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Gender Stereotyping In The Film The Mask You Live In

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A. Gender typing in early childhood is how people think each sex should act. Through cultural stereotypes and norms, children begin to associate different characteristics and activities with one sex or the other. As soon as children begin to understand gender categories they start to assign objects, roles, and traits towards a particular sex. Girls play with dolls and make-up and tend to spend more time with art or playing house, while boys have trucks, fake guns, or racecars and they want to play rough outside with other boys. Girls like pink and soft things; boys like blue and are tough. Girls are too emotional, while boys are too impulsive and aggressive. These are the common gender-stereotyped beliefs that children start to adhere to as soon as they begin to understand that there are differences in sexes. The gender schema theory is a combination of the social learning theory and cognitive-development theory that emphasizes how both environment and a child’s cognition influence children’s gender-role development. This theory falls under the information-processing method. The theory says that children learn “gender specific” behaviors from the people and influencers around them. They categorize these experiences into gender schemas, what is masculine and what is feminine, …show more content…

Gender stereotypes can be dangerous for individuals. It forces people to adhere to norms that may or may not reflect who they actually are. In the film, “The Mask You Live In”, it said that if men and women were to be given a psychological test about 90% of the answers would overlap between the two sexes. Sex makes people different because of biology but gender is cultural. This does not mean we need to force each other into gender-typed roles all because they have a certain kind of part. This limits a child’s choices and learning opportunities to pre-determined limits and standards. Children should be allowed to express themselves how they want and not be held-back because of a

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