Gender essentialism in transgender and cisgender children
Gender essentialism in transgender and cisgender children
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DOI：
10.1371/journal.pone.0224321
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发表时间：
2019-11-13
期刊：
影响因子：
3.7
通讯作者：
Olson, Kristina R.
中科院分区：
文献类型：
--
作者：
Gulgoz, Selin;DeMeules, Madeleine;Olson, Kristina R.
在不同文化背景下，儿童都表现出一种早期就出现的将性别本质化的倾向，即认为性别是与生俱来的，且能预示典型的性别刻板偏好。然而，此前的研究局限于那些自身性别体验在很大程度上与性别本质主义假设相符的儿童。相比之下，跨性别儿童的性别认同（以及相关的性别刻板偏好）与其出生时被指定的性别不同，这似乎对性别本质主义观点构成了挑战。在本研究中，我们探究了跨性别儿童（N = 97，年龄3 - 11岁）在多大程度上认为儿童出生时的性别能够预示其日后具有性别特征的偏好。此外，我们招募了两个对照组：跨性别参与者的顺性别兄弟姐妹（N = 59）以及年龄和性别匹配的顺性别对照组（N = 90）。在一个经过调整的“出生时抱错”范式中，所有组的参与者都认为儿童出生时的性别能够预示其日后具有性别特征的偏好；当目标角色在与其自身性别一致的社会化环境中成长，而非在与不同性别一致的社会化环境中成长时，参与者尤其倾向于这样认为。顺性别参与者随着年龄增长，性别本质主义观念有所减弱，而跨性别儿童在相关观念上并未表现出与年龄相关的变化。本研究结果首次表明，尽管跨性别儿童和顺性别儿童在性别体验上存在差异，但他们可能同样会将性别本质化。然而，这些发现也引发了关于不同参与者群体可能如何对测量方式做出不同解读的问题。
Children, across cultures, show an early-emerging tendency to essentialize gender, viewing gender as inborn and predictive of stereotypical preferences. However, research has been limited to children whose own gender experience is largely consistent with the assumptions of gender essentialism. In contrast, transgender children have gender identities (and related stereotypical preferences) that differ from their sex assigned at birth, which therefore appear to challenge an essentialist view of gender. In the current study, we examined the degree to which transgender children (N=97,3-11 years) view a child's sex at birth as predictive of their later gender-typed preferences. Additionally, we recruited two comparison groups: cis-gender siblings of transgender participants (N=59) and cisgender, age- and gender-matched controls (N=90). In an adapted switched-at-birth paradigm, participants in all groups believed that a child's sex at birth would predict their later gender-typed preferences; participants were especially likely to think so when the target character was reared in a socialization environment that aligned with the target's own gender, rather than one where the socialization environment aligned with a different gender. Whereas cisgender participants showed a decline in essentialism with age, transgender children did not show any age-related changes in their beliefs. The current findings are the first to show that transgender and cisgender children, despite differences in gender experiences, might similarly essentialize gender. However, these findings also raise questions about how different participant groups might interpret measures differently.