode of aggression than males. This difference increases with age and girls growing cognitive skills. The reason can be they are generally smaller in size and physical strength (Bjorkqvist, Lagerspetz, & Kaukiainen, 1992).

GENDER DIFFERENCES IN SOCIAL BEHAVIOUR

GENDER DIFFERENCES IN SOCIAL BEHAVIOUR

6. FRIENDSHIP: ARE FEMALE FRIENDSHIPS MORE INTENSE AND BENEFICIAL Females and males make intense friendships and females find more satisfaction in friendships than males.

MATE SELECTION, RELATIONSHIPS, AND SEXUALITY

1. MATE SELECTION: Ads by females: young, physically attractive; is seeking a partner who has wealth and high status and who is interested in serious relationship. Ads by males: has high status (in education, profession and wealth); is seeking a partner who is young and attractive. Males and females adopt contrasting strategies because they invest different amounts of resources in their offspring.

MATE SELECTION, RELATIONSHIPS, AND SEXUALITY

2. RELATIONSHIPS: Both the genders show high correlation towards long-term relationships (e.g., marriage). With regard to one-night stand, males show low correlation. It means males seem to accept wide range of partners in this context (Kenrick, 1993).

MATE SELECTION, RELATIONSHIPS, AND SEXUALITY

3. SEXUALITY: Females and males differ to some extent with regard to their sexual attitudes and sexual behaviour. Males are more accepting of casual sexual encounters and express more permissive attitudes towards extramarital sex. Males report a higher incidence of masturbation, a greater incidence of intercourse, and more partners (Oliver and Hyde, 1993).

BIOLOGICAL BASIS OF GENDER DIFFERENCES

1. HORMONES: During prenatal development key role Biological sex determined by sex chromosomes XX or XY. Embryos until about 8 to 12 weeks. Gonads (sex glands) produce androgens John Money and colleagues (1972) exposed small number of females to high levels of androgens during their pregnancy.

BIOLOGICAL BASIS OF GENDER DIFFERENCES

1. HORMONES: Girls born to these females were with masculinized genitals, the degree varied. These girls showed interest in outdoor activities, preferred male playmates and male toys.

SOURCES OF GENDER DIFFERENCES

Sex is biological variable BIOLOGICAL FACTORS After birth ppl are treated differently based on their sex SOCIETAL FACTORS Both these factors should be considered.

SOURCES OF GENDER DIFFERENCES

BIOLOGICAL FACTORS: Do differences between males and female brains underlie sex and gender differences? some of the neuropsychologists asked. Exposure to the male hormones affected the development of girls brains, making them favour toys that involve certain kinds of skills.

SOURCES OF GENDER DIFFERENCES

BIOLOGICAL FACTORS: For eg., girls who were exposed before birth to unusually high levels of androgen, male hormones, because their mothers accidentally took a drug containing the hormone during pregnant, preferred different toys stereotypically preferred by boys (such as cars) and less likely to play with toys stereotypically associated with girls (such as dolls).

SOURCES OF GENDER DIFFERENCES

BIOLOGICAL FACTORS: Similarly, some evidence suggests that women perform better on tasks involving verbal skill and muscular coordination when their production of female sex hormone, estrogen, is relatively high, compared with when it is low. In contrast, they perform better on talks involving spatial relationships when their estrogen level is relatively low (Kimura & Hampson, 1988; Kimura, 1999).

SOURCES OF GENDER DIFFERENCES

BIOLOGICAL FACTORS: Some psychologists take evolutionary approach to explain it. David Buss and colleagues (1992) point to differences in nature of jealousy between men and women. They found that men were more jealous in cases of actual sexual infidelity, as apposed to emotional infidelity in which there was emotional attachment to another man but no actual sexual infidelity.

SOURCES OF GENDER DIFFERENCES

BIOLOGICAL FACTORS: They found that men were more jealous in cases of actual sexual infidelity, as apposed to emotional infidelity in which there was emotional attachment to another man but no actual sexual infidelity. In contrast, women were more jealous in cases of emotional infidelity rather than sexual infidelity.

SOURCES OF GENDER DIFFERENCES

BIOLOGICAL FACTORS: The root cause of this controversial explanation lies in evolutionary implications of sexual infidelity for men and women. For men sexual infidelity means their children are not their own, not inherited their genes. This makes them more upset compared to emotional infidelity.

SOURCES OF GENDER DIFFERENCES

BIOLOGICAL FACTORS: For women they know their children are their own, nurtured in their womb. Their main concern is involving male in child rearing. So males emotional attachment is more crucial for them.

SOURCES OF GENDER DIFFERENCES

SOCIAL FACTORS: From birth boys with blue blankets and girls with pink ones. Different kinds of toys are given
Parents treat children differently according to their sex. Fathers play roughly with boys than with girls. Mothers talk more to girls than with boys. (Jacklin & Reynolds, 1993)

SOURCES OF GENDER DIFFERENCES

SOCIAL FACTORS: Social learning theory boys and girls are taught, and rewarded for performing, behaviours that are perceived by society as being appropriate for men or for women, respectively (Philpot, 2000).
Even the society shows this gender differences: in novels (girls as nurturing and boys in physical and action-oriented roles) and TV