Research that can support this theory was done by Slaby and Frey, where they showed children pictures of boys and girls. The responses were appropriate to Kolhbergs theory and thus supporting CDT.
This study has proved to be reliable as it has been similarly repeated and the same results were found.
However the criticisms of this are said to be that the interview had an element of interviewer bias as he was asking leading questions.
Also the pictures shown lack ecological value as there were not realistic to real life.
Damon too, studied gender appropriate behaviour. He asked children questions about what is gender appropriate about clothes, toys etc.
He found that children hold strong stereotypes and need security in stages 1 and 2 (gender identity and gender stability).
Research here is better then the research carried out by Slaby and Frey because there were more aspects to this particular research.
Examples being one for, there were no leading questions and were open ended while the children were allowed to discuss their answers.
The interview used quantitive data therefore a limitation could be the cause and effect can’t be established and variables cannot be controlled either.
However the problem with interviewing and studying children of this age is the fact they are mostly all very compliant so the demand characteristics are going to frequently happen.
Also the fact the children might not fully understand what it is, they are being asked to do and might have been giving answers because that was expected of them.
In conclusion, the CDT theory has validity as you can relate to it, whilst being supported with good evidence of research.
Martin and Halveson developed a schema theory, which could be an alternative to Kohlbergs CDT theory.
A schema is a mental framework for organising experiences. This theory states that the ability to develop a schema is innate even though the content is learnt.
There are no age related stages to this theory, but it is still a developmental one, seeing as it is dependent on the children’s readiness to categorise information from their environment. When children mature and experience more environmental stimuli, there schemas develop being more flexible and complex. These can then hold more ambiguous information. E.g. schemas simplify information processing for children.
Children pay attention to info that fits their schemas and ignore those, which do not.
But because they are simplifications, these can lead to distortions if new info doesn’t fit in with these schemas.
Gender is a powerful schema; the children are more interested in info about their own gender then the other.
Martin and Halvesdon conducted a study in 1983 which consisted of 6 – 5 yr old children where they were shown pictures of children carrying out activities which gender was consistent and gender inconsistent.
A few days later they were asked to recall the pictures and they found the children on average changed the sex of the gender in the inconsistent pictures to ones they expected to be gender consistent. This showed their memories were distorted to fit in within their schemas which existed already with gender.
A problem with this study was however, a somewhat researcher bias as they found what they wanted to find but in accordance with this, other research was done and found similar findings.
One example of this is Liben and Signorella 1993 where young children were shown pictures of adults engaged in stereotypical opposite gender activity e.g. male nurse.
The findings were that children disregarded the info insisting they saw a female nurse.
This evidently supports the notation that children only notice information that is consistent with their schemas.
Martin conducted another experiment where children aged 4 –5 were shown toys and told the toys were either for boys or for girls.
It was found that the male children did only want to play with the ‘boys toys’ and not the ‘girls toys’.
Fagot then however said teachers tented to reinforce ‘feminine’ behaviours in both boys and girls such as ’being quiet’ etc. however both displayed different behaviours and this suggests boys gender schemes override the reinforcement.
There have also been research done by Bee that has failed to find a strong connection between gender awareness and gender typed behaviour.
Archer also found that girls tend to have more flexible gender concepts and a greater tendency to engage in opposite gender activities, proving these findings are inconsistent to the theory.
The schema theory is positive in the way that is has no rigid age stages and thus is more flexible. The theory also allowed individual differences and cultural differences to be taken into account while finally having face validity which means you can relate to the theory as you can see it happen.
