Baron A.S. Schmader T. Cvencek D. Meltzoff A. 2014. The Gendered Self Concept - How Implicit Gender Stereotypes and Attitudes Shape Self Definition

Gender Attitudes and Stereotypes in Childhood 1
The Gendered Self-Concept:
How Implicit Gender Stereotypes and Attitudes Shape Self-Definition
Andrew Scott Baron1, Toni Schmader1, Dario Cvencek2, & Andrew N. Meltzoff2
1
Department of Psychology, University of British Columbia
2
Institute for Learning & Brain Sciences, University of Washington
Background
“If women are expected to do the same work as men, we must teach them the same things.”
– Aristotle
As the quote above suggests, the debate over the fundamental similarities and differences
between women and men extends at least as far back as Aristotle and underscores the
pervasiveness with which the psychological representation of gender as a social category
provides a lens through which we perceive others and define ourselves. Across cultures, the
development of children’s conception of gender is rapid and outpaces their understanding of
other locally significant categories including those based on language groups, race, ethnicity,
religion, nationality, and castes (Bigler & Liben, 2006, 2007; see also, Levy & Killen, 2008;
Martin & Ruble, 2004; Martin, Ruble, & Szkrybalo, 2002). Indeed, gender is among the earliest
social group distinctions young children make, and soon after children learn to categorize others
based on gender, they begin to associate different traits and attitudes with male and female. Once
entrenched in long-term memory, these associations can be easily and implicitly activated in the
minds of perceivers or targets, acting as an unseen force, pushing and pulling the levers of
behavior to subtly steer men and women to different roles and activities (Croft, Schmader,
Block, & Baron, in prep.; Davies, Spencer, & Steele, 2005; Steele, Spencer, & Aronson, 2002).
Existing divisions of behavior inform developing gender cognitions which then recreate gender
differences in behavior as children develop into adults (Eagly & Steffen, 1984).
The societal costs of persistent gender biases among adults underscore the need to chart
its developmental trajectory. Furthermore, advances in social cognition over the past two decades
have revealed that implicit associative biases are governed by and thus likely to develop in ways
that are distinct from explicit beliefs. The primary goal of the present chapter is to introduce
recent evidence from our labs concerning the origins of implicit gender bias in childhood and to
demonstrate how data on the developmental trajectory of implicit gender stereotypes and
attitudes can inform our theories for the causes and consequences of such biases for a child’s
developing conception of him or herself. This work will also provide a novel framework for
conceptualizing the development of the implicit associative system and highlight new directions
for future research.
The Benefits of Examining the Development of Gendered Cognition at the Implicit Level
An expanding body of research on young adults reveals the social and cognitive forces
that work in concert to carve deep trenches of gender-typical behavior that get written into our
system of cognitive associations. Research reveals the ways in which gender biases disadvantage
women from being selected for certain jobs (e.g., Goldin & Rouse, 2000; Moss-Racusin et al.,
2012) and influence how men behave toward women during professional interactions (Logel et
al., 2009). Furthermore, when women themselves are simply reminded that these gender
stereotypes exist, they can show impaired attentional focus and performance resulting from the
added concern that their actions might confirm negative stereotypes about their group (Mrazek et
al., 2011; Schmader & Johns, 2003; Schmader, Johns, & Forbes, 1998; Spencer, Steele, &
Quinn, 1999).
Given that these effects of gender biases occur despite explicitly held values for gender
equality (Pew Center for Research, 2010), we argue that the implicit processes at work merit
special attention and study. In other words, people have cognitive associations linking gender
categories with different traits and attitudes and these implicit associations are likely to be
learned early, unrelated to explicitly endorsed stereotypes and attitudes, and can be activated
automatically in ways that bias perception and behavior. For example, men with stronger implicit
stereotypes about women behave in a more dominant and flirtatious way during a professional
interaction with a woman (Logel et al., 2009), and women with a stronger implicit association of
men with math exhibit poorer performance in math, even among those who are majoring in
math-intensive fields (Nosek et al., 2002). From a developmental perspective, then, it is
important to consider when and how the implicit associations that underlie these biases develop
and how they shape a child’s emerging sense of self-definition. Recently, suitable measures of
implicit processing in young samples have been developed (Baron & Banaji, 2006, 2009;
Cvencek, Greenwald, & Meltzoff, 2011; Dunham, Baron, & Banaji, 2008; Newheiser & Olson,
2012; Rutland, Cameron, Milne, & McGeorge, 2005), providing a unique opportunity to
examine the developmental trajectory of unconscious cognitions. Understanding when these
associations form will speak directly to pathways by which such cognitions can be changed to
establish greater gender equality.
The advent of implicit measures avoids several methodological challenges in examining
the development of gender bias in childhood. First, compared with their explicit counterparts,
measures of implicit associations are generally less susceptible to self-presentational concerns
(Banaji, 2001; Nosek et al., 2001) and avoid some of the interpretive challenges inherent in
testing the cognitions of young children (Baron & Banaji, 2006; Dunham et al., 2008). Although
measures of explicit gender beliefs can reveal substantial information, these assessment tools
also become increasingly susceptible to social desirability as children grow older and become
more attuned to the cultural norms for expressing egalitarian attitudes, beliefs, and behavior (e.g.,
Rutland et al., 2005). For example, whereas children in middle childhood express awareness of
math-gender stereotypes (Cvencek, Meltzoff, & Greenwald, 2011), these children often
simultaneously deny endorsing these beliefs (see also Schmader et al., 2006, for evidence with
adults). However, it is quite possible that older children and adults possess negative gender
stereotypes and attitudes, even if they are reluctant to express them to the interviewer because
doing so would be socially inappropriate. By contrast, implicit cognitive measures are relatively
free from such social desirability concerns.
In addition, the level of processing that underlies implicit social cognition appears to be
continuous across development and thus can be examined independently of an individual’s stage
of cognitive and language development. The same is simply not the case for explicit processes
where at earlier stages of development there are added concerns about whether young children
have sufficient introspective access to provide reliable verbal report on what might constitute an
attitude or stereotype, not to mention concern as to whether explicit reasoning is even available
to such young minds. Children’s difficulty with introspection coupled with evidence of preverbal
processing of gender categories (Bahrick et al., 1998; Quinn et al., 2002), underscores the need
to utilize methods that can assess the more automatic thoughts and associations children hold. As
such, the focus on implicit processes provides a broader population to examine.
A third and perhaps most important reason for our focus on implicit associations is that
they inform our theories of children’s developing sense of themselves seen through the lens of
gender. Highlighting an important theoretical distinction between self-reportable explicit
representations and introspectively inaccessible implicit representations (Banaji, 2001; Devine,
1989; Gawronski & Bodenhausen, 2006; Greenwald & Banaji, 1995), research with adults has
demonstrated that implicitly held gender attitudes and stereotypes can have a profound influence
in daily life, uniquely affecting friendship choices, hiring and voting decisions, and jury verdicts
