Major psychological differences between the sexes. Golovneva I.V. Psychology of family relations - file n1.doc. Questions for seminars
54. Psychology of gender differences
In domestic psychology, until the 80s of the 20th century, the problem was not posed. Kohn was the first to declare: "Psychology is asexual," because sexual dimorphism is not considered. Many techniques are overtly masculine in nature. Not much has changed since then. They began to study gender differences, but this did not affect the fundamental foundations of the psychology of personality, the psychology of work.
Interest in the psychology of sex differences in science arose in the early 20th century. At the beginning, the psychology of p.r. was determined by necessity to prove that one sex is better/worse than the other. But reverse works also appeared, i.e. gender equality. By the 20s, it became irrelevant. Now sex differences are being explored with something else.
There are preconditions for rivalry between men and women. The "war of the sexes" reached its peak in the first third of the 20th century - the feminist movement and the anti-feminist one.
1st wave feminism is quite an aggressive movement
2nd wave feminism is less aggressive. Not so much the protection of rights as equality in psychological terms ( equal rights at home, at home, at work). Relationships in the family are a mainstream principle - both men and women should be equally involved in household chores. But many women have become housewives (even with higher education) - they do not want to work. What were they fighting for?
Many women defend positions - "school at home" - children study at home.
3rd wave feminism is the struggle to protect the equality of both plov. The sexes are equal, recognition of the primacy of individuality over gender. Society needs to be prepared for this.
Now society makes very high demands on men.
Understanding sex, gender .
1. the first understanding of gender is a different understanding of the word "gender", but this tz. not relevant.
2. it's a social gender. These are the demands that society makes on men and women and the response to these demands.
3. Everyday scientific understanding of gender is gender research. Gender education is training in accordance with gender consciousness.
4. Gender-feminist - mostly women are engaged in gender differences.
5. Signs: 1-4 wrong - we can only talk about gender differences in certain studies. These gender studies are carried out in 2 stages:
a) Sandra Bem's method - is aimed at identifying the proportions of the presence of feminine and masculine qualities in a person.
b) on the basis of this technique, some groups were identified - a comparative analysis.
Theories of the formation of gender identity.
Geodakyan's theory- many phenomena in nature and society are built on the same principle. There is a center and a periphery. The human race is built the same way. A center that a woman performs. The periphery is a man. He reveals everything. In traditional cultures, a man represents the family in external contacts - he is more vulnerable, less healthy. And a woman should keep => she is given more time to live. The female gender is yesterday's masculine, and the masculine is tomorrow's feminine.
Identification theory. In the study of neuroses, Freud discovered a fact - early childhood experiences (Oedipus complex, Electra complex). The boy, falling in love with his mother, is forced to take on the traits of his father. And the girls too.
Then industry developed rapidly => workers were needed. There were no conditions for the traditional functioning of male and female roles.
1. Family. The woman has to work. The man is under the pressure of the woman.
2. Work. A woman has become more risky, a man is hindered by collective responsibility.
Inevitably, traditional stereotypes are changing.
1) traditional features are intertwined with modern ones
2) greater consideration of the female point of view
3) the diversity of individual differences is taken into account more than before.
Scheme of the formation of gender identity (Kon).
It starts from the moment of fertilization. Until the 4th week of intrauterine development, the embryo does not differentiate by sex. Further - he receives a hormonal signal (boy) or does not receive (girl) - internal morphological sex. Then the external morphological sex - the external genitalia. Then social factors act (midwife - writes down the passport gender). Before birth, parents prepare for the birth of a boy - a girl.
A powerful factor in the formation of sex is the society of peers. There are opinions that the child in the younger school age you have to grow up in a same-sex environment, but Cohn says that both sexes are important, children learn from their peers to interact with the opposite sex. For boys and girls, the standards of masculinity and femininity are stricter than for men and women, because. in adulthood, they will simply not be adaptive. It is necessary that adults have a combination: androgynous (mixed), mixed (does not know who), feminine; masculine.
Comparison of men and women
In the 20th century, scientists were interested in the question of how much men and women are superior to each other in different types activities.
Hairdressers, designers, playwrights are better than men, but they do worse at school. Hypotheses: boys mature later; girls with an accommodating character impress the teacher more - verbalism develops better; disappearing giftedness of girls (men are encouraged, women are inhibited).
1. Women start careers late.
2. Women are more affected by political and economic changes.
3. Women tend to underestimate friendly solidarity.
4. Overestimate growth and cultural self-improvement
5. Women spend a lot of energy on the fact that they are no worse than men.
6. Role conflict
7. Touchy, sensitive, highly responsive to criticism.
8. Overestimate the importance of personal contacts at work.
Comparison by individual abilities.
A) Verbal - women - the speed of mastering speech - understands written speech better, speaks more clearly about their feelings.
B) Spatial abilities - a man drives a car more successfully, explains the road better, etc.)
