Cognitive Explanation: Kohlberg's Theory

Question 1

Belief of cognitive explanation on gender development:

Answer 1

A child’s mental concept of gender becomes more sophisticated with age

Question 2

What did Kohleberg (1966) suggest?

Answer 2

A child’s understanding of gender develops in three stages

Question 3

What are the three stages?

Answer 3

• Gender Identity
• Gender Stability
• Gender Constance

Question 4

What is Stage 1?

Answer 4

Gender Identity

Question 5

What age does stage 1 occur?

Answer 5

2-3 years

Question 6

Define Gender Identity:

Answer 6

• Sex can change
• Label themselves ‘girl’ or ‘boy’ like their name
• Gender labels changes when appearances changes
• Believe that gender changes over time and situation

Question 7

What is stage 2?

Answer 7

Gender stability

Question 8

What age does stage 2 occur?

Answer 8

3-4

Question 9

Define Gender stability:

Answer 9

• Recognise gender is consistent over time (Egocentric does not realise this applies to others)
• See certain characteristics as being fem or masc
• E.g someone doing heavy labour must be a man
• Boys=men
• Girls=women

Question 10

What is stage 3?

Answer 10

Gender Constancy

Question 11

What age does stage 3 occur?

Answer 11

6-7

Question 12

Define gender constancy:

Answer 12

• Gender is fixed across time and situation despite external appearance changes
• actively seek out role models to imitate
• Realise that a female with short hair and doing a ‘masculine’ job is still female

Question 13

Why is cognitive view similar to social learning theory?

Answer 13

-Gender appropriate role models to identify with and imitate

Question 14

Why is cognitive view different to social leaning theory?

Answer 14

• SLT believes that this process can occur at any age

- Cognitive believes that this can only occur after stage two in order to confirm their concepts

Question 15

Method of Marcus & Overton (1978)

Answer 15

• Flip book, children were shown ‘muddled’ pictures where hairstyles and clothes of a male and female character could be changed.
• The children were then asked what sex they thought the character was.

Question 16

Findings of Marcus & Overton (1978):

Answer 16

• Younger children believed that changing clothes changes gender
• Older children understood gender constancy

Question 17

Aim of Slaby and Frey (1975):

Answer 17

Development of children’s understanding of gender in relation to the attention they give to the same-sex models

Question 18

Method of Slaby and Frey (1975):

Answer 18

• Age of 2-5 , divided into high and low gender constancy groups, shown a silent film
• 2 adult models, one male and one female carrying out the same task, screen was split
• Children watched both films at the same time and eye movement and direction of gaze were recorded to assess which film they looked at most.

Question 19

Findings of Slaby and Frey (1975):

Answer 19

Children with higher levels of gender constancy spent more time watching sex-appropriate model

Question 20

Does Slaby and Frey (1975) research support Kohlberg’s theory?

Answer 20

Yes

Question 21

Findings of Bussey and Bandura (1992):

Answer 21

Children as young as four reported ‘feeling good’ when playing with gender-appropriate toys

Question 22

Does Bussey and Bandura (1992) support Kohlberg’s theory?

Answer 22

No, supports gender-schema theory

Question 23

What are the methodological issues with Kohlberg’s theory?

Answer 23

• Used interviews with children who were very young

- The questions were tailored but not necessarily understood nor have the ability to express understanding

Question 24

Does Kohlberg’s theory support the biological approach?

Answer 24

Yes, stages occur due to the biological development of the brain and cognitive and intellectual capacity with age

Question 25

Is it possible that Kohlberg’s theory is universal?

Answer 25

Yes (Munro et al showed cross-cultural findings of these three stages)

Question 26

Limitation of Kohlberg’s Theory:

Answer 26

Description rather than explanation