(for a review see, Greenwald et al., 2009; for additional evidence of the relationship between
implicit processes and behavior see Nock & Banaji, 2007). These data clearly suggest that
implicit cognitions shape behavior in ways that are independent of the effects of explicit attitudes
and beliefs, underscoring the need to understand their developmental trajectory. Indeed, efforts
to reduce the deleterious consequences of gender bias among adults will likely require revising
the implicit associations that take hold of the developing mind. While there is a vibrant debate in
the field concerning the representational nature of implicit and explicit constructs (e.g., Blanton
& Jaccard, 2006; Gawronski & Bodenhausen, 2006; Karpinski & Hilton, 2001), the outcome of
that debate does not directly bear on the importance of understanding the developmental issues
raised here.
The data that we introduce in this chapter examines the development of implicit gender
stereotypes and attitudes and provides an emerging framework for understanding how implicit
cognitions more generally are shaped by cultural and cognitive forces. We will first consider
how implicit associations are learned in general. We will then focus specifically on the
development of implicit gender stereotypes about math and science and the development of
implicit gender attitudes. We will also examine the ways in which the developing mind may
strive to achieve cognitive-affective balance among gender stereotypes and the self-concept (and
among gender attitudes and self-esteem). Finally, we will discuss the implications of these
findings for theories of the acquisition and development of implicit social cognition more
generally including the timing and method of efforts aimed at changing such cognitions.
Theoretical Perspectives on the Trajectory of Implicit Associations
The conventional view is that implicit associations are the product of a domain-general
computational mechanism that detects patterns of covariation, establishing an implicit
association that may be stereotypic (e.g., male = mathematical) or evaluative (e.g., male = good).
By virtue of the claim that the learning mechanism is domain-general, it is hypothesized that all
associations are learned via the same basic process, regardless of whether they concern
stereotypes or attitudes or whether they are in reference to social groups or to non-social
categories (Bigler & Liben, 2007; Greenwald & Banaji, 1995). Domain-general associative
learning processes can similarly shape associations between the concept gender and children’s
emerging concept of the self. For example, a child who is praised for learning to count or for
demonstrating success with numerical operations might develop an association between the self
and numbers/math. Such an association may form directly when one receives praise (linking self
with positive performance in the domain of math – “YOU are good at MATH”) as well as from
actively noticing one’s selective engagement with math activities (e.g., spending more time
engaged with math exercises, feeling positive about the self during this engagement, awareness
of one’s own preference to spend time on math-related activities).
Associations between the self and particular activities (e.g., I can do math) and between
the concept gender and those same activities (e.g., girls can do math) can form via independent
processes, but they are also importantly linked in one’s broader associative network of
cognitions. These shared linkages might also influence the magnitude and direction of implicit
associations as the developing mind seeks to achieve cognitive balance among associated
constructs (Festinger, 1954; Greenwald et al., 2002; Heider, 1946). Within the theoretical
framework of balance theory (Heider, 1946), the associations among concepts tend to self-
organize on principles of consistency. Thus, if I like John, and John likes Peter, then I will also
be inclined to like Peter. Based on Heider’s (1946) theory, Greenwald et al. (2002) provided a
rigorous statistical approach to test for balanced identity among implicit constructs related to the
self (Balanced Identity Theory, BIT). The theoretical expectation is that, if a balanced
configuration exists among three constructs, any one of the three constructs should be predictable
from the multiplicative product of measures of the other two constructs (Greenwald et al., 2002).
In other words, when two concepts are associated with the same third concept, the association
between those two concepts should strengthen.
Initial evidence of BIT comes from the adult literature. Nosek et al. (2002) showed that
among female college students, a balanced configuration of implicit math–gender stereotypes,
gender identity, and math self-concepts is associated with their negative attitudes towards
mathematics and lower performance on the mathematical portion of the Scholastic Aptitude Test.
Interestingly, these balanced associations were found even among women majoring in math-
intensive fields, pointing to the ways in which these implicit cognitions operate despite more
consciously motivated career pursuits. Such findings are informative when found with adults, but
only a thorough developmental analysis can reveal whether principles of balance operate across
implicit associations (e.g., attitudes, stereotypes, and self-identity) from the point of their initial
acquisition or whether successful balance among these constructs reflects a major cognitive
achievement on the part of the developing child (Cvencek, Meltzoff, & Greenwald, 2011;
Dunham, Baron & Banaji, 2007).
With respect to math stereotypes, the idea is that the following set of cognitions forms to
create psychological balance: I am female (gender identity), and females in my culture do not do
math (a cultural stereotype), then I will not do math (a self-concept). Cvencek, Meltzoff, and
Greenwald (2011) outlined two ways that cognitions of the self might achieve balance as they
are first developing: (a) one’s concept of the self with respect to a given domain and given group
might shape and inform the development of a broader concept of one’s group in that domain, or
(b) group stereotypes may be acquired first and subsequently influence math self-concepts for a
given domain. The first holds that with a strong gender identity and a given level of self-
identification with math (math self-concept), children might generalize/project their own math
identification to others of their own gender (math–gender stereotype; for a similar analysis
among explicit intergroup attitudes, see Patterson, Bigler, & Swann, 2010). This developmental
sequence can be expressed as: Me = Girl; Me ≠ Math; therefore Girls ≠ Math.
An alternative proposal is that children who strongly identify with their gender (strong
gender identity) are more likely to internalize cultural stereotypes about their gender (math–
gender stereotypes), which in turn influences their math self-concepts. Considered from the
perspective of girls, this developmental sequence can be expressed as: Me = Girl; Girls ≠ Math;
therefore Me ≠ Math. Children who do not strongly associate self with either male or female
might show weaker development of gender-based self-concepts through either mechanism.
Evidence for when each leg of this triangle in children’s implicit associative network emerges
and how they relate to one another will likely speak to the causal processes that result in implicit
self-identification with math and its relationship to associated stereotypes and attitudes.
Moreover, an examination of principles of cognitive balance among these concepts in children
from an Asian culture, in which collectivist societal norms are more salient than the norms for
individual cognitions about the self, may also reveal whether or not cognitive balance is a
culturally universal mechanism for developmental change in children’s social cognition
(Cvencek, Meltzoff, & Kapur, under review). In the sections that follow, we will present new
evidence from our labs supporting the theoretical claim that cognitive balance in the
development of children’s stereotypes toward and attitudes about gender groups represents an
early emerging and perhaps culturally universal accomplishment that shapes the developmental
trajectory of such associations by the eighth year of life.