C) Mathematical ability - differences in mathematical logic, not in counting.
Women have more developed fine motor skills, the ability to secret activities, organizing documents, storing and transmitting information.
Is there a psychological difference between the sexes?
In my opinion, this is a very topical issue, especially in our time, when relations between the sexes are changing, and, accordingly, the position of a person in society, his social role and status is changing. The psychological differences between men and women are of interest to me primarily because they remain poorly understood to this day. When studying the process of sexual differentiation, three circles of questions arise at once:
1. What psychological differences between the sexes have been established strictly scientifically, in contrast to the current opinions and stereotypes of the mass consciousness?
2. What is the degree of these differences, how rigidly are male and female qualities distinguished?
3. What is the nature of these differences, are they universally biological or do they reflect historically transient forms of sexual division there?
AT ordinary consciousness the opinion was firmly established that men and women differ significantly from each other not only in physical and physiological characteristics, but also in psychological properties, personality traits and behavioral characteristics. The idea that the male image is a set of traits associated with competence and rational abilities, activity and efficiency has become too familiar. A typical female image, on the contrary, includes such features as emotional support, warmth of feelings, it is focused on social and communication skills. These stereotypes are allegedly supported by authority psychological science, although the vast majority of ordinary people do not know the results of comparing the psychological characteristics between men and women. Psychologists have been conducting research for more than a decade to find out what psychological differences between the sexes are established strictly scientifically, in contrast to conventional wisdom and stereotypes of mass consciousness.
The opinion of the majority on the account of the psychological differences between the sexes is based solely on misconceptions, "walking opinions" and "generally accepted" postulates, and not on proven facts, scientific experiments, and studies. The so-called "female logic" has long come into use and is not even refuted by women, not to mention the "strong sex". But "female logic" does not exist in nature! Logic is present in the thinking of both sexes and no one has canceled it, but the term “female logic” was introduced as an oxymoron, an incompatible combination, in order to emphasize the unpredictability of a woman, the chaotic and even senselessness of her behavior, opposing a man who is the personification of logic, order and sanity. I apologize for feminism. A woman is a mystery, but by no means a creature whose behavior does not obey any laws of logic! Men, on the other hand, have developed this topic so much, having composed many anecdotes and jokes, that a woman has to put up with this role and play along with the man.
To prove it, I would like to give an anecdote:
“Two charming blondes, sitting in a cafe, discuss “the inductive processes of a nuclear engine, as well as metamorphoses that occur as a result of an accelerated reaction ...”, build theories, prove various facts to each other, actively argue, and suddenly one of them notices a man entering the cafe: “ quiet! The man is walking!" she screams. The girls are getting better and, giggling cutely, clapping their eyes, they begin to discuss cute shoes from new collection Prada."
In addition to individual, unique logic, other unreasonable properties are attributed to women regarding gender characteristics of perception, learning, memory, intelligence, cognitive style, motivation, self-awareness, temperament, level of activity and emotionality, sociability, dominance, etc. For example, assumptions that girls are "more social" and more suggestible than boys; girls have a lower level of self-esteem; girls cope better with simple, routine tasks, while boys cope with more complex cognitive processes, the mastery of which involves overcoming previously learned reactions, the male cognitive style is more "analytical" than the female; girls are more influenced by heredity, and boys by environment; girls have a poorly developed need for achievement; in girls, auditory perception is more developed, and in boys, visual perception, in themselves, seems unlikely.
Don't you think that all this is evidence of a somewhat disrespectful attitude towards a woman, perceiving her as a "man's friend." After all, a woman is not deprived of natural qualities, and all these conclusions about her inferiority are only the result of the patriarchy that reigned on Earth and continues to dominate to this day the “stronger sex”. The breaking of the traditional system of sexual roles and stereotypes in our society seriously affects the psyche and behavior of men and women. In this regard, the approach to the study of sex differences from the point of view of psychology is changing.
If we consider this issue historically, one cannot fail to notice that the traditional system of differentiation of sex roles and the stereotypes of masculinity associated with them - femininity was distinguished by the following characteristic features: 1) male and female activities and personal qualities differed very sharply and seemed polar; 2) these differences were sanctified by religion or references to nature and were presented as inviolable; 3) male and female functions were not just complementary, but also hierarchical - a woman was assigned a dependent, subordinate role, so that even the ideal image of a woman was constructed from the point of view of male interests. These irreversible and generally progressive social shifts also cause changes in the cultural stereotypes of masculinity-femininity, which have become less distinct and polarized today. Some uncertainty of role expectations (a woman expects a chivalrous attitude from a man in everyday life and at the same time competes with him at work, not without success) causes discomfort and anxiety in many people. Some talk about the danger of feminization of men, others - about the threat of masculinization of women. In fact, there is only a breakdown of the traditional system of sexual roles and the cultural stereotypes corresponding to it.
