Are Girls More Mature Than Boys?

“Girls are just more mature.”

“Boys! So immature. They just need more time to catch up.”

These ideas are presumed as fact in most households, playgrounds, and classrooms. Parents of boys, especially, are quick to name emotional maturity as a so-called weakness for their sons, attributed to biology. That’s just how boys are.

Or is it?

Are girls actually more emotionally mature than boys? Or do we simply expect them to be?

EARLY USES OF BIOLOGY TO ENFORCE GENDER ROLES

The nature vs. nurture debate has raged on for centuries. In Ancient Rome and Greece, scholars pointed to differences in biology to claim that women are inferior. Aristotle believed that women were simply “mutilated males” and that their menstrual blood was inferior to men’s “reproductive seed” because it can create life, whereas women simply provided room for life to grow. (Hmmm….)

Hippocrates viewed menstruation as something that could be stopped, started, and controlled. Medical scholars dating back to the sixteenth century even coined “The Disease of Virgins,” (a/k/a green sickness or chlorosis) and prescribed marriage and sex as the only remedy to cure symptoms like paleness, irritable moods, headaches, and drowsiness. (Can we say PMS?)

The trouble is, these doctors’ efforts weren’t simply to improve women’s health. Medicalizing their symptoms helped to enforce gender roles, control women’s bodies, and satisfy men’s desires.

These ideas were summarized by Helen King in Hippocrates’ Woman: Reading the Female Body in Ancient Greece:

Being a woman is inherently unhealthy, but the best way to remain as healthy as possible is to marry, have children and keep up with the housework. The social role appropriate to a woman is the means by which her physical health is assured.”

THE NATURE VS. NURTURE DEBATE CONTINUES IN MODERN DAY

In more recent decades, people wield nature arguments to justify test scores, the “opting out” myth, and the lack of women in STEM fields. Even in this millennia!

In 2005, Larry Summers, former Harvard President famously downplayed the socialization of children during his remarks about the underrepresentation of women in math and science. He pointed to his twin girls’ history of creating familial relationships with trucks as toddlers, presumably as proof that girls like to play house. Summers was unwilling to dismiss “intrinsic aptitude” between men and women, pointing instead to an “unwillingness” to work long hours.

Likewise, popular authors such as Michael Gurian advocate for single sex education based on oversimplified gender stereotypes, saying “the pursuit of power is a universal male trait.” He also points to hormones as the reason for mathematics aptitude – a questionable claim.

BRAINS CAN ACTUALLY CHANGE?

It’s probably more likely that genes AND environment play a role in who we are.

There is some evidence that brain development in male babies is delayed during gestation, with studies dating back as far as the 1930s. But we’ve learned in recent years from neuroscientists like Gina Rippon that, historically, gender differences in science were more likely to be published than studies that found no differences. And in fact, those differences were often sought out by scientists with preconceived bias.

In recent years, we’ve learned more about the concept of neuroplasticity. Plasticity of the brain refers to the idea that experiences and new skills can actually change the neural pathways of the brain. This means that giving a child building toys, like blocks and Legos, can indeed improve their spatial ability.

“The neural paths change; they become automatic pathways. The task really does become easier,” Rippon said to the Guardian.

SUBTLE GENDER BIAS OF PARENTS: HOW WE SPEAK TO OUR CHILDREN

Now that we understand neuroplasticity, it’s clear that socialization does have a notable impact on children’s brains. Gender bias starts young and is so subtle that it’s almost invisible.

One important area of parental gender bias is language. For example, mothers speak more to daughters than sons. This happens before a baby can even crawl! Parents make more statements about an infant girl’s feelings, needs, or wishes, even in the first year of life. Meanwhile, they’re more likely to use spatial language (e.g. “next to” or “above”) with sons.

This subtle gender bias continues through toddler years and into grade school. Mothers tend to speak to daughters about complex social interactions and how it makes the child feel. Meanwhile, parents are “less directive” with sons than daughters, “perhaps as a way of encouraging male autonomy.” (Leaper, 1998). This reinforces the idea of male individualism and solitude. (Then we wonder why adult men have a hard time discussing their feelings!)

Parents also associate sadness more with daughters and anger more with sons. This reflects society’s condonation of anger as an acceptable male trait, rather than a universal feeling experienced by everyone, regardless of sex or gender.

THE IMPACT OF GENDER BIASED LANGUAGE ON CHILDREN’S EMOTIONAL MATURITY

Why do the way parents talk to their children even matter? Well, language is a primary pathway for building fluency of emotion. Children use language to understand and communicate social interactions, and to learn appropriate ways to manage their emotions. These tools can go on to impact their relationships and friendships.

With this in mind, let’s look more closely at two findings:

Some studies have found that girls display more empathy as young as age 2;
By age 4, boys were more likely to deny ever being scared.

Is it possible that not all girls have a deep capacity for empathy, simply based upon the anatomy with which they are born? Is it possible that we’ve trained them, through our facial expressions, exploration of emotions, and complex social discussions, to BUILD more empathy?

Likewise, isn’t it possible that 4 year-old boys are indeed scared of a movie, but that we’ve trained them to be tough? That showing “weakness” will place them at risk for humiliation, and losing their ever-precarious masculinity.

ARE GENDERED EXPECTATIONS A SELF-FULFILLING PROPHECY?

Not only do we socialize children with how we speak to them, but also what we expect from them. Were you expected to watch over your siblings as a child? To rise above sibling fights and be the mature one? To babysit the kids down the street?

Were you expected to be vigilant about the feelings of people around you? And apologize frequently?

We expect girls not only to follow the rules, but to be responsible. Not just to have playdates, but to navigate tricky dynamics of friendship from an early age. Not just to be kind, but to lie in order to hurt other people’s feelings.

THE LASTING CONSEQUENCES OF PRIORITIZING GIRLS’ MATURITY

Then we wonder why, in conversations about running households and the mental load, women largely continue to carry responsibility for building and maintaining community. This includes everything from reciprocating playdates and hosting birthday parties to making friends in a new town and caregiving for older family members.

Women breathe a collective sigh of exhaustion about this never-ending emotional labor. But it’s equally scary to think it might disappear. If young girls don’t embrace these tasks with open arms, who will do it?

Even though “boys will be boys” isn’t uttered as frequently as years ago, that sentiment lingers quietly behind the belief that girls are more mature. If we believe our boys to be less mature, they receive the same cloak of protection that men do when we declare them incapable of buying holiday gifts, arranging child care, planning vacations, or running the family’s social calendar.

Our beliefs about what men and boys can do is just as important as their willingness to do it. Let’s believe more about our boys and their potential, so they can step into a more beautiful way of being a man.

Find these other sneaky places where your gender bias is hiding!