Evidence for the emergence of implicit gender stereotypes and cognitive balance
Studying the interplay among math–gender stereotypes, math self-concepts, and math
achievement can help shed light on how the culture’s prevailing stereotypes about mathematics
ability influences children’s emerging math self-concepts and performance. A meta-analysis of
gender differences in explicit self-views about math reveals that girls rate their math ability
lower than boys do across various cultural contexts (Else-Quest, Hyde, & Linn, 2010), despite
young boys and girls exhibiting similar performance on objective measures of math and science
abilities. Thus, the sex differences in explicit math self-concepts observed among older children
and adults appear to precede rather than follow actual differences in math achievement. The
implication of such findings is that, once ingrained, these math self-concepts may exert a
developmental influence on children’s interest and effort, leading to the gender gap in math-
intensive fields such as engineering or computer science that is apparent among adults. If girls
develop a lower self-concept of their math ability before they actually underperform in math, the
implication is that gender stereotypes affect in some way how the self-concept in math first
forms. While it is possible that an internalization of cultural stereotypes into children’s explicit
views of themselves might lead to performance differences in math as children grow older, it is
also possible that these performance differences are better explained by changes in gendered
cognitions at the implicit level.
Bringing current data to bear on these issues, two of our co-authors conducted two studies
with 419 elementary-school children in the U.S. and Singapore that tested the presence of
implicit stereotypes about gender, math, and the self. Each child completed implicit measures of
gender self-concept, math–gender stereotype, and math self-concept (Cvencek, Meltzoff, &
Greenwald, 2011; Cvencek, Meltzoff, & Kapur, under review). Implicit associations were
measured using a child-friendly version of the Implicit Association Test (Greenwald et al., 1995)
that measures reaction time during a categorization task to provide an index of the relative
association strength among select concepts.
Typical IATs pit two concepts against one another (e.g., gender and self) during which
participants are asked to rapidly classify words and or images into their respective categories
(e.g., male/female and self/other) using two response keys. For the gender self-concept task this
involved categorizing words as either self-related (e.g., me, my, I) or other-related (they, them,
their) using separate keys. Further, participants were asked to use those same keys to
concurrently classify words as belonging to the category male (e.g., Mike, John, David) or
female (e.g., Sarah, Emily, Jen). For half the trials the self-related words and male words shared
a single response key (with female and other-related words sharing the second key). For the
remaining half of the trials those pairings were reversed such that male and other shared a single
response key (while female and self shared the second key). The assumption of this procedure is
that the stronger the association among concepts, the faster and more accurate participants should
be to categorize them when they share a single response key (e.g., self + male) compared with
when they share different response keys (e.g., other + male). For the math self-concept IAT,
children were asked to categorize self/other words alongside categorizing words as either math
oriented (e.g., numbers, calculator, addition) or reading oriented (e.g., book, literature, library).
For the math-gender stereotype IAT, participants were instructed to classify words as either male
or female OR belonging to the category math or reading. The order of these tasks was counter-
balanced.
The data show that by eight years-of-age, children exhibit evidence of implicit gender
identity, math-stereotypes, and implicit self-beliefs, with boys and girls associating math more
with males than females and with boys more strongly associating their concept of self with math
than do girls (Cvencek, Meltzoff, & Greenwald, 2011). In other words, both boys and girls were
faster and more accurate to classify words related to math and words related to male when they
shared a single response key. Thus, around the same time that girls begin to exhibit more
negative explicit beliefs about their own math ability, they also develop more negative implicit
associations of girls with math and a weaker association of self with math, despite no observable
differences in performance or ability at this young age. Recent findings demonstrate similar
relationships among elementary-school children from Singapore, a country in which girls excel
in math (Cvencek, Meltzoff, & Kapur, under review).
This evidence suggests that implicit self-construals, similar to their explicit counterparts,
are shaped by the prevailing cultural stereotypes in early childhood. Furthermore, it is
noteworthy that math-gender stereotypes were demonstrated in Singaporean culture (Cvencek,
Meltzoff, & Kapur, under review), where math performance overall is substantially higher
among Singaporean children compared with their American counterparts. In fact, in Else-Quest’s
cross-national comparison of math performance among 14-16 year old children, boys slightly
outperformed girls in the US whereas girls tended to outperform boys in Singapore (Else-Quest
et al., 2010). Yet, in spite of these relatively better math outcomes for Singaporean girls, children
sampled in our recent study in Singapore exhibited implicit gender stereotypes about gender and
math in the same direction as those observed among American youth (math = male), albeit of a
somewhat smaller magnitude.
Speaking to issues of cognitive balance among these implicit representations, the results
showed that the stronger children identified with their own gender and the stronger they
identified their gender with math, then the stronger the association between self and math.
Interestingly, the strength of cognitive balance among implicit associations was positively
associated with age, suggesting that balance may represent an important accomplishment of the
developing mind. This was true in Western individualist cultures and East Asian collectivist ones
alike (Cvencek, Meltzoff, & Kapur, under review), and when coupled with similar evidence of
cognitive balance found in other domains (e.g., race, Dunham et al., 2007), supports a broader
conclusion that the underlying principles of cognitive balance in children’s representations of
their social-cognitive world may be culturally universal. Whereas cultures may differ on which
stereotypes are prominent, the intrapersonal motivation for cognitive balance may apply
regardless of the content of the beliefs.
Development of gender stereotypes can impair performance. In addition to
illustrating how the development of implicit stereotypes can affect the development of children’s
self-concept for math, recent evidence also links these implicit stereotypes to actual performance.
For example, although recent meta-analyses do not reveal an overall gender gap in math
performance among elementary school-aged children, this gap is more pronounced in some
countries than in others (Else-Quest et al., 2010). Moreover, the variation in the gender gap
corresponds to variation in children’s implicit math stereotypes. In a cross-national comparison
of 34 countries, country-level measures of math–gender stereotypes predicted country-level
gender gaps in 8th-grade mathematics achievement —stronger societal stereotypes against
females doing mathematics were correlated with larger gaps between boys’ and girls’ actual
mathematics performance (Nosek et al., 2009).
The relationship between gender stereotypes and a gender gap in math performance is not
only found across cultures; it has also recently been shown it to exist within cultures as well, as
evident by studies of American and German middle-school children and adults. Steffens and
colleagues (Steffens, Jelenec, & Noack, 2010) found that implicit math–gender stereotypes
predicted German adolescent girls’ (but not boys’) math achievement and enrollment preferences
in related disciplines. Nosek et al. (2002) found the same relationship among U.S. college
students. Taken together, the findings from samples in the United States and Germany all show
that culturally shared implicit math–gender stereotypes might play a part in creating gender
differences in math achievement and mathematics participation, relationships that emerge early
in elementary school.
New insights for understanding math achievement gaps. One avenue for future
research is to more clearly isolate the process by which implicit gender stereotypes affect girls’
math achievement. Specifically, future research is needed to test at least two possible pathways.
On the one hand, applying Eccles’ expectancy-value hypothesis (Eccles, Adler, & Meece, 1984;