The ideals of masculinity and femininity today, more than ever, are contradictory. First, traditional features are intertwined with modern ones. Secondly, they take into account the diversity of individual variations much more completely than before. Thirdly, and this is especially important, they reflect not only the male, but also the female point of view. According to the ideal of “eternal femininity”, bourgeois morality of the 19th century, a woman should be gentle, beautiful, soft, affectionate, but at the same time passive and dependent, allowing a man to feel strong and energetic towards her. These qualities are still highly valued today, constituting the core of the male understanding of femininity. But new features also appeared in women's self-consciousness: in order to be on an equal footing with a man, a woman must be smart, energetic, enterprising, that is, possess some properties that previously constituted the monopoly of men (only in principle).
Hence the reorientation of theoretical psychology. Initially, the concepts of masculinity and femininity were constructed strictly dichotomously, alternatively, and any deviation from the norm was perceived as a pathology or a step towards it: a learned woman is a “blue stocking”, etc. Then rigid normativism gave way to the idea of a continuum of masculine-feminine properties. On the basis of this idea, Western psychologists in 1930-1970. designed several special scales for measuring masculinity-femininity of mental abilities, emotions, interests, etc. (Tepman-Miles test, M-F scale MMPI, Gilford Masculinity Scale, etc.). These scales suggest that individuals can, within some norm, differ in the degree of M and F. However, M-F properties at the same time, they seemed to be alternative, mutually exclusive: high M should correlate with low F and vice versa, and for a man, a high M is normative, desirable, and for a woman - F. Soon, however, it turned out that not all mental qualities are polarized into "male" and "female". In addition, different scales (intelligence, emotions, interests, etc.) in principle do not coincide with each other - an individual who has a high M in one indicator can be very feminine in other respects. For example, competitive sports have long been considered masculine. Female athletes generally scored low on traditional measures of femininity, and scholars tended to view their character as more masculine. However, a recent study of a group of Canadian female tennis and handball players and comparing them with male athletes revealed the falsity of this notion. It turned out that these girls perfectly combine a number of masculine qualities (competitiveness, perseverance, uncompromisingness, etc.) with a high level of femininity.
Features of the perception of women and men in terms of ideals are the consequences of the historically established differentiation of male and female social roles, division of labor depending on gender, differences in the content and methods of raising boys and girls, cultural stereotypes of masculinity and femininity. As real social equality of men and women is ensured, the relations of the sexes, based on the subordination of women, lose their former character, their sphere joint activities expands, as a result of which many psychological differences between them, previously considered unshakable, disappear or decrease. The degree and content of gender differences are not the same in different spheres of life. The most significant differences were recorded in the field of psychophysiology (including different rates physical development and maturation). Row psychological features The role of a woman is connected with her specific functions of a mother, which is manifested both in the orientation of interests and in the ratio of social production and family and household functions.
It has been scientifically proven that women have a larger vocabulary, are more open to communication, and women also have much more developed intuition, they tend to calculate every step and “try on situations”. All this is determined by the historically and biologically established role of the woman-mother, the keeper of the hearth.
Since ancient times, the duty of a woman was to raise children, communicate with other members of society, learn new information (after all, men were engaged in hunting and gathering, they had no time for this), but a woman had to make plans, calculate everything and navigate, following the calculations.
The man has long played the role of breadwinner, breadwinner, hunter. He does not have sentimentality and sensitivity, a man must quickly navigate the situation, make decisions instantly (otherwise the tiger will eat him! :)), well represent the area so as not to get lost. It is firmly established that girls are superior to boys in verbal ability; boys stronger girls in visual-spatial abilities; boys have higher mathematical abilities; men are more aggressive. If we are talking about school age, the presence of gender differences in mathematical abilities has not been proven, at the same time, the results obtained on a student sample show that young people perform tasks in general more successfully than girls.
In social behavior, men are characterized by a higher level of development of such traits as aggressiveness and dominance, while women are characterized by friendliness and contact. Men are characterized by a pronounced tendency towards independence, while women are oriented towards interdependence, which in the context of an authoritarian society often transforms into dependence. Women are more socially oriented, they are more aware of the connections that unite people and make their communication more trusting. Men, on the other hand, strive for independence through avoidance of dependence.
Another difference is related to the attitude to the surrounding world. The male attitude is characterized by assertiveness, self-confidence, orientation to control. The female version of the attitude to the outside world is characterized by a focus on maintaining the established types of interactions with people.
The most pronounced differences in the social behavior of men and women relate to aggressive reactions and actions. There is a lot of convincing evidence that men are more aggressive than women. Men are more likely to resort to open physical aggression. For women, various manifestations of indirect aggression are more characteristic. Women consider aggression as a means of expressing anger and relieving stress, men - as a tool, a model of behavior that they resort to to receive social and material rewards.
