Male And Femal Stereotypes

Generalizing boys and girls is quite a big issue today. Many people think that the color pink should only be represented by girls and blue can only be represented by boys. Parents tend to treat the different genders differently as they are growing up also. They have a tendency to help girls out with more, and make boys do more on their own and let them learn from their mistakes (Geneva, 17). Also, the parents give their girls more positive feedback, and give the boys a sort of "you did well, but you could have done better" type of message. All of this has many effects on the children. Some of them become incompetent and the other seem to benefit greatly from the feedback. A lot of generalizing goes on at the children's school in the classroom also.

In the classroom teachers and instructors are generalizing by separating boys and girls during certain activities on a daily basis. They will do such things like set up spelling bees that are boys versus girls (Bigler 1). Others will do things like have the children sit at the lunch table in girl, boy order (Bigler 1). Research has shown that doing these things can play a large part in shaping the children's attitudes about gender (Bigler 2). They start to think that since they are being separated from the other gender, that they are very different from them. The research also show that by calling their class by boys or girls could draw the children's attention to gender instead of more important characteristics, such as their personality (Bigler 2). People generally think that boys are better at math than girls for some reason. This is not true, but as a girl it can be discouraging. As a result of this, girls tend to think that they can not solve math problems, or are not good at math before they even try it (Bigler, 3). To help resolve this, people should not focus on saying things such as "The boys are being too loud," or "The girls are doing a good job." (Bigler 4). They should say things like "The April birthday children are doing well," or "The children with velcro shoes are being too loud" (Bigler 4). These points coincide with racism and how it affects African Americans. Because of racism, a lot of the African American communities feel as if they cannot achieve as much as a white person because of the stereotype that they are given as maybe not as smart, or less able to communicate professionally.

Another place that stereotyping children comes up is in the children's home, with their parents. There was a study done, where a psychologist put a camera inside of a couple's home. They had both a girl and a boy. The study showed that the parents helped the little girl with more than they did the boy. (The Difference Between Boys and Girls 3) As a result, the girl felt less confident, and helpless, and the boy felt like he could make his own decisions and do things on his own (The Difference Between Boys and Girls 3). This is also part of the reason that men achieve more later in life than women do. Women feel like they can't, or are scared of what might happen if they do not accomplish what they are trying to do, while men are used to doing everything by themselves which makes them know that they can do almost anything that they put their mind to.

Stereotypes of men and women in the work force are another problem. People believe that only women are capable of taking care of the kids (Marinova 4). They also believe that men should make most of the money and work all the time. This is not true for the most part. A lot of men are better at being stay at home dads, and a lot of women are better workers. The percentage of female-headed two parent families has been increasing a lot in the past few years (Marinova