Eccles, Adler, Futterman, Goff, Kaczala, et al., 1983), these stereotypes decrease young girls’
interest and engagement in math because the stereotypes lower their self-confidence and the
value they place on that domain. For example, Steffens et al. (2010) found that stronger implicit
math–gender stereotypes were particularly predictive of lower achievement among low-
achieving girls. They speculated that holding a stereotype that “math is for boys” plays a role in
determining the amount of time girls spend studying math. They observed that if a girl holds a
strong math–gender stereotype that girls don’t do math, then she may feel that it is not needed,
culturally expected, or even possible for her to excel in math. From this perspective, implicit
gender stereotypes decrease girls’ motivation and lead them to avoid math-related pursuits.
Alternatively, the awareness of stereotypes that associate math with male more than
female sets the stage for children to experience stereotype threat. Stereotype threat occurs when
the concern that one might confirm negative stereotypes about oneself or one’s group disrupts
performance (Steele & Aronson, 1995). For example, in a recent study of middle-school aged
children, girls evaluated themselves less confidently in mathematics than boys did, despite
having equal performance (Muzzatti & Agnoli, 2007). However, when these 10 year-old girls
were reminded that females are underrepresented in mathematics, the performance of the girls
dropped precipitously to become lower than that of boys. Other research has also shown that
gender stereotypes about math, if activated, have the potential to create a gender gap in
performance (Ambady, Shih, Kim, & Pittisky, 2001). The adult literature suggests that these
performance impairments induced by bringing stereotypes to mind result from an interrelated set
of processes including physiological signs of stress, meta-cognitive monitoring of performance,
efforts to regulate emotion, and problems of attentional control (Schmader et al., 2008).
However, an assumption of stereotype threat theory is that these cognitive impairments
stemming from a concern about confirming the stereotype are greatest among those most
motivated to do well in the domain. It is not yet known, whether any or all of these mechanisms
reviewed by Schmader et al. (2008) account for performance impairments that young girls
experience when gender stereotypes are primed.
Research is needed to adjudicate between these two possible mechanisms by which
implicit gender stereotypes may lead to lower math performance among girls. The first
implicates motivational variables like avoidance of math-related tasks and activities as
contributing to underperformance. The second implicates impairments in cognitive processing
that occur when one is particularly motivated to excel in the domain as a means of disconfirming
the stereotype. Although research on the gender gap in math performance among young adults
has separately examined each of these mechanisms (Forbes & Schmader, 2010; Jamieson &
Harkins, 2007; Diekman, Brown, Johnston, & Clark, 2010), no research has tried to parse the
separate effects of motivation versus cognitive interference especially as predicted by implicit
associations among children. Developmentally, the fear of confirming a negative stereotype and
the cognitive interference it can create may occur relatively early in development. Indeed,
children as young as 3 years-of-age show a tendency to conform to behaviors stereotypical of
their gender (Weinraub et al., 1984), and a motivation to disconfirm negative stereotypes may
similarly guide children’s behaviors around this period in development. On the other hand, it is
not until children are older that they manifest more flexibility in approaching or avoiding math
classes and activities. As a result, any motivational differences might not reveal themselves until
children experience greater control over their time. The degree to which gender stereotypes
shape motivation and induce cognitive interference at younger ages is yet to be examined.
Such research could also explore how manipulating the content of implicit associations
uniquely affects these processes. For example, in a series of experiments with undergraduate
women, one of our coauthors demonstrated that retraining an implicit association of ‘liking’ with
math led women (but not men) to exert more effort at a math task, especially when gender
stereotypes were primed or made salient (Forbes & Schmader, 2010). However, this
strengthened tendency to like math did not improve working memory capacity or math
performance. Instead, retraining an implicit association of women with math led women to
exhibit higher working memory capacity and perform better on a math exam even in the context
of stereotype threat cues. Such findings suggest that one’s attitude toward a domain might be a
stronger predictor of whether one approaches or avoids a task in that domain but that positive
stereotypes about your group can specifically shape performance by facilitating more fluid
cognition.
Although studies seeking to shape implicit associations have not been done with younger
age groups, such data would certainly speak to the causal role that cultural stereotypes about
math and gender play in shaping the observed gender differences in performance. We suggest
that intervention programs aimed at targeting such stereotypes before they become engrained
might be best aimed at children as young as age 6 or 7, the earliest ages where evidence of the
internalization of cultural stereotypes about gender and ability are observed and prior to the
reported developmental increase in strength of cognitive balance among related self-constructs.
We return to this general point about changing implicit gendered cognitions later in the chapter.
Evidence for the Emergence of Implicit Gender Attitudes
Our recent research demonstrates how the abilities and domains that children come to
implicitly associate with males and females might shape their emerging perceptions of the self in
or around early childhood. Stepping back we realize that the complex web of gender cognitions
extends beyond the relationship between stereotypes and self-definition to include the attitudes,
positive and negative, children form toward males and females. In fact, developmentally, gender
attitudes emerge prior to gender stereotypes and the awareness of one’s own gender identity
(Martin et al., 2002). If similar principles of cognitive balance can be applied to the implicit
attitudes one develops toward their gender group and themselves, then an examination of implicit
gender attitudes could provide an important opportunity to better understand how principles of
cognitive-affective balance begin to take hold at even earlier stages of the developing mind. For
example, a child’s emerging attitude toward the self might be partly shaped by the pressures of
cognitive balance stemming from learned attitude associations with his or her gender group. Just
as with the insights gained from research on implicit stereotypes, our research has also recently
examined the developmental trajectory of implicit gender attitudes to highlight potential
pathways and timing for attitude change.
Before presenting our data on the developmental trajectory of implicit gender attitudes,
we first summarize alternative hypotheses one might have about how and when these attitudes
develop. We will then show how our developmental data has constrained theory building in this
domain. First, it might be expected that boys and girls from a young age will simply exhibit a
preference for their own gender group. In two classic experiments, Sherif et al. (1961) and
Turner, Brown and Tajfel (1979) demonstrated that a mere preference for one’s ingroup may be
an automatic consequence of self-categorization processes – once you categorize yourself in a
group and identify with that group label you can’t help but feel positivity toward it. There is now
a wealth of data showing that children and adults tend to prefer the ingroup based on sharing the
same race or ethnicity (Aboud, 1988), religion (Heiphetz, Spelke, & Banaji, in press), nationality
(Barrett, 2007), or language (Kinzler, Dupoux, & Spelke, 2007). Indeed, both children and adults
even show preferences for previously unfamiliar social groups to which they have been
randomly assigned (e.g. Baron & Dunham, under review; Bigler et al., 1997; Brewer, 1979;
Dunham, Baron, & Carey, 2011; Greenwald et al., 2002; Nesdale & Flesser, 2001; Nesdale,
Griffiths, Durkin, & Maass, 2007; Nesdale, Maass, Griffiths, & Durkin, 2003; Spielman, 2000).
Consistent with these findings, Yee and Brown (1994) report that 2-year-olds verbally express an
own gender preference on explicit attitude measures; little boys like boys and little girls like
girls. As such, it might be predicted that boys and girls will exhibit similar levels of implicit own
gender positivity once they attain an awareness of their gender identity and associate the self
with that gender group. Provided a child’s gender identity doesn’t change, this own gender
preference should be observed across development.

