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The Importance of Social & Cultural Factors in Gender Roles

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The Importance of Social & Cultural Factors in Gender Roles
The Importance of Social & Cultural Factors in Gender Roles

Social and cultural factors are critical in moulding gender roles because of societal expectations, family dynamics, and psychological differences. Most often, a child is nurtured into the gender role because of norms and stereotypes. These forces of socialization help us define our gender because together they create a concept on how a certain gender should act and or behave. School and the education curriculum significantly plays an important part in nurturing kids into each gender role. For instance, girls have to go to the girls washroom and boys have to go to the boys washroom. Without these aspects, it would be difficult for us to understand how we should behave if we do not have these exposure as to what the society expects of us as a male or female. Moreover, cultural factors such as sibling relationships and type of families, for example two parent and single parent families, plays an important role in shaping the child's gender development. Siblings can influence a child's understanding of the roles of a specific gender by demonstrating the responsibilities each gender is suppose to fulfill within the household. For instance, girls should be helping mom with the dishes and laundries while boys wash the car. In addition, single parent families often take part into shaping an individual's personality because of how they are socialized by their parent and the bond that the parent has with the child such as watching Sunday night football with the father. Furthermore, the psychological differences including our beliefs, values, and attitudes can have an impact on how we view gender roles. People who are intersex can be nurtured into whichever gender of their belief and value or like Baby X, they can choose to be "other". Transgender, for example, have all the biological attributes of a one sex, but their attitudes desire for the opposite sex. This proves that gender role is not based on

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