Are gender and sex the same thing? Explain why or why not? Gender refers to the socially constructed roles, behaviors, activities,and attributes that a given society considers appropriate for men and for women. Sex refers to the biological and physiological characteristics that define men and women such as breasts, testicales, menstration, hormones , and men normally have a higher amount of bone mass. Gender is put into “masculine” and “feminine” categories while sex is put into “male” and “female”categories.
That is, men and women, as well as boys and girls, are more alike than they are different” (Hyde, 2005, p. 581). To prove her hypothesis she focused on specific categories for possible similarities such as, cognitive variables, nonverbal and verbal communication, social and personality variables, psychological well-being, motor behaviors, and moral reasoning. My opinion of gender, prior to reading the article, men and women are far more different than others tend to want to believe. Women tend to be more driven by their emotions whereas men are driven more on their skills to problem solve and physical capabilities. That is not to say that there is not a sense of equality, but based on my personal observations a female has the tendency to be more capable of carrying out and following through with tasks more than a man.
This difference in structure deployed by the authors could represent the different manners in which opposite genders will refer to love in, with the female character in Les Grands Seigneurs being composed and polite in her acknowledgement of the importance of males in her life. This completely juxtaposes the
The Case for Girls In Anya Kamenetz’s The Case for Girls, she identifies the increase of male to female ratio, and tries to show that we can change society’s view of a preference for males over females. She tries to inform and persuade the reader on why sex-preference is a step back for society. Kamenetz sees this as an opportunity in some way to help influence the people of the world that men and women are equal and capable of the same things. She believes that if the advertisements can work nation-wide, they can also work at a global level as well. Kamenetz uses pathos, ethos, and logos to show that if we invest the time and money, we can change society’s view of the preference for baby boys over baby girls on a global, rather than just a national level.
men and women also show differences in reproductive behaviours. It has been suggested than males are more likely to have one night stands and short term sexual relationships than women as there are fewer costs for males, this suggestion was showed by Hatfield’s
Evolutionary psychologists that me have enmvolved to be responsive to females who are young and attractive since these are ohysical cues to a womens reproductive value wheres women seek indicators of socio-economic stautus. This idea is supported by Buss (1989) he conducted a cross-cultural study (37 different cultures) and more than 10,000 adults investigating mating prefances . The study was in the form of a questionnaire/survey. Buss found consistent gender differnances across cultures. It found males were interested in youth and baety while females looked for wealt,staus and maturity.
Intersexual selection refers to the fact that members of each sex have innate preferences for mates with certain characteristics. The preferences of one sex determine the areas in which the other sex must compete. These indicators reveal characteristics which could be passed on to offspring or which could give protection & support to the offspring. For example, if females prefer tall men, over time there would be an increase in the number of tall males in the population Buss aimed to test the hypothesis that the factors affecting mate choice in men and women are consistent across a range of cultures. Buss explored what males & females look for in a marriage partner.
Men are more inclined to be goal -oriented using assertive strategies to establish power and status. On the other spectrum, females are thought of as more sensitive, in touch with their own and other’s feelings, supportive, inclusive, and inferior when interacting with males. In “Sex, Lies and Conversation,” Deborah Tannen breaks down why couples tend to have communication issues. A shared issue women commonly face is the feeling that,”…intimacy is the fabric of
Differences in cognition between men and women are highly influenced by their roles in the society and culture they belong to. For example, in a society where women are defined by their male partner and depend on him economically, it is likely that they will depend on them mentally as well and will be more prone to develop depression when losing them than the other way around. Although there are biological explanations to the reason why females tend to be more prone to depression (hormonal changes in puberty, menopause or the premenstrual period, for example), I do not believe depression could be evoked solely by hormonal changes (because otherwise depression would be even more common among females) without the participation of environmental factors in addition. Another reason why I believe socio- cultural explanations are more relevant when explaining gender differences in prevalence of depression is because these
Early research did support this hypothesis. Goldwyn cites the case of Mrs DW, who had androgen insensitivity syndrome, but was brought up as a woman. When informed that she was biologically male, she felt that she was a woman and elected to remain that way. This shows that social factors strongly influence our gender identity; more so perhaps, than our biology. This therefore supports Money’s hypothesis that social factors determine gender identity.