Another possibility, however, is that at an early age, gender labels do not represent
abstract categories of males and females in general but rather map on more directly to a child’s
most salient male and female exemplars (e.g., mom and dad). If this is the case, then we might
expect boys and girls to form positive attitudes toward the gender of their primary caregiver.
Indeed, research with infants shows that boys and girls illustrate a preference to look at faces of
individuals who are matched in gender to their primary caregiver (Quinn et al., 2002). Thus,
children raised primarily by their mother show a preference for female faces and those raised
primarily by their father show a preference for male faces. Despite improvements in gender
equality in the division of labor at home and in the office, women continue to perform the lion’s
share of childrearing duties (Croft, Schmader, Block, & Baron, under review) and thus it may be
expected that a preference for female will similarly shape the gender attitudes of both boys and
girls. As such, a role for maternal attachment implicates early-emerging female positivity in both
males and females as positive attitudes toward one’s mother generalize to positive attitudes
toward women in general.
Of course, a preference for one’s ingroup and a preference for the gender of one’s
primary caregiver can both exert some combinatory influence over the development of gender
attitudes, albeit differently for boys and girls. For girls, both mechanisms would reinforce a
strong own gender preference (female = good). For boys, these two forces should act in opposing
directions, provided the primary caregiver is female. In this case it might be expected that boys
will exhibit a weaker own gender preference relative to females (male = a little good), a
significant but weaker preference for female (female = a little good), or the two effects could
cancel each other out producing no clear gender preference. This tension for boys should be
evident early in development given preverbal children’s sensitivity to the gender of their primary
caregiver (Quinn et al., 2002) and the fact that the primary caregiver is more prominent in the
life experiences of young children.
At a young age, children’s developing concepts of ‘male’ and ‘female’ can also be
shaped by observations that in books and media, males and females often enact different
behaviors or embody differentially valenced roles. For example, Rudman and colleagues
(Rudman & Goodwin, 2004; Rudman, Phelan & Heppen, 2007) highlight a tendency to associate
men more than women with violence. Although Rudman and colleagues speculate that children
might not develop a fear of male violence until adolescence, when a higher propensity for male
violence reaches a peak (United States Department of Health and Human Services, 2001), even
quite young children are exposed to the potential threat of males through indirect mediums such
as television programming where villains are frequently male (Gerbner & Gross, 1978;
Sternglanz & Serbin, 1974; Tedesco, 1974). The salience of such negative and fear inducing
imagery might enable a relatively early but strong association of male = bad. For example,
studies have shown that even preschoolers have a tendency to assume that males respond to
ambiguous situations with more anger than do females (Parmley & Cunningham, 2008). Such
information, whether learned directly or indirectly, might simply exacerbate a tendency among
girls to prefer their own gender (female = good & male = bad), while again mitigating, canceling
out, or even reversing an own group positivity bias among boys.
New empirical insights into the development of gender attitudes. Thus far we have
detailed several alternative hypotheses for the development of implicit gender attitudes,
depending on different mechanisms that could be involved. Importantly, while each mechanism
supports different predictions about the emergence and ontogenesis of implicit gender attitudes
among boys and girls, it is certainly possible that multiple mechanisms operate concurrently or
even independently across development. Clearly, developmental data is crucial in adjudicating
among these contrasting theoretical positions. We next turn to evidence from our labs on the
actual developmental trajectory of implicit gender attitudes to provide new insight into which
mechanisms shape these attitudes and when during development that influence is exerted.
The earliest developmental examination of implicit gender attitudes to date focused on 4-
5-year-olds using the Preschool IAT (PSIAT), a child-friendly adaptation of the adult IAT
(Cvencek, Greenwald, & Meltzoff, 2011). Here, children were tasked with categorizing images
of boys and girls into their respective categories using either a large green or orange response
button connected to the computer. Concurrently, children heard (and saw) affectively positive
words (e.g., good, nice) and affectively negative words (e.g., bad, mad) and were similarly asked
to classify these words into their respective categories (good or bad) using the same two response
buttons. Once again, the average reaction time and error rate to categorize male + good (and
female + bad) using the same response key was compared with the average reaction time and
error rate to categorize female + good (and male + bad) using the same response key. If children
exhibit an implicit preference for their own gender group, then they should be faster and more
accurate to categorize images of same gender when those pictures are paired with the same
response button used to simultaneously categorize positive words.
Turning to the data, we observed that girls exhibited a strikingly strong implicit
preference for female over male, whereas boys exhibited a marginally significant preference for
their own gender group (Cvencek, Greenwald, & Meltzoff, 2011). Thus, children generally
exhibited evidence of own gender bias, but this bias was significantly stronger for girls than
boys. Even if an own group positivity bias influences implicit gender attitudes at this young age,
it appears that other factors could be mitigating the strength of the own gender preference among
boys. This discovery of a weaker preference among 4-year-old boys toward their own gender
group may reflect an internalization of positive attitudes toward the gender of their primary
caregiver (who is most often female). It may also reflect an internalization of a male =
violent/angry stereotype. One way to tease these possibilities apart is to collect data on children’s
primary caregiver and to measure children’s implicit gender stereotypes about violence and
aggression and examine what role these variables play in shaping implicit gender attitudes at this
age.
Moving to an examination of gender attitudes among school-aged children with a specific
focus on documenting age and gender differences in attitude, we recently measured the implicit
gender attitudes among children ages 5-17 (Dunham, Baron, & Banaji, under review). This
procedure followed a similar IAT design reported in the preschool study above, whereby
children were asked to categorize images of boys and girls into their respective categories along
with affectively positive and negative words presented acoustically through headphones into the
categories good and bad. We tested nearly 500 children across this age range with an equal
distribution of males and females at each age. As such, we achieved much better power at
detecting age and gender related differences in the magnitude and direction of these implicit
gender cognitions compared with the prior study by Cvencek and colleagues.
The youngest girls in our sample exhibited an implicit pro-female bias and the magnitude
of this bias did not change across the age range studied. This is a remarkable degree of stability
in own gender bias for girls throughout childhood and adolescence, seemingly uninfluenced by
puberty where notions of masculinity and femininity might be expected to change dramatically.
This study also found that boys at the youngest ages in the sample reported a significant implicit
own gender preference. This finding provides stronger statistical support for the general
conclusion reached by Cvencek, Greenwald, and Meltzoff (2011) that males also implicitly
evaluate their own gender positively. Moreover, as in Cvencek et al.’s study of preschoolers, the
magnitude of this bias was substantially weaker than that shown by their female counterparts. In
other words, young girls associated female with good more than young boys associated male
with good, even though both showed a significant attitudinal preference for their own gender
over the other.
One unique aspect of the Dunham et al. study of implicit attitudes across childhood is the
ability to use process dissociation analyses to distinguish between an association of ingroup =
good and outgroup = bad, a distinction that should further disentangle the unique hypotheses
raised earlier (Batchelder & Reifer, 1999; Conrey, Sherman, Gawronski, Hugenberg, & Groom,
2005; Sherman et al., 2008). Using these analyses, Dunham and colleagues reveal that a female =
good and a male = bad association was observed among girls and the relative strength of each
association did not change with age. In contrast, boys only showed evidence of a male = good
association that gradually weakens across childhood until no gender preference is observed in or
around adolescence. Thus, at no point in development did boys exhibit a female = bad
association.
Together, these data are among the first and most convincing to suggest an early
emerging role for own group positivity among both boys and girls perhaps in combination with a
fear of male violence bias that might model a more negative association with men. Interestingly,
our data seem to suggest that girls may learn this male = bad association early on and this
association remains stable across development. Among boys, in contrast, their disappearing
preference for their own group around puberty hints at the possibility that greater direct exposure
to male aggression may help undo this own gender preference. It is also possible that own group
positivity bias may operate alongside a maternal attachment bias, thereby increasing positivity
toward women. These new findings may explain why males failed to show an outgroup = bad
association across development. It will be especially important for further research to build off
these early findings to evaluate the impact of the male = bad association for males and females at
different points during development. Such research could begin to examine the development of
implicit gender stereotypes about violence and whether there is evidence of balance among such
stereotypes, self-concept, and attitudes at some point during development.
Emergence of cognitive balance among gender attitudes, self-concepts, and
behavior. Our recent findings suggest that gender biases emerge by the fifth year of life and are
largely stable in magnitude across development, at least for girls. We next consider how these
emerging biases toward gender concepts interact with a developing sense of self, given the
principles of cognitive balance discussed earlier. Recall, according to BIT (Greenwald et al.,
2002), people with high self-esteem should display stronger ingroup bias. This is because people
strive to maintain consistent attitudes toward the self and toward their ingroups. Thus,
developmentally, BIT allows for (a) either self-esteem or ingroup bias to precede the other in
development or (b) for both to develop concurrently. Current research provides both the
framework, as well as the methodology, that will allow for a much closer empirical investigation
of the developmental course of the interrelationship among these implicit constructs.
Cvencek, Greenwald, and Meltzoff (under review) examined evidence of balance among
implicit gender self-concept, self-esteem, and gender attitudes among 5-year-old children. Once
again, they employed a modified version of the PSIAT to measure implicit self-concepts and
self-esteem with preschool children. They observed theoretically expected principles of
affective–cognitive consistency (Greenwald et al., 2002) operating in children as young as 5

