Chapter VII: Gender and Development

Learning Objectives: describe gender equality and inequality and how they affect development; explain the relationship between gender and power; and Discuss significant gains that have been made in women’s education as a result of global advocacy.

Gender One of the universal dimensions on which status differences are based. A social construct specifying the socially and culturally prescribed roles that men and women are to follow. Shapes the lives of all people in all societies. It influences all aspects of our lives, the schooling we receive, the social roles we play, and the power and authority we command.

Theories of Gender Development

Social Learning Theory Proponents of social learning theory believe that parents, as the distributors of reinforcement, reinforce appropriate gender role behaviors. By their choice of toys, by urging “boy” or “girl” behavior, and by reinforcing such behavior, parents encourage their children to engage in gender-appropriate behavior.

Cognitive-developmental theory Derives from Kohlberg’s speculations about gender development. We know from Piaget’s work that children engage in symbolic thinking by about 2 years of age. Using this ability, children acquire their gender identity and then, Kohlberg believes, they begin the process of acquiring gender-appropriate behavior.

Gender schema theory A schema is a mental blueprint for organizing information, and children develop and formulate an appropriate gender. Such a schema helps a child to develop gender identity and formulate an appropriate gender role. Consequently, children develop an integrated schema or picture, of what gender is and should be (Elliott et al., 1996)

Gender Stereotyping

Gender stereotyping is defined as the beliefs humans hold about the characteristics associated with males and females.

Gender Stereotyping From an early age, people form ideas of what males and females should be, beginning to accumulate characteristics that they consider male and female, and assigning labels tot those categories. This process certainly simplifies the ability to deal with the world. Obviously, that rough, noisy person is a boy, and that gentle, soft-spoken, obedient person is a girl.

One feature of stereotyping is that people perceive and interpret a situation is accordance with their beliefs. A stereotype is a schema or a set of beliefs about a certain group of people. Gender – role stereotype are the features we assign to men and women in our society, features that are not assigned due to biological sex but due to the social roles that men and women hold.

Gender and Equality

Gender equality gives women and men the same entitlements to all aspects of human development, including economic, social, cultural, civil and political rights, the same level of respect, the same opportunities to make choices, and the same level of power to shape the outcomes of these choices.

Gender Equality Between men and women is a worth goal that is central to progress in human development. Research from around the world has shown that gender inequality tends to slow economic growth and make the rise from poverty more difficult. The reason for this link are not hard to understand.

Half of the world’s population is female, hence, the extent to which women and girls benefit from development policies and programs has a major impacts on the countries’ overall development success. Research also shows that women and girls tend to work harder than men, are more likely to invest their earnings in their children, are major producers as well as consumers, and shoulder critical, life sustaining responsibilities without which men and boys could not survive much less enjoy high levels of productivity.

Gender equality has gained wide acceptance as an important goal for many countries around the world. The growing support for and attention to gender equality is bolstered by the assumption that it would improve the lives of most people, especially those of women and children.

Gender Inequality

First, men and women are situated in society not only differently but also unequally. Specifically, women get less of material resources, social status, power, and opportunities for self actualization than do men who share their social location – be it a location based on class, race, occupation, ethnicity, religion, education, nationality, or any other socially significant factor.

Second, this inequality results from the organization of society, not from any significant biological or personality differences between men and women.

Third, although individual human beings may vary somewhat from each other in their profile of potentials and traits, no significant pattern of natural variation distinguishes the sexes. Instead, all human beings are characterized by a need for freedom to seek self-actualization and by a fundamental malleability that leads them to adapt to the constraints or opportunities of the situations in which they find themselves.

Fourth, all inequality theories assume that both men and women and men will respond fairly easily and naturally to more egalitarian social structures and situations.

Gender and Power

Gender – refers to the different ways men and women play in society, and to the relative power they wield. While gender is expressed differently in different societies, in no society do men and women perform equal roles or hold equal positions of power. Power – basic fabric of society and is possessed in varying degrees by social actors in diverse social categories.

Gender and Education

The past decade has witnessed a significant increase in the importance accorded to education, with both “instrumental” as well as “intrinsic” arguments made for increasing financial investment and policy attention to education provision. Investing in education is seen as one of the fundamental ways is which nation states and their citizens can move toward long-term development goals and improve both social and economic standards of living.

Schools also reinforce gendered social roles Schools also reinforce gendered social roles. Researchers have documented the differential treatment accorded males and females in the classrooms that reinforces a sense of inferiority and lack of initiative among female students. Boys are more likely than girls to be given specific information that guides improvement of their performance.

End Prepared by: Abigail B. Bautista / 3EED-2A Submitted to: Ma’am Marjorrie Lazatin