Bridging the Gender Divide

Based on our discussions in class, and our analysis of language, culture, historical gender roles, and even advertisements, it's clearly evident that a gender divide exists. But despite the attempts of most societies to bridge this divide, why have these differences persisted?

I decided to look at "upstream" inputs, or ones that influence the way in which mindsets are formed.

Dr. David Anderson, professor of economics, and Dr. Mykol Hamilton, professor of psychology at Centre College, KY, have documented that gender bias is common today in many children's books in their research published recently in Sex Roles: A Journal of Research titled "Gender Stereotyping and Under-Representation of Female Characters in 200 Popular Children's Picture Books: A 21st Century Update."

They studied 200 top-selling children's books from 2001 and a seven-year sample of Caldecott award-winning books, and discovered a number of examples of gender bias:

- There were nearly twice as many male as female title and main characters
- Male characters appeared in illustrations 53 percent more than female characters
- Female main characters nurtured more than did male main characters, and they were seen in more indoor than outdoor scenes
- Occupations were gender stereotyped, and more women than men appeared to have no paid occupation

(http://www.collegenews.org/x6773.xml)

By the time children are 3 to 4 years old, they have already formed an image of themselves as boy or girl. Children form these images from parents, teachers, societal members, and the toys and games with which they play. Playing with gender-stereotyped toys is considered to be the beginning of sex role development in young children.

An overview of findings at "Toys R Us" helps expose the hidden sexism that occurs through children's toys. Except for Sesame Street and Fisher Price, who manufacture successful gender-neutral toys to children younger than four years of age, "Toys R Us" actually divides toys into a blue and navy "boys" section, and a pink and white "girls" section. Furthermore, toy packaging exhibited significant color differences. The store aisles contained plenty of pinks, the most popular "girl" color by 95%, yellows, whites, lavenders, reds and pastels. Conversely, the boys' aisles had an array of blue the most popular "boys" color by 95% as well as green, red, black, gray, and brown. In addition to color, inventory also reveals sexism. The female section of the toy store was much bigger than the male side possibly feeding into the stereotype that women have more material objects than men.
(http://www.unc.edu/~dcderosa/STUDENTPAPERS/childrenbattles/toysrusdenise.htm)

A child’s earliest years are critical. During the years from 3~8, skills such as language, social competence, the ability to think critically and the capacity to learn, are developed. Because of entrenched gender bias in many regions, young girls fare less well than boys in many aspects of early childhood, including receiving a worse diet and health care. In fact, there are an estimated 60-100 million fewer women alive today than there would be in a world without gender discrimination and without social norms that favor sons.

Some 121 million children are not in school, most of them girls. If a family can afford school fees for only one child, it will likely be a boy who attends. If someone needs to fetch water or do housework instead of going to school, a girl will likely be chosen. Despite this, numerous studies have shown that educating girls is the single most effective policy to raise overall economic productivity, lower infant and maternal mortality, educate the next generation, improve nutrition and promote health. And mothers who have had some education are more than twice as likely to send their own children to school as are mothers with no education.

(Source: Unicef; http://www.unicef.org/mdg/gender.html)

Although Unicef's "Millennium Development Goal" of gender equality consists of outreach programs in developing nations, it's interesting to note that the problems relating to gender differences exist all over the world. Even more interesting is the fact that the result, namely economic progress, is the catalyst that has brought about the concept of equality in the first place. If it boils down to simple economics, then bringing about gender equality could be as simple as introducing tax breaks for stay-at-home moms who want to run a business from home, or other innovations like loans in Bangladesh that are extended to women at very low interest rates. Based on existing data, women in Bangladesh are much less likely to default on loans than men, and the result of this is, better cash-flow for banks in that country. Diversification has very tangible economic benefits, and it's time we include everyone in the game for reasons that extend beyond mere political correctness.