years-of-age, such that children who had positive self-esteem and strong gender self-concepts
also displayed greater positivity toward their own gender. These results now contribute to a
growing body of research documenting evidence for principles of cognitive balance operating in
children as young as 5 years of age (Cvencek, Meltzoff, & Greenwald, 2011; Dunham et al.,
2007). It is interesting to note that balance among these attitudinal constructs occurs a full 3-
years before documented evidence of balance among the implicit gender stereotypes discussed
earlier. Such a finding suggests that the failure to detect balance among younger kids in the
domain of gender stereotypes is not the result of a cognitive limitation of the mind in establishing
balance, but rather those constructs may take longer to form interconnections. Finally, although
implicit self-esteem and ingroup positivity appear to be present and developing concurrently by
age 5, it is possible that one precedes the other during development. Once more, no studies have
examined balance among these constructs with younger samples to date, leaving this an area of
considerable interest for further research.
Although the relationship among implicit gender attitudes, explicit gender attitudes, and
observable behavior has only recently received developmental examination, there is suggestive
evidence of balance among these constructs as well. For example, in the study of preschool
children’s implicit gender attitudes reported above, Cvencek, Greenwald, and Meltzoff (2011)
examined the relationship between implicit and explicit gender attitudes and children’s gendered
play activities. Implicit attitudes were measured using a variant of the PSIAT. Explicit attitudes
were measured using a forced-choice preference measure where participants had to choose
(across several trials) which gender individual they liked more. Finally, to measure gendered
play preference, parents were asked to indicate how frequently during the past month their
children played with gender typical toys, engaged in stereotypical activities, and exhibited
gender typical behaviors.
According to Cvencek, Greenwald, and Meltzoff (2011) implicit and explicit measures of
gender attitudes correlated significantly with one another, such that the more children implicitly
preferred their own gender group, the more they reported an explicit preference for people of that
gender. Moreover, both measures predicted variance in parents’ reports of their children’s
gendered play activities. Thus, the more children implicitly preferred one gender over the other,
the more likely their parent reported that their child engaged in behaviors typical of that
preferred gender. Pointing to the unique role played by implicit processes in predicting behavior,
children’s implicit gender attitudes predicted their play preferences over and above the role
played by children’s explicit attitudes toward gender groups.
Thus, similar to the developmental emergence of implicit gender stereotypes, children’s
implicit gender attitudes are shown here to emerge early in development – by the fourth or fifth
year of life, and are bound, in some part, by principles of cognitive-affective balance from a
young age. These findings in the gender domain parallel recent reports on the early emergence
and developmental stability of implicit race attitudes (Baron & Banaji, 2006, 2009; Dunham,
Baron, & Banaji, 2008), underscoring potentially broad signatures of how implicit associations
form and develop. While there is considerable research to be pursued, some of which we have
outlined here, the evidence is building in support of the important role cognitive balance plays in
children’s emerging network of associations. Such findings, across measures of gender
stereotype, attitude, identity, and behavior, highlight the importance of targeting a vast web of
constructs from an early age if one wants to affect positive change for the implicit associations
that contribute to gender differences in behavior and well-being more generally.
A Roadmap for Change: Insights from Developmental Investigations

