Gender Differences In Children's Toys

Usually when someone goes to the toy aisles in a store, he will most likely notice the high contrast between the frilly pinks of the girls’ aisle and the dark blues of the boys’. He will then go into the aisle pertaining to the gender of the child he is shopping for. Down the blue aisle, there will most likely be trucks, superheroes, and toy guns. Princesses, barbies, and toy kitchen sets are usually found in the pink aisle. Many people in society have recently been striving for equality among females and their male counterparts. Tabuchi (2015) states that because of this, a few companies that carry children’s toys, such as Target and Amazon, have changed their labeling system from using genders as labels, to having a more gender neutral labels, such as interests.
It is said that girls generally gravitate towards the toys labeled as girls’ toys and young boys always choose trucks over dolls. This way of organization makes it easy to find the right plaything for each child. When given the choice between a doll and a truck, female infants are most likely to choose the doll, and male infants choose the opposite (Cherney et al., 2003). Girls seem to be attracted to pastel colors and role play toys such as dolls. Boys automatically want to play with guns and toy soldiers, things that are aggressive in nature. The separation of toys has never had an effect on children or their future. They have been marketed in this way for years without trouble, so why change these