Mothers of Sons and Daughters: Different Influences on Gender Development Judith E. Owen Blakemore & Craig A. Hill Indiana University - Purdue University, Fort Wayne Abstract Introduction Conclusions Method We examined mothers’ attitudes about gender norms in general, and about their own children’s gender-related behaviors. We also examined children’s knowledge about gender norms, their attitudes about gender norm violation, their toy preferences, their gender schematicity, and their knowledge of gender constancy. Relationships were not found between mothers’ attitudes and children’s knowledge or gender constancy, but they were found with children’s attitudes about norm violation, especially for sons. Some parents are more traditional in their attitudes about gender roles than others. How do these parental differences in attitudes impact children's gender development, and are there differences for boys and girls in the degree of impact? There are many components of gender development. Children gain knowledge about gender and gender stereotypes, they demonstrate gender-related interests and behaviors, and they develop attitudes about gender- related norms. There is some research showing that parents whose gender-related attitudes about others are more conservative have children who also have more conservative attitudes (Tenenbaum & Leaper, 2002), and that their children develop knowledge about gender earlier than other children do (Fagot & Leinbach, 1995). But much remains to be learned about the relationship between parents’ gender-related attitudes and children’s gender development. Most of the research measuring parents’ gender-related attitudes has used general measures of gender-related attitudes about adults such as the Attitudes towards Women Scale (AWS, Spence & Hahn, 1997; Spence & Helmreich, 1972). On the subscales of the CGSS, they were equally positive about the need for their sons’ (M = 6.87) and daughters’ (M = 6.97) education to prepare them for work. They were more positive about the need for boys (M = 6.48) than girls (M = 5.88) to learn to help at home, F (1, 121) = 9.37, p =.003; and for boys (M = 5.23) than girls (M = 4.58) to be educated for family roles, F (1, 120) = 4.77, p =.031. They were more positive about girls playing with feminine toys (M = 6.32) than with boys playing with masculine ones (M = 5.65), F (1, 121) = 19.63, p <.001, but displayed no difference in views about their playing with opposite- gendered toys (Ms = 4.69 for girls and masculine toys; 4.58 for boys and feminine toys). However, when asked directly how much they disapproved of their child behaving or acting like a child of the other gender, mothers of sons were more negative (M 3.96 as compared to 2.37, where 7.0 would be most negative), F (1, 120) = 33.51, p <.001 We also noted differences in the distributions (See Fig. 1), with mothers of daughters clustering at the positive end of the range (SD = 1.31; skew =.74), and mothers of sons being distributed across the range (SD = 1.73; skew = -.17). In other words, mothers of sons and daughters had similar gender-related attitudes except when it came to their children acting like the other gender, where mothers of sons were more negative and considerably more variable. In spite of the fact that mothers of sons and daughters had similar attitudes about gender norms in general, and varied from traditional to liberal in these attitudes, mothers of sons were considerably more negative and more variable in their attitudes about their sons acting or being like girls than mothers of daughters were about their daughters acting or being like boys. Sons whose mothers were more negative about their sons acting like girls, themselves judged gender norm violations of several different types to be more negative. Relationships between mothers’ attitudes and cognitive aspects of gender development (knowledge; gender constancy) were not found. Relationships Between Mothers and Children. We also examined relationships between mothers’ scores and their children's gender-related knowledge and attitudes. There were significant relationships between mothers’ attitudes about their sons acting like girls, and their sons’ own judgments about the appropriateness of violating several types of gender norms such as gender norms in general (r =.39, p =.005), appearance norms for both boys and girls (r =.32, p =.019), wanting to become a parent of the other gender, (r =.40, p =.003), and boys playing with feminine toys (r =.34, p =.013). Mothers who were more positive about their sons’ play with masculine toys, had sons who were more likely to use a gender schema to facilitate their own toy choices (r =.36, p =.006). For the most part, similar relationships were not found between mothers' and daughters' attitudes about gender norm violations, although more liberal mothers on the AWS had daughters with more positive attitudes about gender norm violations overall (r =.24, p =.048). Maternal attitudes about gender were not related to the development of children’s gender-related knowledge or gender constancy. Poster presented at the Gender Development Research Conference, San Francisco, April 15 th – 16 th, Figure 1. Attitudes of Mothers of Boys and Girls about Their Children Acting Like the Other Gender. Participants. Mothers and their 3- to 8-year-old children (N = 68 F; 55 M) participated. Approximately 78% of the children were White; 9% African American; 8% biracial; and the majority of the remainder Asian and Hispanic. Measures. Mothers completed the AWS (Spence & Helmreich, 1972) and the The Child Gender Socialization Scale (CGSS, Blakemore & Hill, 2008). The AWS ranges from 0 to 45, with higher scores being more liberal. The CGSS consists of 5 subscales, each of which ranges from 1 to 7. The children were administered three measures: (1) a measure of toy preference and “gender schematicity” originally developed by Levy and Carter (1989) as a paper and pencil measure, but adapted for use with a Hewlett-Packard tablet PC; (2) a measure of knowledge about 16 gender norms, judgments about whether norm violation was possible, and attitudes about norm violation rated on a 5-point scale from very bad to very good, and previously used by Blakemore (2003); and (3) a measure of gender constancy as recently modified by Ruble and her colleagues (Ruble et al., 2007; Szkrybalo & Ruble, 1999). The Child Gender Socialization Scale was recently developed to measure parents’ attitudes about their own children’s gender-related interests and behaviors (Blakemore & Hill, 2008). In the present study, we used this measure as well as the AWS to examine relationships between parents’ attitudes to their 3- to 8-year-old children's gender development. Mothers’ Attitudes. As measured by the AWS, mothers of sons (M = 35.6) and daughters (M = 35.7) had similar attitudes about adult gender norms. Results