Gender Stereotypes and Children
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This study sought to determine the existence of the relationship between gender stereotypes in children's books and children's perceptions of gender. The exploration of this topic involved a qualitative review of 15 research articles that addressed this topic from multiple perspectives. Several research studies that focused on measuring the gender representations in children's books were based on the premise that the presence of gender stereotypes in books automatically translates into children's gender stereotypical perceptions. However, the remaining research studies suggested that children's gender perceptions played a stronger role in shaping their interpretations of gender issues in books, rather than vice versa. In fact, multiple factors such as gender orientation, socialization, gender bias in the classrooms and the role of teachers in providing guidance in the interpretation of books, were shown to play even more important roles in shaping children's gender perceptions. Therefore, the relationship between gender stereotypes in children's books and children's perceptions of gender is not a direct one; it is also likely to be complex (involving the interaction of multiple variables) and bidirectional. In spite of the fact that many children's books immersd children in fantastical and imaginary worlds, they often transmit values and social norms of the real world. One of these social norms is gender roles. According to Tepper and Cassi
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velopment of sexual identities often coincided with their interest in reading picture books. However, these research studies, in of themselves, did not prove that the presence of gender stereotypes automatically translates into sterdotypical gender perceptions on the part of children.
Research Studies that Examined how Children's Gender Perceptions are Shaped by Gender Stereotypes in Books
The weaknesses of the previous research studies are addressed by this category of research studies that studied how children's interaction with language and books affect their gender perceptions. To study this phenomenon, educators and researchers in these research studies adopted diverse methods – each of which will be explained in the subsequent paragraphs.
The impact of gender stereotyping language on children's gender perceptions was studied by Liben, Bigler and Krogh (2002) who asked children to offer their gender perceptions about various types of occupations with a question such as this: Could a man, a woman, or both perform a particular occupation? The effects of language on the children's gender perceptions were investigated by introducing linguistically marked job titles. While a linguistically unmarked job title would be "
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Approximate Word count = 4320
Approximate Pages = 17 (250 words per page)
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