Paper 3: Gender

Question 1

Outline gender schema theory

Answer 1

Gender schema develops based on stereotypes - develops gender script - child pays more attention to gender appropriate behaviours
(consistent with schema)

Question 2

What is a gender schema and what age does it develop?

Answer 2

Age 2-3, internal mental representation of the world which is used to make sense of experience

Question 3

If gender schema and script is inconsistent to information in front of child, what happens?

Answer 3

Failure to encode that information - child rejects the information to protect self esteem

Question 4

What did Martin and Halverson find?

Answer 4

Gender inconsistent photos distorted memory (if remembered)

Question 5

Evaluate Martin and Halverson’s research

Answer 5

Supports gender schema theory but there is researcher bias because they created the theory. The age of the child was 5-6 but gender schema develops age 2-3, however, there would be practical issues when conducting research on 2-3 yr olds. Standardised instructions but low temporal validity