Outline AND Evaluate THE Biosocial Approach PDF

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Psychology essay based on biosocial approach on gender...

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OUTLINE AND EVALUATE THE BIOSOCIAL APPROACH The biosocial approach refers to theories that compare both the biological and social explanations such as Money and Ehrhardt theory and social role theory. The biosocial approach to gender development emphasises that it is the interaction of both nature and nurture that is important rather than one or the other. Biosocial theory was first advanced by MONEY ET AL (1972) who start by proposing that there are a number of critical events that affect the early development of the child. These events begin before birth with the biological influences covered in the previous section. These biological factors obviously have a large influence on the child. However, from birth onwards, social factors also begin to play an important part. A lot of research shows that once a child is labelled as a boy or girl they are treated very differently, and these social factors interact with the biological ones to determine the child’s gender identity. In the majority of cases, the child’s biological sex matches the gender of upbringing and there are no problems. However, some individuals, known as intersex children, are born with ambiguous genitals and are not obviously one sex or the other. MONEY believes that provided a child’s sex of rearing is decided before their third birthday, then social factors are so strongly influential that such children will accept their assigned gender identity. The third year is another critical period and since a child’s gender identity is established by that age, then, according to Money, it cannot thereafter be changed without causing the child serious psychological problems. The social role theory was proposed by EAGLY AND WOOD. It suggests that selective pressures do not cause both physical and psychological sex differences: they only cause physical differences, and these lead to sex role allocations which in turn create psychological sex differences. This means that psychological sex differences are seen as the consequences of the different roles to which men and women are assigned. Social role theory argues that physical differences between men and women allow them to perform certain tasks more efficiently. For example men’s upper body strength makes them more suitable for hunting. Mate choices can also be explained by different social roles: each sex will seek a partner who fulfils the social roles that they themselves do not.

The biosocial approach is supported by SMITH AND LLOYD who dressed babies in nonspecific gender clothes, then labelled them with a boy’s or a girl’s name. They found that people would play with them differently according to their gender label, with ‘boys’ being treated in a more physical manner. This supports the biosocial theory as it shows that when a baby is labelled as male or female, they are perceived differently. The biosocial approach is also supported by BRADLEY ET AL who reported on a case of a biological male who, after accidental damage to his penis, had reassignment surgery and was raised as a female. This individual exhibited some male behaviours as a child but preferred female company and as a result, perceived himself as female and was happy that way. This suggests that sex rearing is more important that biology as suggested by Money and Ehrhardt.

Another piece of research support come from SCHAFFER who showed a sample of over 200 male and female adults a video of a 9 month old baby named either David or Dana, playing with toys and responding to stimuli. The adults labelled the babies behaviour and emotions in gender-typical ways according to whether they believed it to be a boy or a girl. This supports the biosocial approach as it shows that adults treat babies differently depending on their biological sex label. COLAPINTO reports the case of David Reimer, which does not support the biosocial approach. Reimer was raised as a girl after his penis was accidentally burnt off during a botched operation at 8 months. According to MONEY (1975), this was a success but the “girl” was never happy as a girl and once the truth was revealed to her, she reverted to being a male. This outcome has also been supported by further research. REINER ET AL studied 16 biological males born with almost no penis. Of the 14 who were raised female, 8 re-assigned themselves as male by the age of 16. This suggests that biological facts have a more important role in gender development than social factors. There are methodological problems with the David Reimer study as it is a case study. The results may well not apply to other individuals and so therefore lacks generalisability. The study of Reiner and Gearhart has a very small sample size and so the results from study may also be invalid. MONEY ET AL had collected other evidence to support their theory yet it was still all derived from the study of abnormal individuals, such as the study of genetic females exposed to male hormones prenatally because of drugs taken by their mothers. Such evidence may not be relevant to understanding normal gender development. The more specific assertion of MONEY ET AL (1972) that in the first two-and-a-half to three years a child’s sense of itself is flexible enough to allow its sexual label to be changed without undue disturbance is now somewhat discredited, especially in light of the Reimer case. The approach taken by Eagle and Wood is a social constructionist one, an approach which suggests that much of human behaviour is an invention or outcome of a particular society or culture. EAGLY AND WOOD (1999) re-examined the data from Buss's study of 37 cultures in relationships, and suggested that the pattern of differences between sexes can be just as well explained by social roles. It was shown that in all cultures, women seek men with resources, so, seeing as women have evolved with less earning capacity, it is no surprise that women seek men with resources. Men want younger women not just because of their fertility, but because they will be more obedient.

Another contradicting piece of research is by LUXEN who reports that a number of research has shown that very young children and even animals display sex differences in their toy preferences. This contradicts the biosocial approach as it shows that even before the ages of 2-3 years, children and animals show sex differences in their behaviour suggesting that biological factors are more important. A strength of the approach is that in terms of real world application, biosocial theory is more valuble than biological explanations as it does not imply that sex differences are innate and cannot be changed by altering social context. Biosocial theory is valuable because it supports the feminist view that changes in social roles will lead to changes in psychological differences between men and

women. In addition, it has high ethical appeal because sex roles are perceived as social and therefore more flexible. This theory is less of a reductionist as it takes account of both biological and social factors. Whilst the biosocial theory does offer adequate levels of explanations, it does not easily account for the existence of pre-natal hormones circulating during foetal development that relate to psychological and behavioural sex differences. The fact that hormones precede gender typed behaviours is a thorn in the side for the biosocial theory. Findings from other studies are in fairly direct conflict between biological and social factors. For example, IMPERATO-McGINLEY ET AL described a family in the Dominican Republic, a case that contradicts the theory. Four of the sons appeared biologically to be female when they were born and they were reared as girls. However, at the age of about 12, they developed male genitals and started to look like ordinary adolescent males. In spite of the fact that all four of them had been reared as girls, and had thought of themselves as females, they seemed to adjust well to the male role. Nevertheless, it is still difficult to draw firm conclusions as the male role is more respected in this community than is the female one, so their acceptance of a changed gender identity could have been influenced by social factors as well as biological ones....