Jobs for the boys: How children give voice to gender stereotyped job roles

Children, and especially boys, show stronger stereotyping about masculine and feminine jobs than previously suspected, an innovative study by the University of Sussex reveals. New research reveals the extent to which girls exaggerated their gendered voices to imitate workers in different professions dropped off at around seven but continues to increase beyond that age with boys. Boys also used an overtly masculine voice even when imitating workers in gender-neutral roles, the study found. Research in the field of gender stereotypes usually involves asking study participants what they think about men and women doing different jobs, but there are concerns this can mask people's true beliefs because their answers may be biased by their desire to conform. So instead, University of Sussex psychologists tapped into children's unconscious stereotypes by asking them to speak in the voices of people with different occupations. The research found that for stereotypically male jobs, both sexes spontaneously masculinised their voices, by lowering pitch and resonance, and they also feminised their voices for stereotypically female occupations, by raising their pitch and resonance. The academics are advising authors and children's TV writers to be extra vigilant about associating job roles too strongly with a specific gender, to avoid children associating certain jobs exclusively with a given gender.