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Social Constructionism Essay

703 Words3 Pages

Social constructionism is an approach to psychology which suggests that certain aspects of the world, such as knowledge, only ceases to exist because we give it reality and meaning (reference). For example, money has no value as it’s just paper and metal. However, as a society, we agree it has value by giving money a reality through social agreement. Likewise, social constructionism is the idea that reality and meaning forms our interactions with others, rather than our personality (reference). Within society, we are all members of different groups, some we choose to be a part of (such as sports team), and some we automatically belong to (such as gender or age). This can be explained using the social identity theory (reference), which proposes …show more content…

One of the most obvious and important differences is how gender-related roles are developed within society, and how these roles influence our characteristics and behaviour traits as early as infancy. The clear differences between both sexes is what socially constructs gender. For instance, males are thought to be aggressive and strong, while females are considered sensitive and weak. In one study, men and women were asked to watch videos of infants that were presented with four different stimuli. Participants had to describe each infant by determining factors such as gender and emotion (reference). When the infant was thought to be showing pleasure, many participants marked the gender of the child as male. When a particular stimulus was shown – the buzzer – many of the infants cried. If the infant was thought to be a boy, the crying was noted down as anger – the social norm of what a standard ‘masculine’ response is thought to be. On the other hand, if the infant was thought to be a girl then the crying was marked as fear – a ‘feminine’ response. Participants who were men observed more differences in total than those who were women. This could in turn propose that such differences mean that fathers expect more of a sex difference between infants, such as behaviour, and so treats them differently. This could potentially be why fathers let their sons be more liberal and why they’re more protective of their

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In the essay “Even Nine-Month-Olds Choose Gender-Specific Toys,” Jennifer Goodwin acknowledges the possibility of gender being innate, as a research showed that “even 1-day-old boys spent longer looking at moving, mechanical options than 1-day-girls, who spent more time looking at faces” (89). However, she claims that even actions this early in life may already be influenced by the parents’ different treatments, which start almost instantly after their child is born. Goodwin states that, even when their children are still infants, parents tend to show more affection towards girl than boys, who are dealt with in a more active and playful manner, which could explain the findings of the research mentioned. This difference in treatments is later

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