The Gendered Social Construction of Intelligence in Early Adolescence

• In Event: 4340 - Children, Youth and Institutions

Abstract

Although kindergarten through college students perceive boys as more intelligent than girls, few sociological studies have theorized the effect of school processes on students’ gender status beliefs. Drawing on 2.5 years of longitudinal ethnography and 196 interviews conducted at a racially-diverse middle school, this article demonstrates how educators’ differential regulation of boys’ rule-breaking by course level produced gender differences in students’ perceptions of intelligence. In higher-level courses – where affluent, White, and Asian American students were overrepresented – educators tolerated sixth-grade boys’ interruptions. Boys learned to challenge girls’ opinions and monopolize classroom conversations, such that eighth-graders perceived boys as more intelligent than girls. However, in lower-level courses – where non-affluent, Latinx students were overrepresented – educators penalized sixth-grade boys’ repeated interruptions. Boys gradually disengaged from classroom conversations, such that eighth-graders perceived girls as more intelligent than boys. This article also demonstrates how race intersected with gender when shaping educators’ responses to boys’ rule-breaking by course level, with students learning to associate the most superlatives to affluent, White boys’ intelligence. Through this analysis, my findings contribute to gender and education research by demonstrating how school processes can naturalize the gendered social construction of intelligence in early adolescence.

Author

• Michela Musto, Stanford University