Examined toddlers' awareness of own-sex and other-sex gender-typed and non-gender-typed toys, also measuring accuracy at labeling sex. Toddlers participated in sequential touching tasks. Results indicated that toddlers possessed significant awareness of gender-typed categories, particularly own-sex gender-typed ones. Awareness of gender-typed…

This study focused on the influence of gender schemas on children's abilities to focus their attention away from or toward stimuli containing the dimension of gender. Children identified as gender schematic and aschematic participated in a nonreversal discrimination learning paradigm in which one relevant dimension was gender-relevant and another…

Over the last decade or so, researchers have started to describe some of the ways young children begin to acquire and apply certain gender-relevant concepts, constructs, and behaviors. Researchers are beginning to build developmental models detailing young children's acquisition of certain gender-typed behaviors and gender schema factors. The…

This study examined the effects of children's understanding of gender constancy and their perceptions of differences in figures' sexes and relative body sizes on their attributions of gender-typed activities and characteristics. Interviews with 80 children between 3 and 6 years of age were conducted to ascertain the children's understanding of…

Data from 44 boys and 39 girls of 27-63 months of age indicated that children's gender schematization and other cognitive gender schema factors were significantly associated with accuracy in attributing gender-role stereotypes to males and females. (RH)

Traditional and evaluative aspects of flexibility regarding transgressions across several domains (gender roles, moral rules, social etiquette, and physical law) were assessed in four-year olds, eight-year olds, and college undergraduates. Found distinctly different patterns of response. Results suggest that masculine and feminine gender roles and…

Examines developmental and individual differences in the effects of gender schematization on young children's memories for gender-typed information, and investigates the interactive effects of children's age, gender schematization, and verbal labeling of information on preschoolers' memories for gender typed information. (JS)

Forty-four boys and 23 girls aged 3 to 6 years attending preschools serving mostly middle class populations participated in a nonreversal discrimination task with gender typing and size of stimulus the relevant target dimensions. Results support predictions based on gender schema theory regarding salience of gender-to-gender schematic and…

An attempt was made to integrate script and schema-based approaches in an examination of children's early gender role development and gender typing. The examination focused on: (1) young children's sequencing of gender scripts and the relation of this sequencing to children's age, sex, and gender role knowledge; and (2) age-related differences in…

Results suggest that gender schematization exerts an important influence in early sex-role development and illustrate the utility of a gender schematic approach to early sex-typing phenomena. (RH)

A total of 83 children of 27 to 63 months of age were interviewed in an effort to assess the importance of the children's understanding of gender constancy and their use of physical characteristics in making gender role stereotype attributions. It was hypothesized that young children would use stimulus models' sex to a greater extent than the…

Examined young children's abilities to recall pairs of categorically related and unrelated items. Forty children participated in the Recall of Item Pairs Task. Results show that young children use gender role categories to organize and facilitate aspects of their recall. (GR)

Reported are a series of studies revealing developmental and individual differences among preschool children on relationships between gender-based knowledge, gender constancy, gender schematic processing, recognition memories for gender-typed information, and flexibility, sequencing, and understanding of gender scripts. Alternative approaches for…

The present study investigated relationships between cognitive components of children's sex-role development and the bases of their attributions of sex-stereotypes to a particular gender. Specifically, it was predicted that the number of sex-stereotypes children correctly attributed would be significantly related to gender differences between the…

Investigated young children's perceived competencies of men and women in gender-typed occupations, perceptions about how much money they earn in gender-typed occupations, and affective reactions regarding growing up to have gender-typed occupations. Children perceived differential competencies of men and women regarding gender-typed occupations…