Gender differences can be defined as biological differences in sexes. However, the perceived differences are strongly influenced by cultural or societal beliefs and expectations rather than the differences in the actual sexes. The community expectations dictate the kind of behaviors that are deemed appropriate based on someone's gender. For example, immediately a child is born, the parents begin making arrangements on the traits to nurture in children depending on the child's gender. For example, if the child is a boy, the parents will buy all blue and toys associated with boys, and if the child is a girl, they buy all pink and dolls that are termed as girly. From this stage, the parents start nurturing their children towards the community expectations based on their gender (Helgeson, 2016). The gender difference societal expectations determine the kind of roles men and women take and determine how they engage in different fields and the challenges their face.
Research done by Parker (2017) found that Americans define men and women depending on their personality and claim that their gender highly influences it. Americans consider men and women to be different in expressing their feelings, interest, and physical abilities. Men and women tend to go through different pressure points as they navigate life, taking different roles in society. The research revealed that men face a lot of pressure to support their families financially and to be successful in their careers. In contrast, women face less pressure in supporting their families financially or advancing their careers. However, women face more pressure to be present and involved parents to their children than men. Women also face great pressure to look attractive physically, and most of the time to be defined as feminine depends on the women's physical look. The research also reviewed the traits that society values most from both women and men through open-ended questions, and the differences were quite striking. Most responses dwelled on the women's physical attractiveness, empathy, and nurturing nature as some of the societal women valued traits.
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On the other hand, professional and financial success, men's leadership and ambitions, toughness, and morality were some of the men's valued traits. However, society places a higher premium on men as compared to women. These expectations define the roles both genders take in a different field such as education, sports, workplaces, and those that are transgender or suffer from gender dysphoria finds a hard time settling in society.
Some courses are defined as being masculine and others feminine in education, and these labels determine the number of men and women who enroll in these courses. Society considers STEM courses to be manly, which has increased the number of male enrolments compared to female enrollment. Research by Jiang et al. (2018) compared gender differences in the enrollment and completion of STEM courses offered online. The research found out that even with the ongoing education equity campaign, these fields have more males than females. Averagely, 1in 5 learners in Stem Courses is female. This kind of enrollment is attributed to the community's views that men should do well in the challenging field due to their tough nature. The less involving courses have more females as compared to men.
Moreover, the gender differences contribute greatly to maternal son preferences when it comes to education. Men are tasked to support their families financially and therefore to make this possible; there have are higher chances of enrolling in competitive courses than their female counterparts. A study by Bose (2012) on gender disparities in education among the Indian population found out that community expectation has contributed greatly to maternal son preferences on education. Therefore, girls were at a higher educational disadvantage in families that have maternal son preferences.
Gender schemas are determining the gender role expectations of sportspeople based on biological sex. Once individuals identify themselves as either masculine or feminine, the community already sets expectations of what kind of sports and athletes they can engage in. sports are considered male-dominated and promote traditional gender roles. A literature review done by Yi-Hsiu & Chen-Yueh (2013) on masculine versus feminine sports found that gender stereotypes have been a societal phenomenon and determine men and women's participation in various sporting activities. However, societal expectations consider sporting activities to be more masculine, and women's engagement in more competitive or involving sports activities goes against the female's traditional sex roles. The researchers also argue that female participation in these competitive activities tends to masculinize women. These gender stereotypes and community expectations greatly influence individual's choices on which type of sports to engage in.
At times, individual choices cause role conflicts, especially when deciding to participate in sports that go against gender-appropriate and inappropriate activities. The role conflicts are caused by the societal expectations that women need to displays feminine behaviors as they participate in masculine activities. Evidence also reveals that men are likely to participate in team sports since masculine sports focus on strength and strong contact. Such is because men are considered to be good collaborators and team players as compared to women. Women's sports are likely to be individual games and have strong aesthetic elements compared to those of males. Therefore, to avoid being judged harshly by the community, men and women will tend to abide by the societal-defined gender roles in sports.
