1418 



HORMONAL REGULATION OF BEHAVIOR 



provides an important stimulus to parents 

 which helps determine the gender-species 

 role training they will provide. 



Rabban (1950) studied the influence of 

 social class status on sex-role identification 

 in children and reported that boys are more 

 clearly aware of sex-appropriate behavior 

 than girls in both middle- and working-class 

 groups. On the other hand, he found that 

 boys and girls of the working-class group 

 were not only earlier, but more clearly, 

 aware of gender-appropriate behavior than 

 were either boys or girls of the middle-class 

 group. Clearly class level provides the so- 

 cial frame of reference within which such 

 diverse influences as parental models, play- 

 mates, social mores, attitudes, and oppor- 

 tunities can operate to structure gender role 

 and personality structure. 



In their excellent study of how 379 Amer- 

 ican mothers brought up their children from 

 birth to kindergarten. Sears, Maccoby and 

 Levin (1957) correctly point out that, al- 

 though sex role in modern American culture 

 is constantly changing and shifting in terms 

 of what the culture regards as appropriate, 

 there is no culture that does not make some 

 distinction between masculine or feminine 

 role behavior (see also the Mead's chapter, 

 in this volume). Although it may not be a 

 logical absurdity to regard masculine and 

 feminine behavior as biologically innate 

 phenomena, the study of sex role in other 

 cultures makes it clear that all too often we 

 have wrongly identified that which is cur- 

 rent and prevalent in our own culture as 

 the natural and normal state of affairs. It 

 seems more in accord with the findings in 

 both humans and other animal forms to re- 

 gard humans, male and female alike, as 

 capable of acquiring, during early life, an 

 almost infinite variety of behavior patterns 

 some of which will be approved of as serving 

 the individual and society well, whereas 

 others will be considered unfortunate, if not 

 actually detrimental, both biologically and 

 culturally (cf. Mead's comments on the folk- 

 ways of the Mundugumors) . 



Sears, Maccoby and Levin (1957) distin- 

 guished three kinds of learning occurring in 

 association with the development of social 



asked about the difference between boys and girls 

 will give an answer in terms of the hair-cut rather 

 than the genitals. 



behavior appropriate to the child's own sex: 

 (1) trial and error, (2) direct tuition by the 

 parents, and (3) role practice or rehearsals. 

 From their experience these authors were in- 

 clined to believe that very little learning of 

 social behavior and social values ever oc- 

 curs by simple trial and error. They point 

 out an important difference between learn- 

 ing by direct tuition and guidance and 

 learning through role rehearsal, namely 

 that, in the latter, the child selects the ac- 

 tions to perform from his own observations 

 of what the role requires rather than from 

 what the instructions of his parents may be. 

 This being so one must immediately con- 

 sider individual differences in cognitional 

 and perceptual inheritance as important 

 variables affecting the final outcome of such 

 learning. 



In studying the intentional teaching of 

 gender-appropriate behavior by the 379 

 parents in their study. Sears, Maccoby and 

 Levin found important differences in the 

 kind of rearing meted out to the two sexes. 

 Among the items studied it was with respect 

 to aggressive behavior that the greatest dis- 

 tinctions were made by parents; boys were 

 allowed significantly more freedom than 

 girls to fight back in encounters with non- 

 siblings. Many mothers actively encouraged 

 their sons to be aggressive and provided 

 ample opportunity for learning aggressive 

 behavior and, as one parent put it, to be a 

 "real boy." Parental attitude toward such 

 diverse things as household tasks and chores 

 and school achievement differed, too, with 

 respect to sons and daughters. Of the 91 

 mothers of boys and the 83 mothers of girls 

 who were most strongly inclined to differen- 

 tiate sex-role in their rearing practices, it 

 was found that definitely higher expecta- 

 tions were put on girls for table manners, 

 neatness and orderliness, and instant obedi- 

 ence. Techniques of child training differed 

 too: even with the nonaggressive group of 

 children, boys were more commonly admin- 

 istered physical punishment than girls. Girls 

 were disciplined more often by so-called 

 love-oriented techniques of praise for good 

 behavior and the display of disappointment 

 at unacceptable behavior. Interestingly, 

 many of the mothers did not recognize any 

 efforts they were making to evoke appropri- 

 ate sex-role behavior in their child and those 