Sociocultural learning theories stress the importance of the environment in shaping
children’s beliefs and attitudes toward social groups. Most learning theories are quite broad,
emphasizing the general importance of both direct and indirect experiences. The very nature of
these learning mechanisms means individuals will sometimes acquire negative attitudes and
stereotypic attributes about themselves and their groups. As such, understanding how to change
these implicit associations has received considerable attention, focusing on contact with outgroup
members as well as direct and indirect forms of exposure to counter-stereotypical and counter-
attitudinal information (Dovidio & Gaertner, 1999; Dovidio et al., 2002; Dovidio et al., 2004;
Gaertner & Dovidio, 2005; Gaertner et al., 1999; Gregg, Seibt, & Banaji, 2006; Olsson, et al.,
2005; Pettigrew & Tropp, 2006; Tropp & Pettigrew, 2005). Unfortunately, much of this work has
revealed that while change is possible, it is also surprisingly difficult to achieve. While many
studies share this general conclusion, it is worth noting that all of these examinations have
exclusively focused on adult samples. However, recent data on the early emergence of implicit
stereotypes, attitudes, and cognitive-affective balance from our labs and others discussed here
highlights the importance of bringing developmental data to bear on understanding the
malleability of implicit associations.
Looking forward, developmental analysis will play a crucial role in understanding when
across the lifespan implicit associations are most amenable to change and may help shed light on
the challenges faced in changing the minds’ of adults. For example, several existing theoretical
models produce strikingly different predictions concerning the developmental trajectory of
implicit intergroup cognition with implications for when such cognitions would be most flexible.
Only developmental evidence will help adjudicate among these alternatives. On one view,
intergroup stereotypes and attitudes are acquired slowly, the result of accumulated experience
over the lifespan (Bigler & Liben, 2006; Devine, 1989; Greenwald & Banaji, 1995). This view
supports the hypothesis (a) that change will become increasingly more difficult with age as there
will be a longer period of reinforcement to overcome.
A second view, motivated by the literature on executive function development, suggests
that with age comes a global increase in the flexibility of children’s thought (Aboud, 1988;
Bigler & Liben, 2006; Davidson, Amso, Anderson, & Diamond, 2006; Jones, Rothbart & Posner,
2003; Piaget, 1929; Piaget, Green, Ford, & Flamer, 1971). Accordingly, this view supports the
hypothesis (b) that efforts to change implicit associations will be more successful later in
development (i.e., adolescence) as the capacity to revise earlier thoughts improves. Both
hypotheses predict a gradual change in the flexibility of implicit intergroup cognition across
development, albeit in opposite directions.
On a third view, implicit associations are particularly influenced by early life
experiences, perhaps akin to a sensitive period, whereby first impressions become particularly
difficult to modify. Such a view supports the hypothesis (c) that the optimal period to affect
change occurs in early childhood at the time these associations first take root (Rudman, 2004;
Rudman et al., 2007), with no specific predictions about age-related differences in the capacity
for change after this period. The converging evidence from our labs on implicit gender
stereotype and attitude development that we have summarized here supports the idea of a
sensitive period for the development of implicit associations. Specifically, these studies reveal
that such associations are learned surprisingly early during development, and that there is very
little change in the magnitude of such associations from age 5 onward. These findings not only
parallel what has been observed in the domain of race (Baron & Banaji, 2006; Dunham et al.,
2008), but they also underscore the generality of our earlier claims that such associations form
early and quickly, relatively unaffected by the wealth of learning opportunities that await the
developing mind later in childhood and adolescence. Indeed, given the general stability of these
implicit associations across development as well as our presented evidence of cognitive-affective
balance that only strengthens over time among school-aged children, we believe that a sensitive
period of acquisition appears to take place before or around ages 4-5 for gender attitudes and by
age 7-8 for gender stereotypes about math and science (at least among Western societies where
formal schooling in these disciplines occurs).
One important implication of our speculation of a sensitive period in the formation of
these implicit cognitions is that efforts to change an individual’s gender stereotypes or attitudes
may be most effective by reaching the child at the very point during development when these
associations first take root in the mind. Such a claim runs contrary to the current research focus
of investigating adult populations. Examining developmental constraints on the malleability of
implicit social cognition can focus on changing the content of the cognition (e.g., we should be
instilling that girls do science just as well!) and, based on our findings of cognitive balance,
might also minimize the strength of association between self and gender (thereby reducing the
likelihood that girls will internalize the stereotype that science isn’t for “me” and that boys will
internalize the attitude that “I” am bad).
One way to approach these questions is to design an experiment with participants who
range in age from childhood through adolescence. An initial assessment of an implicit attitude or
stereotype should be assessed, followed by a targeted intervention (e.g., direct contact with a
counter-attitudinal or stereotypical exemplar such as a female), and then a measure of the
implicit association following the intervention period. Age-related differences in how much that
initial association changes based on the controlled experience will begin to shed light on the
proposals raised earlier.
Other efforts could focus on manipulating the length, quality, and type of exposure to
counter-attitudinal and stereotypical information. For example, research with young adults has
seen some success in predicting weaker implicit gender stereotypes after both short term and
long-term exposure to successful female role models (Stout, Dasgupta, Hunsinger, & McManus,
2011), but such interventions might be stronger and more long lasting when conducted with
young children. One suggestion would be to expose children to early examples of women
excelling in mathematics. This could take the form of reading children’s books about famous
female scholars in the field. Another possibility is to ensure that summer camps and after school
programs that have math-centered classes for young children have a gender parity requirement.
While parents might be subtly influenced by their own gender biases and sign up boys more so
than girls for such programs, the result is that parents’ own gender biases reinforce different
skills in boys and girls. Another suggestion would be for mothers and fathers to supervise gender
atypical courses for their children. Thus, in the case of math and science courses, moms would
make more of a concerted effort to review this work with their children while dads focused on
other subjects such as reading and writing. This practice would provide children with evidence
that counters the prevailing cultural stereotypes. Effects on developing implicit associations of
math with gender categories and the self would inform best practices and timing for
interventions. Surprisingly, we aren’t familiar with any other research focusing exclusively on
interventions with young children designed to change implicit gender associations.
Of course, it should also be recognized that our evidence for the stability of implicit
gender attitudes and stereotypes from childhood to adulthood does not imply that these
associations cannot be changed at later ages. Indeed, while the magnitude of the associations we
examined appears fairly stable across development, features of the environment (cultural
attitudes and beliefs) are also fairly stable. As such, it is still possible that systematic changes in
the cultural messages people receive can lead to changes of various degrees across development
in the magnitude of the corresponding implicit associations. Examining this possibility will
surely be another important avenue for future research.
Final Thoughts on Promoting Gender Equality
In this chapter, we have summarized recent evidence for the early development and
ongoing stability of implicit gender biases. We have also argued that an understanding of how
gender associations shape children's developing views of themselves points to the need for early
intervention for effective change. The findings presented here with elementary-school children
reveal that gender-linked academic stereotypes exert an influence on children’s math self-
concepts much earlier than previously thought. Intervention programs aimed at changing the
ideas of students about gender and mathematics might profitably be directed at very early stages
in development. Specifically, interventions based on implicit measurement techniques can be of
particular benefit to elementary-school students: By changing young girls’ implicit attitudes,
stereotypes, and self-concepts about math and science, their performance and interest in these
domains might also increase. Importantly, exerting such change does not require students to
complete a specific curriculum. Implicit measures can also be used to provide diagnostic
information about the prevalence of stereotypic biases among students and the effectiveness of
approaches that attempt to mitigate these biases. Implicit measures are easily administered,
psychometrically sound, and sensitive to individual differences. If the lower math achievement in
girls can be partially accounted for by those girls’ internalization of the cultural stereotype that
math is for boys, a method to measure those stereotypes at an early age will provide a useful tool
for teachers in assessing their students and designing appropriate intervention strategies.
The developmental trajectory of implicit gender attitudes reported here also raises
concern for children’s exposure to another cultural association, the male = violent stereotype.
The internalization of this association may be diminishing boys’ ability to maintain a positive
own group preference and fueling a male = bad association among females. If this causal
relationship is borne out through further research, then new consideration must be given to the
content of children’s (and adults’) television programming, especially given evidence of the
interrelationship among implicit constructs such as gender identity, gender attitudes, and self-
esteem. Indeed, the far reach of implicit gender attitudes, shaping attitudes toward the self and
one’s gender identity through principles of cognitive balance, underscores the need to address
this issue quite early development (Cvencek, Greenwald, & Meltzoff, under review).
Gender identity is a foundational way in which we define ourselves. As a result, the
associations with gender categories in a child's environment are learned and internalized quite
easily. Efforts at reducing gender bias then needs to focus on how environments shape broader
cultural information about gender that becomes imprinted onto the minds’ of bodies just a few
years removed from diapers. Such a conclusion might only be reached from a careful analysis of
the developmental trajectory of these implicit associations. Without such inquiry, the window
within which such associations form and are considered most malleable would still be wrongly
attributed to a period much later in development. We hope researchers who traditionally study
the gender cognitions of adults or who focus only on explicit measures of gendered cognitions
will increasingly see the value of developmental inquiry in constraining theories of acquisition
and change by examining implicit social cognition starting from very early ages.
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Gender Attitudes and Stereotypes in Childhood 1

