Ideas of intelligence across development : a look into children's implicit attitudes of the male = brilliant stereotype

• Main Author: Ng, Sara Hui Xin
• Other Authors: Setoh Pei Pei
• Format: Final Year Project
• Language: English
• Published: 2018
• Subjects: DRNTU::Social sciences
• Online Access: http://hdl.handle.net/10356/73974
• Institution: Nanyang Technological University

The stereotyped belief of men being more intelligent that women in various domains have been well studied across the years. Much lesser attention has been paid to whether children endorse such gender stereotype attitudes as well. As such, this study aims to explore the possible implicit attitudes of children towards gender and intelligence, with three main research questions, of first, wanting to investigate whether this stereotype is present for both boys and girls, secondly, whether children as young as 8 years old have this gender stereotype, and lastly, to investigate the possible factors of how parental influences (such as their socioeconomic status (SES) and beliefs) and also the exposure to media might contribute to the acquisition of this stereotype. Results showed that only boys held the gender stereotype of males as intelligent, but girls aged 8 to 11 did not have such stereotyped beliefs. However, a developmental course of this stereotype was observed in girls, where as they grew older, they tend to attribute brilliance more to males. Parental SES and beliefs were not significant predictors of children’s implicit gender stereotyping but the number of e-devices that boys have does influence their beliefs of this gender stereotype. These results prompt for further exploration of other possible factors such as cultural influences and other socialising agents such as teachers and peers that could have a greater influence on children’s development of this gender stereotype.