Children's Internalization and Expression of Gender Stereotypical Social Roles

• In Event: "Yes We Can": Improving Equity in Education Through STEM Motivation and Engagement

Abstract

STEM fields are persistently stereotyped as affording agency-based goals and ill-suited for those who value communion (Diekman & Steinberg, 2013). By adulthood, tendencies toward agency versus communion fall along gendered lines, with men tending to report valuing agency more (and communion less) than women do. Importantly, these gendered value sets reliably predict men and women’s gravitation toward careers they perceive as in line with their identity (Schmader & Sedikides, 2018). Understanding the childhood emergence of gender differences in communal and agentic values may therefore inform our understanding of widespread gender segregation in the workplace (Cortes & Pan, 2018).
In this talk, we discuss evidence from three studies that early gender differences in values are meaningful and guide children’s aspirations for adulthood. In addition, we present novel findings that children’s internalization of values are linked to gender stereotypes. This cycle of stereotyping and internalization may then trap boys within career trajectories perceived as affording more agentic values (such as STEM) and girls within paths ascribed more communal values (such as healthcare, early education, and domestic paths; HEED).

Authors

• Katharina Block, New York University

• Antonya Gonzalez, Western Washington University

• Toni Schmader

• Andrei Cimpian, New York University

• Andrew Scott Baron, The University of British Columbia