On the workplace gender issues, one may associate them with sexual harassment, a huge pay gap, and leadership. However, in most workplaces, gender issues result from gender differences and the community perceptions of males and females, which affect how men and women relate in workplaces. Women are traditionally painted to be emphatic and emotionally aware of their environment. Men are seen as dominant and are required to be assertive and confident enough (Heilman, 2012) . These men's traits are considered essential for any leadership position. Because of male dominance, women are forced to conform to the prevailing leadership styles, which are presented to be a bit foil to more feminin e traits and they end taking subordinate positions. Since society expects men to be aggressive, and those that show empathy tend to be termed as soft, which is deemed feminine by society. Therefore, men tend to be mocked due to these traits and resulted in acquiring aggressive traits. Women that are assertive, confident, or dominant are called bossy and aggressive. Also, since the community expects women to have strong social skills and being emotionally available to their colleagues, and if they do not show this trait, they called out and termed as insensitive. This gender-based personality difference affects how both men and women perform at workplaces.
Given that community has expectations based on one’s gender, those that suffer from Gender dysphoria find it hard in the community due to gender role conflict. Gender dysphoria, also referred to as gender identity disorder categorizes individuals who have felt that their gender identity is not incongruent to their sense of identity. Most people who have this disorder acquire it when they are young due to many challenges during their development stages. Since roles are assigned to individuals based on their gender alienation, those who have this disorder face gender role and expectation conflicts since they cannot fully associate themselves with a specific gender. Failure to identify with any gender can be traced back to childhood traumas and their desire to identify with one gender because hard makes them feel hopeless of ever gaining their identity. That results in other alternatives that help them identify with a certain gender. For example, a lady with an abusive father tends to acquire masculine strengths to protect her family from the father’s violence. Therefore, as they got older, there are some aspects of appearances that are termed to be feminine, which makes them feel misplaced and suffer from gender insecurities. Most of the teenagers who suffer from gender identity disorder feel hopeless and develop psychiatric problems, which can result in them committing suicide (Dhejne et al., 2016). Others tend to go through hormonal treatment and plastic surgery to achieve societal gender-based traits or appearances.
Gender differences can be defined as differences in separate sexes, but society's expectations reinforce what is termed masculine and feminine. These expectations determine what kind of roles men and women take in different fields and the kind of challenges their face in those fields. However, community expectations changes with generations For example, from the millennials onwards, there is a great emphasis on gender equity, which shapes how men and women related to each other in different fields; the researchers now need to look at the effects of acquiring gender equity and losing some the traditionally gender-based roles. This will help understand the role of gender diversity and how society can leverage it to drive change in the community.
References
Bose, S. (2012). A Contextual Analysis of Gender Disparity in Education in India: The Relative Effects of Son Preference, Women's Status, and Community. Sociological Perspectives.
Dhejne, C., Vlerken, R. v., & Arcelus., G. H. (2016). Mental health and gender dysphoria: A review of the literature. International Review of Psychiatry , 44-57.
Heilman, M. E. (2012). Gender stereotypes and workplace bias. Research in Organizational behavio r. 113-135.
Helgeson, V. S. (2016). The Psychology of Gender. Routledge
Jiang, S., Schenke, K., Eccles, J. S., Xu, D., & Warschauer, M. (2018, september 13). Cross-national comparison of gender differences in the enrollment in and completion of science, technology, engineering, and mathematics Massive Open Online Courses. Retrieved from https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0202463
Parker, K., Horowitz, J. M., & Stepler, R. (2017, November 30). On Gender Differences, No Consensus on Nature vs. Nurture. Social & Demographic Trends .
Yi-Hsiu, L., & Chen-Yueh, C. (2013). Masculine versus feminine sports: The effects of peer attitudes and fear of negative evaluation on sports participation among Taiwanese college students. Revue internationale de psychologie sociale , 23.