The Gendered Self-Concept:

How Implicit Gender Stereotypes and Attitudes Shape Self-Definition

pervasiveness with which the psychological representation of gender as a social category

development of children’s conception of gender is rapid and outpaces their understanding of

for future research.

math-intensive fields (Nosek et al., 2002). From a developmental perspective, then, it is

examine the developmental trajectory of unconscious cognitions. Understanding when these

establish greater gender equality.

The advent of implicit measures avoids several methodological challenges in examining

measures of implicit associations are generally less susceptible to self-presentational concerns

free from such social desirability concerns.

such, the focus on implicit processes provides a broader population to examine.

gender. Highlighting an important theoretical distinction between self-reportable explicit

representations and introspectively inaccessible implicit representations (Banaji, 2001; Devine,

Theoretical Perspectives on the Trajectory of Implicit Associations

computational mechanism that detects patterns of covariation, establishing an implicit

stereotypes or attitudes or whether they are in reference to social groups or to non-social

of one’s own preference to spend time on math-related activities).

between those two concepts should strengthen.

among female college students, a balanced configuration of implicit math–gender stereotypes,

Dunham, Baron & Banaji, 2007).

sequence can be expressed as: Me = Girl; Me ≠ Math; therefore Girls ≠ Math.

might show weaker development of gender-based self-concepts through either mechanism.

Moreover, an examination of principles of cognitive balance among these concepts in children

culturally universal mechanism for developmental change in children’s social cognition

trajectory of such associations by the eighth year of life.

ability influences children’s emerging math self-concepts and performance. A meta-analysis of

cognitions at the implicit level.

association strength among select concepts.

in math (Cvencek, Meltzoff, & Kapur, under review).

are shaped by the prevailing cultural stereotypes in early childhood. Furthermore, it is

noteworthy that math-gender stereotypes were demonstrated in Singaporean culture (Cvencek,

somewhat smaller magnitude.

conclusion that the underlying principles of cognitive balance in children’s representations of

regardless of the content of the beliefs.

Development of gender stereotypes can impair performance. In addition to

corresponds to variation in children’s implicit math stereotypes. In a cross-national comparison

of 34 countries, country-level measures of math–gender stereotypes predicted country-level

gender gaps in 8th-grade mathematics achievement —stronger societal stereotypes against

mathematics performance (Nosek et al., 2009).

math–gender stereotypes were particularly predictive of lower achievement among low-

of processes including physiological signs of stress, meta-cognitive monitoring of performance,

However, an assumption of stereotype threat theory is that these cognitive impairments

experience when gender stereotypes are primed.

Research is needed to adjudicate between these two possible mechanisms by which

implicates motivational variables like avoidance of math-related tasks and activities as

contributing to underperformance. The second implicates impairments in cognitive processing

separate effects of motivation versus cognitive interference especially as predicted by implicit

children as young as 3 years-of-age show a tendency to conform to behaviors stereotypical of

reported developmental increase in strength of cognitive balance among related self-constructs.

Evidence for the Emergence of Implicit Gender Attitudes

examined the developmental trajectory of implicit gender attitudes to highlight potential

pathways and timing for attitude change.

an automatic consequence of self-categorization processes – once you categorize yourself in a

preference should be observed across development.

toward women in general.

life experiences of young children.

out, or even reversing an own group positivity bias among boys.