As for the social roles of men and women, family roles are more significant for women, and professional roles for men. Women's role in the family is more related to the care and care of family members; professional status plays a central role in male self-identification.
So, in numerous studies it has been convincingly proven that even the really existing differences between men and women turn out to be very small and often do not exceed 5% of the maximum possible value. In fact, there are much more similarities between men and women in psychological characteristics than differences.
References:
1. Kletsina I. S. "Gender socialization". Tutorial. SPb., 1998.2. "Glossary of Gender Terms".
3. Craig G. Developmental Psychology. SPb., 2000.
Page 1
In my opinion, this is a very topical issue, especially in our time, when relations between the sexes are changing, and, accordingly, the position of a person in society, his social role and status is changing. The psychological differences between men and women are of interest to me primarily because they remain poorly understood to this day. When studying the process of sexual differentiation, three circles of questions arise at once:
1. What psychological differences between the sexes have been established strictly scientifically, in contrast to the current opinions and stereotypes of the mass consciousness?
2. What is the degree of these differences, how rigidly are male and female qualities distinguished?
3. What is the nature of these differences, are they universally biological or do they reflect historically transient forms of sexual division there?
In everyday consciousness, the opinion is firmly established that men and women differ significantly from each other not only in physical and physiological characteristics, but also in psychological properties, personality traits and behavioral characteristics. The idea that the male image is a set of traits associated with competence and rational abilities, activity and efficiency has become too familiar. A typical female image, on the contrary, includes such features as emotional support, warmth of feelings, it is focused on social and communication skills. These stereotypes are allegedly supported by the authority of psychological science, although the vast majority of ordinary people are not aware of the results of comparing the psychological characteristics between men and women. Psychologists have been conducting research for more than a decade to find out what psychological differences between the sexes are established strictly scientifically, in contrast to conventional wisdom and stereotypes of mass consciousness.
The opinion of the majority on the account of the psychological differences between the sexes is based solely on misconceptions, "walking opinions" and "generally accepted" postulates, and not on proven facts, scientific experiments, and studies. The so-called "female logic" has long come into use and is not even refuted by women, not to mention the "strong sex". But "female logic" does not exist in nature! Logic is present in the thinking of both sexes and no one has canceled it, but the term “female logic” was introduced as an oxymoron, an incompatible combination, in order to emphasize the unpredictability of a woman, the chaotic and even senselessness of her behavior, opposing a man who is the personification of logic, order and sanity. I apologize for feminism. A woman is a mystery, but by no means a creature whose behavior does not obey any laws of logic! Men, on the other hand, have developed this topic so much, having composed many anecdotes and jokes, that a woman has to put up with this role and play along with the man.
To prove it, I would like to give an anecdote:
“Two charming blondes, sitting in a cafe, discuss “the inductive processes of a nuclear engine, as well as metamorphoses that occur as a result of an accelerated reaction ...”, build theories, prove various facts to each other, actively argue, and suddenly one of them notices a man entering the cafe: “ quiet! The man is coming! she screams. The girls are getting better and, giggling cutely, clapping their eyes, they begin to discuss cute shoes from the new Prada collection.
In addition to individual, unique logic, other unreasonable properties are attributed to women regarding gender characteristics of perception, learning, memory, intelligence, cognitive style, motivation, self-awareness, temperament, level of activity and emotionality, sociability, dominance, etc. For example, assumptions that girls are "more social" and more suggestible than boys; girls have a lower level of self-esteem; girls cope better with simple, routine tasks, while boys cope with more complex cognitive processes, the mastery of which involves overcoming previously learned reactions, the male cognitive style is more "analytical" than the female; girls are more influenced by heredity, and boys by environment; girls have a poorly developed need for achievement; in girls, auditory perception is more developed, and in boys, visual perception, in themselves, seems unlikely.
Don't you think that all this is evidence of a somewhat disrespectful attitude towards a woman, perceiving her as a "man's friend." After all, a woman is not deprived of natural qualities, and all these conclusions about her inferiority are only the result of the patriarchy that reigned on Earth and continues to dominate to this day the “stronger sex”. The breaking of the traditional system of sexual roles and stereotypes in our society seriously affects the psyche and behavior of men and women. In this regard, the approach to the study of sex differences from the point of view of psychology is changing.
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The problem of psychological differences between men and women (boys and girls) has long attracted the attention of psychologists. However, systematic studies on this problem are carried out mainly by foreign psychologists. In domestic psychological publications, the empirical data obtained on behavioral and personality differences between boys and girls (men and women) are presented as a completely obvious fact that does not require substantiation and interpretation.
