To understand gendered roles in toys, there should be an understanding of the very activity of play. A large portion of play is for children to develop cognitive skills and lessons about communicating with others. Play also encourages traditional gendered roles and conditions boys and girls to perform these gender roles through play with toys. There are societal norms and expectations that are taught in primary socialization that can be detrimental to the development of girls and the restrictions put on of what they can and cannot do. This paper will discuss the societal issues specifically related to the history of gendered toys and solutions of societal changes that could transform the current normalization of gendered toys. Gender is a social construction which means differences between genders are products of social experiences not biology.
Gender is learned behaviors. There are common misconceptions of social constructionism. Some people believe that social construct is fictional, trivial, unimportant or not real because it is socially constructed A social phenomenon that is “constructed” through social contexts, and then often taken for objective, fixed “reality.”W.I. Thomas (1928), sociologist (https://courses.lumenlearning.com/sociology/chapter/social-constructions-of-reality/). Knowing this, teaching our children what “being a man” is and what “being a woman” is through toys and play does a huge disservices to both males and females. We socialize our children through toys and media. Children learn to categorize themselves by gender usually by age 3 and will start policing their peers by age 5 (Miller,2018). Policing peers happens when children pressure their peers to conform to traditional gender roles.
Children’s toys are cultural products which embody and transmit ideological messages about gender (Sweet, 2013). According to Elizabeth Sweet, “Industry explanations for this practice generally boil down to the claim that boys and girls have fundamentally different interests, preferences, skills, and proclivities and catering to these differences is necessary to sell toys (p.2). However, this wasn’t always the case. By 1925, gender had become much more evident in toys—the percentage of non- gendered toys dropped by 28 percentage points and the gendering of toys became more clear and pronounced.
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Of the 50% of toys that were gendered in this decade, there was an even split between toys aimed at boys or girls and between those gendered implicitly or explicitly (Sweet, 2013). From the 1920’s to the 1960’s toys made were promoting domesticity which was targeted at girls. 1959’s Barbie was modeled on a German doll that men would give to women (timeline news, 2018). According to Blakmore and Centers, (p.619), a study done 30 years ago observed the toys and other objects present in 1-6-year-old boys and girls bedrooms. The result was there were the same number of musical items and stuffed animals, but boys had a greater variety of toys. Boys had more vehicles and more “spatial-temporal toys” (p.619).
Toys geared toward boys during this time were about fighting, racing, and speeding. Girls rooms contained more dolls and domestic items. Blakmore and Centers found that neutral and moderately masculine toys were rated as most likely to stimulate intellectual and scientific skills. Knowing this our society gives an advantage to boys. Today aggression and violence are seen an issue but not seen as a “boy issue”. Issues seen in today’s society surrounding aggression, domestic violence and school shootings are because of how we influence our children and socialize them to be at a young age.
When walking in a toy store today, you can automatically tell which aisles are for boys and which aisles are for girls. The colors in girl’s isles are pink and glittery. There are domestic toys and dolls. Boy’s toy isles are filled with action figures, building sets, and toy guns. Just by having associations of what gendered toys are male and female, boys and girls that their opportunities lie in a box where certain roles are acceptable. Gender socialization through toy play spills into the lives of children as they get older. Masculinity and femininity are products of gender role stereotypes.
Typically, feminine gender roles have more flexibility than masculine gender roles. Because masculinity is defined in opposition to femininity, there is less room for gender deviance. Masculinity must continually prove through adherence to masculine gender roles (Miller, 2018). Boy toys promote violence and dominance. When children play with video games, the game designers create games with fighting and killing. There are also games that objectify women. When this is what boys are playing, they think this is an acceptable way to treat others and a proper way to express emotions.
We have made obvious changes towards gender equality. Many women have entered the public sphere while males have a greater share of domestic duties. We have not made sufficient progress in toys that promote gender neutrality. Instead there is an evidence that gender stereotyping is more rampant than ever before. This is limiting when it comes to what interest are acceptable. What can we do to change the current normalization of gendered toys? We can start with marketing. We can take away colors that represent specific genders so that children will feel free to explore all types of toys and feel confident there will be no gender policing.
This summer, retail giant Target announced that amid customer outcry it would stop labeling toys for girls or boys and remove any colored paper from its toy shelving that referenced gender, such as pink or blue (“Debate Rages Over Gender specific toys”, 2015). Toy play leads to learning vital skills needed for girls and boys to be well rounded adults. To have more girls in math and sciene we as parents and a society, must give our children permission to explore all types of toys and games. Babies are born into a world of gender expectations. They observe others behavior especially from parents and media to form preferences for certain toys. Parents can also advocate with other parents to ultimately change what the toy markets produce.
Gender socialization is constructed by the world around us. Toys play an important role in children’s’ learning and skills. Knowing from the past and how toys were gender neutral at different points in history, there is a way to provide children with the same opportunities regardless of gender, but we must start with the parents. If we are aware when we perpetuate gender stereotyping, we can change the dialogue and our decisions when buying toys for our children to promote gender equity in the future.
References
- Social Constructions of Reality – Lumen Learning
- Gendered Toys and the Perceptions of Children – National Center for Biotechnology Information
- Gender Typing of Children’s Toys: Causes, Consequences, and Correlates – National Center for Biotechnology Information
- The Effect of Gender-Stereotyped Toys on Boys’ and Girls’ Stereotypes and Play Behaviors – American Psychological Association
