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Early Gender Development in Children and Links with Mental and Physical Health

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Abstract

Early childhood is an important time for gender identity development. During this developmental period, children learn that there are gender categories and assign meaning to these categories. This chapter focuses on two aspects of gender development—gender identification (e.g., evaluations of one’s gender) and gender typing (e.g., gender-stereotypical dress, play, and other behaviors). In early childhood, it is normative for most children to exhibit a positive and strong sense of gender identification, as well as elevated gender-typing. However, this is not true of all children as not all boys and girls adhere to a gender-normative path. This chapter aims to review literature encompassing both gender normative and gender-variant children. We discuss the developmental trajectories of gender identification and gender-typing for each group. Further, we put forward a model whereby feeling different from others based on gender or feeling devalued by others based on one’s gender can put children at risk for poorer mental and physical health. We discuss theory and evidence to support our model, identify future areas of inquiry, and suggest practical implications.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Psychology, California State University, 1250 Bellflower Blvd, Long Beach, CA, 90840-0901, USA

    May Ling D. Halim Ph.D. & Danielle Bryant M.A.

  2. Centre for Addiction and Mental Health, 250 College Street, Toronto, ON, Canada, M5T 1R8

    Kenneth J. Zucker Ph.D.

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  1. May Ling D. Halim Ph.D.
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  2. Danielle Bryant M.A.
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  3. Kenneth J. Zucker Ph.D.
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Correspondence to May Ling D. Halim Ph.D. .

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Editors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Preventive Medicine, Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai, New York, New York, USA

    Maya Rom Korin

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Halim, M.L.D., Bryant, D., Zucker, K.J. (2016). Early Gender Development in Children and Links with Mental and Physical Health. In: Korin, M. (eds) Health Promotion for Children and Adolescents. Springer, Boston, MA. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4899-7711-3_10

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