Chapter Review: Gender and Sexuality

Test yourself by taking a moment to answer each of these Learning Objective Questions (repeated here from within the chapter). Research suggests that trying to answer these questions on your own will improve your long-term memory of the concepts (McDaniel et al., 2009).

Gender Development

Question 4.13

What are some gender similarities and differences in aggression, social power, and social connectedness?

  • Gender refers to the socially constructed roles and characteristics by which a culture defines male and female.
  • Males and females are more alike than different, thanks to our similar genetic makeup—we see, hear, learn, and remember similarly.
  • Male-female differences include body fat, muscle, height, age of onset of puberty, life expectancy, and onset of certain disorders.
  • Men admit to more aggression than women do, and they are more likely to be physically aggressive. Women’s aggression is more likely to be relational.
  • In most societies, men have more social power, and their leadership style tends to be directive, whereas women’s is more democratic.
  • Women often focus more on social connectedness than do men, and they “tend and befriend.”

Question 4.14

How is our biological sex determined, and how do sex hormones influence prenatal and adolescent development?

  • Both sex chromosomes and sex hormones influence development.
  • The twenty-third pair of chromosomes determines sex, with the mother contributing an X chromosome and the father contributing either an X chromosome (for a girl baby) or a Y chromosome (for a boy baby). A Y chromosome triggers additional testosterone release and the formation of male sex organs.
  • During puberty, both primary and secondary sex characteristics develop. Sex-related genes and physiology influence behavioral and cognitive gender differences between males and females.
  • Intersex individuals are born possessing biological sexual characteristics of both sexes.

Question 4.15

How do gender roles and gender typing influence gender development?

  • Gender roles describe how others expect us to act and vary depending on cultural expectations, which change over time and place.
  • Social learning theory proposes that we learn our gender identity—our sense of being male or female—as we learn other things: through reinforcement, punishment, and observation. But critics argue that cognition also plays a role because modeling and rewards cannot explain gender typing.
  • Some people display androgyny, with both traditional masculine and feminine psychological characteristics.
  • Transgender people’s gender identity or expression differs from that associated with their birth sex. Their sexual orientation may be heterosexual, homosexual, bisexual, or asexual.

Human Sexuality

Question 4.16

How do hormones influence human sexual motivation?

  • The female estrogen and male testosterone hormones influence human sexual behavior less directly than they influence sexual behavior in other species.
  • These hormones direct sexual development in the prenatal period; trigger development of sexual characteristics in adolescence; and help activate sexual behavior from puberty to late adulthood.
  • Women’s sexuality is more responsive to testosterone level than to estrogen level.
  • Short-term shifts in testosterone level are normal in men, partly in response to stimulation

Question 4.17

What is the human sexual response cycle, and how do sexual dysfunctions and paraphilias differ?

  • William Masters and Virginia Johnson described four stages in the human sexual response cycle: excitement, plateau, orgasm (which seems to involve similar feelings and brain activity in males and females), and resolution. Males then enter a refractory period in which renewed arousal and orgasm are impossible.
  • Sexual dysfunctions are problems that consistently impair sexual arousal or functioning. They can often be successfully treated by behaviorally oriented therapy or drug therapy.
  • Paraphilias are conditions, which may or may not be classified as disorders, involving nonhuman objects, the suffering of self or others, and/or nonconsenting persons.

Question 4.18

How can sexually transmitted infections be prevented?

  • Safe-sex practices help prevent sexually transmitted infections (STIs). Using condoms helps protect against most sexually transmitted infections (especially AIDS), but not those that are transmitted skin-to-skin.
  • A vaccination administered before sexual contact can prevent most human papilloma virus (HPV) infections.

Question 4.19

How do external and imagined stimuli contribute to sexual arousal?

  • Erotic material and other external stimuli can trigger sexual arousal in both men and women.
  • Viewing sexually coercive material can lead to increased acceptance of violence toward women.
  • Viewing sexually explicit materials can cause people to perceive their partners as comparatively less appealing and to devalue their relationships.
  • Imagined stimuli (fantasies) help trigger sexual arousal.

Question 4.20

What factors influence teenagers’ sexual behaviors and use of contraceptives?

  • Rates of teen intercourse vary from culture to culture and era to era.
  • Factors contributing to teen pregnancy include minimal communication about birth control with parents, partners, and peers; passion overwhelming self-control; alcohol use; and mass media norms of unprotected and impulsive sexuality.
  • High intelligence, religious engagement, father presence, and participation in service learning programs have been predictors of teen sexual restraint.

Sexual Orientation: Why Do We Differ?

Question 4.21

What has research taught us about sexual orientation?

  • Sexual orientation is an enduring sexual attraction toward members of one’s own sex (homosexual orientation), the other sex (heterosexual orientation), or both sexes (bisexual orientation).
  • About 3 percent of men and 1 or 2 percent of women are homosexual, and sexual orientation seems to be enduring.
  • Sexual orientation is not an indicator of mental health. There is no evidence that environmental factors influence sexual orientation.
  • Evidence for biological influences on homosexuality comes from same-sex attraction in many animal species; gay-straight differences in body and brain characteristics; higher rates of homosexuality in certain families and in identical twins; exposure to certain hormones during critical periods of prenatal development; and the fraternal birth-order effect.

An Evolutionary Explanation of Human Sexuality

Question 4.22

How might evolutionary psychologists explain gender differences in sexuality and mating preferences?

  • Evolutionary psychologists attempt to understand how natural selection (how nature selects traits and appetites that contribute to survival and reproduction) has shaped behaviors found in all people.
  • They reason that men’s more recreational attitude toward sex results from their ability to spread their genes widely by mating with many females.
  • In contrast, women’s more relational approach to sex results from their need to incubate and nurse one infant at a time. Women increase their own and their children’s chances of survival by searching for mates with the potential for long-term investment in their joint offspring.

Question 4.23

What are the key criticisms of evolutionary explanations of human sexuality, and how do evolutionary psychologists respond?

  • Critics argue that evolutionary psychologists (1) start with an effect and work backward to an explanation, (2) relieve people from taking responsibility for their sexual behavior, and (3) do not recognize social and cultural influences.
  • Evolutionary psychologists respond that understanding our predispositions can help us overcome them. They recognize the importance of social and cultural influences, but they also cite the value of testable predictions based on evolutionary principles.

Reflections on Gender, Sexuality, and Nature–Nurture Interaction

Nature and nurture interact in the development of our gender-related traits and our mating behaviors.

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