The traditional analysis of gender differences was reduced to demonstrating and proving the characteristic differences between male and female nature, while hushing up the possible similarity of some psychological and behavioral reactions in men and women. Occasionally addressing the problem of sexual differentiation, psychologists limited themselves to ascertaining the "natural" opposition of male and female. Taken in a broader cultural and historical context, the process of formation of sex-role stereotypes consists in the constant emphasis on the hormonal and biological determinants of the female (but not male) social behavior. This position of psychologists is due to the deeply rooted idea that the sign of sex is a mandatory difference not only at the level of manifestations of a person as an individual, but also at such levels as personality, subject of activity, individuality.
Special psychological studies focused on the study of the problem of differences between the sexes have sought and continue to seek answers to the following questions:
1. What psychological differences between the sexes have been established strictly scientifically, in contrast to the current opinions and stereotypes of the mass consciousness?
2. What is the nature of these differences, are they universal biological or do they reflect historically transient forms of the sexual division of labor?
Most often in the psychological literature, the existence of differences between boys and girls (men and women) in intellectual, moral development, achievement motivation, and the sphere of behavioral manifestations is emphasized. Consider the available answers to both questions in each of the four areas personal development: cognitive, motivational, moral and behavioral.
Cognitive sphere
To answer the first question - a description of clearly established psychological differences between the sexes - let's turn to the article by T.N. Vinogradova and V.V. Semenov (1993), which analyzes numerous works of foreign researchers on gender differences in the cognitive sphere. Examination of children different ages showed that in the early stages of ontogenesis (up to about 7 years), girls are ahead of boys in their intellectual development. In the future, these differences are smoothed out, and adult men and women do not differ in average indicators of intellectual development, their IQ is approximately the same. At the same time, according to psychometric studies, the number of men at both ends of the normal distribution curve, built according to the results of measuring the intelligence quotient (IQ), significantly exceeds the number of women. This means that among men there are more mentally retarded individuals, but also more highly gifted. Among the most talented people who have received the recognition of society, as you know, men predominate. Men and women (boys and girls) differ not only in the range of spread of mental abilities. J. Maccoby and C. Jacklin, having analyzed 1600 psychological studies of sex differences available to them, showed that girls have better developed verbal intelligence than boys (women compared to men). Compared to girls (men, compared to women), boys have better developed visual-spatial and mathematical abilities (Maccoby E.E., Jacklin C.N., 1974).
The superiority of women in the development of speech functions begins from childhood. At 18 months, girls know about 50 words, while boys acquire such a vocabulary only by 22 months. And in the future, the speech of girls, as a rule, is richer and more vocabulary, and by grammatical structure; girls also acquire reading skills earlier than boys.
Visual-spatial abilities are the area where men have been leading since childhood. T.L. Hilton in 1985 summarized the results of performance tests on the understanding of spatial relations of a large sample of American high school students ( total number more than 23 thousand subjects.) and found that the boys coped with them much better than the girls. The same author made a comparison with data from a similar study performed 20 years ago: the differences between men and women decreased over this period. This fact can be explained as follows: either the girls' visual-spatial abilities increased significantly, or the experimenters' attitude to find differences in this area decreased.
There is evidence that boys as early as 8-9 years old significantly better girls use visual supports to navigate in space, and even in younger children, differences in understanding of spatial relationships were found. When in the experiment six-year-old children were asked to construct a three-dimensional model of their school room, it turned out that the boys coped with the task much more accurately (Vinogradova T.V., Semenov V.V., 1993).
The most heated discussion among specialists is the question of mathematical abilities. Mathematics has always been considered a male domain, and on tests of mathematical ability, men tend to outperform women. According to psychometric studies, among students elementary school differences in the level of mathematical abilities are not detected, these differences begin to appear in adolescence and concern mainly complex forms of mathematical thinking. Researchers K. Benbow and J. Stanley associate the high achievements of men in mathematics with their innate ability to solve visual-spatial problems better than women.
The second question we were going to answer after describing the psychological sex differences that have received reliable confirmation from research is the question of the nature of these differences. All variants of possible interpretations can be combined into two groups: 1) the influence of biological factors in the differentiation of the cognitive abilities of men and women; 2) the role of socio-psychological factors in the development of cognitive abilities.
The physiological differences between the sexes are so obvious that some researchers have tried to find the biological basis for the observed differences in the cognitive sphere as well. most popular in last years are explanations of sex differences based on hormonal regulation and features of the interhemispheric distribution of functions in men and women.
A number of authors suggest that sex differences in cognitive abilities are associated with the effect of sex hormones on the formation of brain structures either in the prenatal or pubertal period. English psychologist R.L. Woodfield compared the performance of women on spatial ability tests before and after childbirth, i.e. during periods when pronounced hormonal changes are observed. It was found that in those moments when the level of estrogens (female sex hormones) decreased sharply in women, the performance of spatial tests improved markedly.
