Poster #199 - "You're not a boy or a girl": Children's Predictions About Perceptually Gender Ambiguous People

• In Event: 1-061 - Poster Session 02
  In Poster Session: PS 02 Section - Social Cognition

Integrative Statement

Children make gender category-based assumptions (e.g., that a boy with girl-like physical appearance shares properties with other boys, despite appearance; Gelman, Collman, & Maccoby, 1986). However, people perceived as gender ambiguous lack category-specific information, rendering category-based assumptions ineffective. We investigated how children reason about perceptually gender ambiguous people. Children were asked if a gender ambiguous person preferred the same novel activities as someone with appearance (i.e., gender ambiguous) or conceptual (i.e., traits and activities) similarities. Traits were expected to be particularly potent given that even 3-year-olds prioritize trait over appearance information when inferring another's preferences (Heyman & Gelman, 2000). In contrast to traits, we expected that activity-based assumptions would not be prioritized over appearance to the same extent. Indeed, research indicates that 5-year-olds prioritize gender category over activity information when inferring another's preferences (Martin, 1989). Also, gender ambiguity was either labeled or replaced with non-gender information. Labeling was expected to elicit more appearance matches, as labeling leads children to assume shared properties (Gelman et al., 1986). Forty-two 5- and 6-year-olds (24 5-year-olds and 18 6-year-olds) were given two labeled (gender information) or unlabeled (non-gender information) vignettes. Each included a gender ambiguous target, a gender ambiguous character, and a character of gender-stereotypical appearance matched to the participant's gender. The target and gender-stereotypical character shared trait or activity (i.e., occupation) similarities. Participants were asked if the target preferred the same novel activities as the gender-stereotypical character (conceptual match) or gender ambiguous character (appearance match). Participants received a score of 0 (appearance match) or 1 (conceptual match). A 2 (labeling: unlabeled vs. labeled) x 2 (information type: trait vs. occupation) x 2 (age: 5-year-olds vs. 6-year-olds) mixed ANOVA revealed a significant interaction between labeling and age, F(1, 38) = 4.542, p = .040, ηp2 = .107. Six-year-olds in the unlabeled condition (M = 1.5, SD = .71) made significantly more conceptual matches than those in the labeled condition (M = .62, SD = .74), but there was no significant difference in conceptual matches made by 5-year-olds between conditions (unlabeled: M = 1.0, SD = .63; labeled: M = 1.1, SD = .76). A main effect of story type was also found: there were more conceptual matches in the occupation story (M = .659, SD = .480) than in the trait story (M = .415, SD = .499), F(1, 38) = 4.163, p = .048, ηp2 = .099. For 6-year-olds, gender information elicited appearance matches and non-gender information elicited conceptual matches. Gender information might have entailed categorization and shared property assumptions between the ambiguous characters, in line with previous research (Gelman et al., 1986). Despite gender information, 5-year-olds matched at chance, suggesting appearance was not more powerful than conceptual information as a source of inference. Despite expectation, more conceptual matches were made in the occupation story than the trait story. Perhaps occupations entailing activity were more comparable to subsequent novel activity inferences than traits entailing personality. Overall, beliefs about gender ambiguity appear dependent on age and the specific social information provided.

Authors

• Andrea C Yuly, University of North Carolina - Greensboro
  Presenting Author

• Janet J Boseovski, University of North Carolina - Greensboro
  Non-Presenting Author

• Kestyn Harris, University of North Carolina - Greensboro
  Non-Presenting Author