As it has been proven the stereotypical behaviour is influenced by our environment then it makes it quite obvious it also depends on the environment a child is bought up Best and Williams have found that in different cultures children learn stereotypes differently children in Pakistan and new Zealand for example already have a clear stereotypes at the age of five whilst those in Brazil and France showed little stereotyping at 5 but more clearer stereotypes at the age of 8. In Britain we live in a multi-cultural society and being a British born Ethnic myself I understand where there is a culture difference. I may clarify at this stage that through out the rest of may study I will refer to British born Pakistani children as ethnic children.
As it is proven that environment is the main influence of stereotyping I need to understand why I think that ethnic children will be different to white born children. White children being more into Hollywood films and Ethnic people being more interested in Bollywood movies here there is a well difference in the ideas being portrayed such Bollywood movies represent males to be fierce, competitive and strong macho men and women are portrayed as being soft kind, sensitive people. There are also other environmental factors such as the type of occupations men an women take up in the two cultures, if we look at ethnic women’s occupation although it is gradually changing we still see an enormous amount of women staying at home compared to white women who are well into male occupations such as army officers work and the police force although not working is apparent in both cultures another area which was pointed out in the Best and William experiment is that Pakistani boys and girls are trained in early via Muslim cultural traditions, for sex-differentiated roles so this may also have effect a final example of where there is a difference is the clothing were in the British white society the dress sense the
There are factors which show similarity in the cultures where the ethnic people have adapted a west culture such as reading the same books, and watching the same programmes and cartoons on TV. There is also a change when children begin to start school and mix in culture, as they are exposed to the same amount of stereotypes.
In my investigation I want to make a link between best and Williams’s investigation and look at stereotyping comparing British born children at the age of 4-5 and Ethnic born Pakistani children. I will carry out my investigation by designing a stick man in a certain position and having two possible things it could be doing one which describes a female action such as putting the clothes on the line and another which would be a male action such as hammering a nail in the well an then asking children which of those they think the stick man is doing.
Hypothesis
There will be a significant difference in sex role stereotyping in children who are white and ethnic Pakistani.
Null hypothesis
There will be no difference in sex role stereotyping in children who are white and ethnic Pakistani.
Design
The experimental was conducted because design, it is the only method which will make it an experiment objective as possible and allow me to test and compare variables and effectively to test the hypothesis. The two variable in the investigations are independent variable being the W.British children and the Asian British children the other variable which is the dependant variable will be the two stereotypical behaviours the stick man could be doing . Any extraneous variables which may cause my investigation to go wrong maybe that the stereotype picture maybe one sided I.e. it may be a clear women in order to over come this I will be doing a pilot study before carrying the investigation out this will explained further on.
The experiment will be conducted as a field experiment in a school as this is and will make my results as best as possible and if a laboratory experiment was conducted the result would not be accurate as children may act different in unfamiliar surroundings. The experiment I will be carrying out will be a independent group design where different participants will take part in each experimental condition this is because I am looking at a comparison between the two variables and matched pairs and repeated measures will not be suitable as with matched pairs it will be very hard to find participants alike under so little time and repeated measures will not able me to compare participants. My investigation will take place with two conditions with 10 participants taking part in each five will be male and five female I have chosen this amount because it will be hard to find children of the type that are needed. I also need to consider ethics as I am using children I will need to require permission from parents, guardians or teachers. As part of my design I have carried out a pilot study where by I showed the actual drawing of person which will be used in the investigation (see appendix 1). The picture was shown 10 male and 10 female children and adults family members the answer I received is shown below which suggests that the extraneous variable has been controlled. The pilot study also enabling me to see any problem that may occur.
Participants
The target population was the reception class of Intack County Primary School, Blackburn. These children are aged 4-5 of middle sex and the class consisted of mixed Asian and white children. The children will be randomly selected form those whom have permission to participate (see appendix…) preferably by the teacher of the class of whom she thinks will be capable of actually of participating.
Materials and apparatus
The material used consisted of participants aged 4-5, picture of a person doing an activity which could be doing either putting the clothes or hammering a nail in the wall (appendix 1). I will also have an answering sheet (appendix 2) where I will be able to mark the reply I get from the children and standardised instruction (appendix 3) here I have received enough conformation letters for 20 participants which will now enable be to succeed in carrying out the investigation, a list of standardized instructions which I will be reading out to the children but before the actual investigation I will be needing a letter of conformation which I will give out to parents.
Appendix 1- picture of a person doing an activity
Appendix 2 – answer sheet
Appendix 3 – standardized instructions
Appendix 4- letter of acceptance
Procedure
Here I have described exactly what I did step by step:
- I arrive at the school in the afternoon whilst the children are out on there afternoon break which I have discussed with the teacher already and this will gave me a chance to have debrief the teacher on how I like the experiment to work.
- I then asked the teacher in which she and I preferred to see the children and we came to agreement that I should be sat at a desk and she will send the children one by.
- As she told the children to come to me I sat the child making sure they where comfortable as possible, before the standardised instruction where read out to them.
- I then readout the standardised instruction which I had memorised in order to helping the participant feel as comfortable as possible (see appendix 3) whilst I did this the picture sheet was placed in front of the seating position once I had read out the instructions I waited for an answer helping the child to answer the question in every way but giving no direction of answer. Once I received an answer and thanked the child I then mark the answer once they are have walked away on the answer sheet.
- The procedure was repeated to all 20 participants
During the investigation I also received some answer which I did not mark down which where children who didn’t answer and struggled with the question, and children who thought the person was doing both.
Result
The aim of my investigation was to finding whether the sex-role stereotyping in children in two different cultures which are ethnic and white. The table below shows the results I have found if you look at the results I have found that in white boys there is a quite a mix range of sex role stereotyping compared to those boys who are ethnic where only one boy said that the person was hanging the clothes. In the girls the finding was exactly the same both cultures had one girl saying that the person was hammering a nail. The graph below compares the two sexes stereotyping as you can see there is a clear difference in the boys and in the girls the bar graph shows exactly the same result
Discussion
The aim of the investigation was to see the relation in stereotyping in ethnic and white children. The results show that stereotyping in the boys was stronger in the ethnic children then in the white children but the results in the girls was exactly the same only one girl in both culture stated that the person was hammering a nail.
In the hypothesis it is stated that there will be a significant difference in sex role stereotyping in children who are white and ethnic Pakistani, my results support the view of in the boys but not in the girls
Standardised instructions
- Offer the child a seat and introduce your self “ hi my name is salmah”
- describe what they are supposed to do “I was wondering if you can help me by answering this question
- ask the question “can you see this picture what do you think that person is doing, do you think he’s hammering a nail or is she putting clothes on the line”
- wait for an answer and help the child if they are struggling by repeating the question
- then thank the child and mark the question once they have worked away