Along with this, a direction linking gender differences in the cognitive sphere with the functional specialization of the cerebral hemispheres is currently being actively developed. There is evidence that the right hemisphere becomes specialized for spatial perception earlier in boys than in girls. The results of clinical studies and studies of healthy subjects indicate a more pronounced trend towards lateralization of verbal and spatial functions in men and to the bilateral representation of both types of functions in women. "In general, biological interpretations of gender differences in cognitive abilities do not explain the complexity of the available data, although biological data are very significant, especially when it comes to brain lateralization" (Vinogradova T.V., Semenov V.V., 1993. P. 68 ).
Among the socio-psychological factors of differentiation of cognitive abilities, the following can be distinguished:
1) certain traditions and cultural expectations, which are internalized in the process of the child's interaction with the outside world and subsequently influence his motivation, value systems, degree of self-confidence, etc.;
2) the behavior of parents and teachers associated with instilling in children ideas about stereotypical gender roles, about "male" and "female" types of behavior, "male" and "female" professions;
3) explicit and covert discrimination against women that exists in the scientific community and hinders the achievements of women in the scientific field.
The idea that women and the exact sciences are incompatible concepts has firmly established itself in society. After examining a large sample of American graduate students, S. Rallis and her colleagues found that girls, even who successfully completed courses in mathematics and natural sciences are three times less likely to express a desire to work in these areas in the future. K. Benbow got similar results. She reports that of the 2,000 mathematically gifted American students, 63% of boys and 30% of girls choose to major in mathematics, and boys are twice as likely to choose a career as a research scientist.
The reason for this fact is most likely that from an early age girls get used to the idea that mathematics is not their field of activity and that they are unlikely to achieve serious success here. The sphere of scientific activity is traditionally considered a male sphere. Thus, women make up 28% among candidates of sciences, 14% among doctors, and 1% among professors, corresponding members and academicians (Kalabikhina I., 1995). Tutorials and Tools mass media paint an image of science and the scientist that fits much better into a masculinized or patriarchal value system. The image of science and a typical scientist is perceived as the strongest determining factor in choosing a career, but, as can be seen from the experiments, the corresponding image turns out to be unattractive for women. Indeed, women striving to succeed in science face serious challenges: their desire for achievement, preoccupation research work often viewed by others as a loss of femininity or as a way to compensate for failures in personal life (Women in Science, 1989). This situation is typical for almost all countries. Thus, professor of psychology Jill Moravsky writes: “The gender asymmetry of modern society is expressed, in particular, in the marginal position of female scientists, who constantly experience a situation of choice: scientific independence or personal attachments, career or family, prestige or scientific truth, etc. The marginal position (both in science and in society) deprives a woman of scientific courage and the formulation of hypotheses, hinders the education of followers and the creation of scientific schools" (Morawski J.G., 1990).
Thus, numerous studies of the abilities of men and women in the cognitive sphere show that, in comparison with the universal biological, sociocultural determination of differences plays a more significant role.
Motivational sphere
Studies of the characteristics of men and women in the field of motivation mainly concerned the study of achievement motivation. In 1972, psychologist Martina Horner proposed the concept of "Fear of Success". Empirical studies have shown that boys are characterized by the dominant type of motivation - orientation to success, girls have the dominant motivation - avoidance of failure. Women and girls are characterized by the phenomenon of "fear of success". They do not want to acquire a profession and master areas of activity dominated by men. Achieving success in these areas is identified with activity and masculinity, and girls worry that they will be considered less feminine, i.e. they are afraid social consequences success.
In a study by D. Spence and R. Helmreich, the achievement motive in men and women was studied in three areas: improvement, competition, and achievement of results. On the student sample, it was found that women have a higher motivation to achieve results, and men have a higher motivation for improvement and competition. In other groups of subjects (athletes, businessmen, psychologists), the differences between men and women in terms of motivation for achieving results and improvement decreased, but in terms of competitiveness, the differences remained statistically significant, in men the motive for competition is significantly higher than in women (Deaus K., 1985).
Differences between men and women in the motivational sphere have a socio-cultural determination.
Sphere of morality
The idea that virtue is somehow related to gender, that the standards and criteria of morality are different for women and men, has been central to the ethical thinking of many Western philosophers. AT late XIX- the beginning of the 20th century and Western countries on this issue, the following opinions were established: female virtues that men lack are sympathy, compassion, benevolence, modesty; but they are also a consequence of the fact that women do not have male rationality, the ability to act on the basis of principles. Women were often considered incapable of objective or universal judgment, of rational action. They were thought to be more dependent on particulars and more likely than men to give in to emotions. Such judgments were based on the opinion that there are systemic differences between male and female personalities in the structure of the male and female psyche (Grimshaw D., 1993).
