Cognitive explanations of gender development: Gender Schema Theory

Theory differs from Kohlberg's theory in two ways:

• Information about gender-appropriate behaviour is acquired before gender constancy.
• This theory describes how schemas are processed-how they affect later behaviours in terms of memory and attention.

Schemas-The main concept in the GST is the concept of a schema. Children learn schemas related to gender from their interactions with other children and adults, as well as from tevelvison programmes or videos. Such schemas are therefore very much related to cultural norms. Gender schemas (stereotypes) have the function of organising and structuring other information that is presented to children. Then learn about what toys are appropriate for each gender, what clothes to wear and so on. In a sense, these gender schemas are like 'naive' theories-personal rather than scientific- about appropriate behaviour for men and women.

Ingroups and Outgroups- Ingroup= the groups a person identifies with. Being a girl means that you identify with being with that ingroup. A girl will also identify with maby other groups such as the twon she comes from or the football team she supports. The same for boys. Once a child identifies with groups this leads them to positively evaluate…