The literature on the male gender role portrays real men as lacking weakness, need, doubt, or any of the "female" values such as sympathy, concern, or empathy. It is contended that Western society develops, reinforces, and maintains gender roles by the emotion shame; many males are motivated in part by an effort to avoid or escape…

Describes the different preferences in learning styles of adolescents based on the pioneering work on values development done by Kohlberg and Gilligan. Focuses on learning preferences of males and females and values research and its role in learning. Offers recommendations of middle-level academic and cocurricular planners. (RJM)

Examines gender differences in domain-specific areas of identity development among college youth (N=210). Also explores gender comparisons of relationships among domains. Results indicate that males were more likely to explore and commit in politics, whereas females were more likely to explore in sex roles and to commit in religion and dating.…

The past 15 years have brought a re-evaluation of women's adult development in light feminist thinking. However, many outdated assumptions in psychological theory remain comfortably ensconced; to challenge these ideas, some misrepresentations of women's experience are examined. The focus is on Erik Erikson's explanation of the second stage of…

Examined the gendered influence of downward social comparisons among college students. Compared to men, women were more likely to feel that another's failure reflected their own chance of success, especially when it was considered due to personal characteristics. Men were more susceptible to dampened self-evaluations in light of another's failure…

Three issues are addressed relating to the role of family experience in adolescents' self concept: the extent of sex differences in adolescents' friendship and dating identity, how links between family experience and friendship and dating identity might differ for males and females, and whether mothers and fathers play distinctive roles in such…

Examines gender differences in self-perception in the United States and the U.S. Virgin Islands. Results indicate significant gender variance in the participants' ratings of the evaluative and potency scales of "my ideal self," with all women rating the potency of "my ideal self" lower than did the men. (RJM)

Explored the link between development of bulimic eating behavior and suppression of masculine traits in adolescence. German high school students completed a sex role inventory. Among girls, higher risk of developing bulimia appeared to be caused by increasing discrepancies between actual and ideal self-concept on masculine-typed personality…

Citing concern over the decline in self-concept and achievement exhibited by middle school girls, this article summarizes ERIC documents and journal articles that explore the factors that impinge on boys' and girls' academic and social lives in the middle grades. Presents annotated bibliographic references for ten items. (SD)

Investigated gender differences in psychological problems--decision anxiety, life-goal awareness, and others--in the career decision-making process (CDM) of 1,006 college students. Results indicated no gender differences in global levels of problems in CDM. Some specific difficulties, such as life-goal awareness and authority orientation, were…

Reviews research on how gender affects adolescent development. Discusses various conceptualizations of adolescence, the crisis of self-esteem for adolescent girls, the ways in which schools reinforce traditional gender roles, differences between boys' and girls' achievement patterns, and the intersections of gender with ethnicity and social class.…

Provides an analysis of the identity construction of students in two Mexican secondary schools within the structural, cultural, and informational resources that schools provide. Explores the lack of congruence between the resources educational institutions provide students and their daily struggles to construct personal and occupational…

Examines the effects of gender, expectations of success, and social comparison on children's performance on a computer-based task. Finds that the presence of like students facilitated the performance of girls with high expectations of success but was detrimental to those with low expectations; found opposite results for boys. (DSK)

Studied three different criteria of within-sex, gender-related individual differences taken from three studies. Data showed that items displaying large sex differences tended also to correlate most strongly with independent gender-related criteria within the sexes. Discusses assessment implications for gender-related and other group-related…

Introduces this issue of Middle School Journal. Highlights articles presenting theories concerning how male and female adolescents face the development of self-concept, the dilemma of ensuring gender equity, as well as divergent perspectives on helping both genders develop positive self images about themselves as learners. (SD)