The starting point of K. Gilligan's work "In a different voice: the theory of psychology and development of women" was the analysis of Lawrence Kohlberg's research on the development of moral ideas in children. Just as Jean Piaget tried to define the levels cognitive development children, L. Kolberg made an attempt to identify the stages of the moral development of children based on their answers to questions about how to resolve a moral dilemma. The highest stage was recognized, at which, when solving moral dilemmas, there was an appeal to previously learned rules and principles of morality through a logical choice of priorities. K. Gilligan analyzes L. Kohlberg's method in detail using an example when he analyzes cases with two eleven-year-old children - Jack and Amy. Jack and Amy were asked to solve the following dilemma. A man named Heinz has a wife who dies but has no money to buy medicine for her. Should he steal the drugs to save his wife's life? It is clear to Jack that Heinz must steal the drugs; his answer revolves around rules protecting life and property. During the conversation, he described the dilemma as " math problem with people" as a problem that can be solved by developing logical priorities for some rules. Amy's answer was very different. Heinz, in her opinion, should go and talk to the druggist to try to find a solution to this problem "we. For Amy," Gilligan argues, the actors in this sketch are not so much opponents in a contest of rights, but members of a network of relationships on which they depend to continue. If Jack thinks a situation needs to be intervened through a system of logic or law, then Amy sees the need in intervention through communication in relationships (Grimshaw D., 1993).
Based on the stereotypical idea that the process of reasoning in women is more primitive than in men, L. Kolberg is sure that at the same age boys are at a higher level of moral development compared to girls. K. Gilligan agrees that men and women think differently about morality, but does not agree with L. Kohlberg's statement that the level of moral development of women is lower than that of men.
As K. Dow emphasizes, opposite principles of moral development are used in relation to children of different sexes in the process of socialization. For boys, the principle of individualization is used (the emphasis is on separating the child from adults), and for the upbringing of the girl, the principle of cooperation is used: the emphasis is on affection and care for others (Deaux K., 1985). This further determines the features of the moral development of children at an older age.
Answering the question about the determinants of gender differences in the sphere of moral development, we can conclude that in this case there is a socio-cultural determination of differences.
Sphere of conduct
In the field of behavioral manifestations, gender differences in manifestations of aggression, conformity and empathy are most often emphasized.
Aggression. In a study of neo-behavioral direction (A. Bandura, A. Biller), boys were found to be more aggressive than girls, but the authors explained this by different socially approved behaviors.
E. Maccoby and C. Jacklin considered aggression the only type of social behavior where gender differences are clearly manifested. Based on cultural and interspecies studies (aggressivity in male animals is higher than in females), they argued that sex differences in aggression are biologically determined (Maccoby E.E., Jacklin C.N., 1974).
Already three years after the publication of their book, A. Frodi and his collaborators rejected the opinion that sex differences in aggressiveness are biologically determined. Women, according to them, are no less aggressive than men if they regard their actions as fair or free from responsibility for them. The guilt inherent in women often leads to the suppression of aggressiveness where men do not hide it. Not without reason is the remark that aggressiveness is traditionally attributed to men, is a source of their pride and therefore is much more often mentioned in self-reports, while women tend to remain silent about it.
In general, they believe, it is more correct to speak not about gender differences in aggressiveness, but about gender differences in its determination in different situations (Kagan V.E., 1991).
T. Tiger analyzed 94 studies and determined that in 52 of them a predominance of aggressiveness in males was revealed, in 5 in females, and in 37 no differences were found at all. Therefore, he concluded, the conclusions about the biological conditionality of gender differences in aggressiveness are unreliable.
E. Maccoby and K. Jacklin conducted additional research in 1980, which allowed them to defend their opinion expressed earlier. They referred to the data that boys are already more aggressive than girls at the age of 3-5, and since socialization at this age is not yet completed, the differences should be considered congenital (Deaux K., 1985).
All of the above is an illustration of the complexity of the issue of the psychology of sex differences. The problem also lies in the fact that the concept of "aggression" does not have a more or less clear and unambiguous definition. Many contradictions can be removed, distinguish styles aggressive behavior and talk about instrumental aggression; a quantitative criterion for describing sex differences in aggressiveness can hardly be considered adequate.
conformity. A lot of studies have been carried out, in which data have been obtained that girls, unlike boys, are more dependent and fearful. So, for example, in B. Fagot's study, facts were obtained confirming that girls are more shy, unsure of their abilities, more emotional and conformal than boys. They are more easily frustrated, less active, and therefore do not seek leadership. B. Fagot found that among children of the second year of life, girls are three times more likely to ask for help from their parents than boys, and parents are more positive about their requests than the requests of boys (Kon I.S., 1988).
E. Maccoby and K. Jacklin note that no stereotype of gender-role behavior is as strong as the stereotype that women are dependent. This feature in early childhood It is typical for children of both sexes, but it is mainly fixed in the behavior of girls and becomes a stable personality trait, as it is supported by the social expectations of the people around and, first of all, by parents (Maccoby E.E., Jacklin C.N., 1974).
The American researcher of the psychology of sex differences K. Dow, analyzing the data on the higher conformity of women compared to men obtained in the Eccles study, makes a reasonable assumption: the conformity of women is higher because their status in society is lower than the status of men. In general, she emphasizes that the gender factor explains only 1% of differences in people's behavior (Deaux K., 1985).
