Gender Constancy

Gender constancy refers to the understanding that gender is a stable characteristic
that cannot change over time and that is not altered by superficial
physical transformations such as wearing a dress or cutting one’s hair. As
children come to see gender as a stable, important characteristic of themselves
and other people, they begin to use the concept consistently to organize
social information. They learn societal expectations for members of
each gender by watching the actions of the people around them.
Kohlberg proposed that children use their developing knowledge of cultural
gender expectations to teach themselves to adopt culturally defined
gender roles (self-socialization). He argued that children acquire a strong
motive to conformto gender roles because of their need for self-consistency
and self-esteem. A young boy says to himself, “I am a boy, not a girl; I want to
do boy things, play with boy toys, and wear boy clothes.”
Children hold more rigid gender stereotypes before they acquire gender
constancy (ages two through seven); once gender constancy is achieved,
they become more flexible in their adherence to gender roles. As childrenenter adolescence, their thinking about the world again enters a new stage
of development, becoming even more complex and less rigid. As a result,
they may be able to achieve what Joseph Pleck has called “sex-role transcendence”
and to choose their interests and behaviors somewhat independent
of cultural gender-role expectations.