Researchers of gender differences in conformity have no doubts that in this case the differences have a sociocultural determination.
Empathy. Empathic ability, with a variety of methodological approaches to its study, starting from the first days of life, it is more pronounced in females. N. Eisenberg-Berg and P. Massen believe that the characteristics of socialization affect the development of empathy only in boys. But P. Blank and colleagues found that with age, the superiority of girls (women) increases in relation to arbitrary non-verbal signals (for example, a controlled facial expression) and decreases in relation to involuntary ones (tone, gestures). In the course of development, they believe, women realize that too good "reading" of involuntary communicative signals is too obliging, and therefore "unprofitable" (Kagan V.E., 1991). Thus, there is a tendency for gender differences in empathy to level out as they grow older: boys learn si, and girls wean. But the differences are not completely eliminated. So, in the work of K. Deaux (1985) it is indicated that women encode and decode better non-verbal signals. In a study conducted by M.L. Butovskaya (1997), it was revealed that the behavior of girls is characterized by less aggressiveness, a greater propensity for emotional empathy, and a greater concentration of attention on others.
Researchers of empathy have not come to a more or less agreed opinion regarding the determination of this psychological characteristic. A number of studies confirm biological, a number - socio-cultural determination.
Thus, the analysis of works devoted to the study of the problem of the psychology of sex differences shows that many differences between the sexes, which until now were considered "constant" (for example, the level of intellectual abilities and moral development), have not been confirmed in repeated studies. Some researchers came to this conclusion, proving the fallacy or inadequacy of the experimental methods used and the arbitrariness of the interpretation of the data obtained. Others have tried to comprehend sexual differentiation as a social process. Psychologists of this direction sought to show how the cultural and historical specificity of the perception and interpretation of gender differences forms stable stereotypes of masculinity-femininity, supported by the authority of psychological science. These representatives of psychological science played a more significant role in the overthrow of orthodox postulates about the psychology of sex differences.
The problem of the psychology of sex differences will probably attract researchers for a long time to come. It seems that it may be more productive in this direction not to search for new differences between men and women, but to focus on the facts of similarities in their personality and behavioral manifestations. Such an approach will contribute to the reconstruction of orthodox ideas about the phenomenon of sex as a determinant of social role and psychological behavior.
Gender psychology is an absolutely new direction in the system of social sciences and humanities, it is just beginning its first steps and is declaring itself as an independent science in the field of psychological knowledge. Gender psychology is responsible for the behavior of people depending on whether they belong to the male or female sex. She studies phenomena such as self-esteem, socialization, prejudice, discrimination, self-perception and the emergence of different social norms and roles. The basis of gender psychology is the psychosocial development of the personality and the psychology of sex, it is these aspects that determine the structure of the doctrine.
gender sociology deals mainly with the sexual development of girls and boys, and the adequacy of their performance of sexual roles. The bulk scientific works in gender psychology does not study the sexes, the nature of sex differences and the assessment of psychological diversity between the sexes.
Initially, the concept of "sex" was intended to refer to physiological features of a person (male or female), the sex of a person was considered the foundation and prevailed in determining the social and psychological differences between men and women.
As a rule, men are characterized by increased ambition, rationality and independence, while women are considered more sensual, tender, emotional and sociable. Such ideas about women and men are very common in our culture. Gender psychology based on the latest scientific research claims that there are more similarities between women and men than differences. The only clear distinction between the sexes lies in their role of reproduction. Today, physical differences between the sexes are very vague, since muscularity and endurance are no longer a priority for the male population of the planet. For example, Southeast Asian men are much shorter than European women.
In addition to physiological divisions between people, there is a division of their forms of activity, social roles, differences in behavior and temperament. Very often, the biological sex does not quite correspond to the emotional characteristics, and sometimes it is the complete opposite. This is where the concept of "gender psychology" comes from - that is, the science that studies the totality of cultural and social norms that are considered a privilege of one sex or another. Ultimately, it is not the biological sex of a person that determines his type of activity and behavior pattern, but sociocultural norms affect the psychological characteristics of men and women. Being a woman or a man in society does not mean having certain anatomical features structure of the body, this means scrupulously fulfilling the prescribed by society gender roles.
Unlike psychology, psychology does not simply study men and women. In the center of her attention, first of all, the results caused by the phenomena of sexual stratification and differentiation. Gender psychology primarily focuses on the hierarchy of statuses, roles, positions of women and men, while the problem of discrimination and gender inequality is actively discussed. Gender psychology, like gender linguistics, unlike the psychology of sex, is characterized by different theoretical and methodological foundations. For example, for gender psychology, the basis is the social constructivist paradigm, while for the psychology of sex, the biodeterminist paradigm is considered the basis.