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Individual Differences in Gender Development: Associations with Parental Sexual Orientation, Attitudes, and Division of Labor

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Abstract

Research on children of lesbian parents has suggested that such children are developing well, but questions have been raised about their gender development. In this study, we explored associations among parental sexual orientation, parental gender-related attitudes, parental division of labor, and children’s gender development. Participants were 66 preschool children and their 132 parents from the East Coast of the United States. Thirty-three families were headed by lesbian and 33 by heterosexual couples. Parents who divided paid and unpaid labor more unequally had children whose occupational aspirations were also more traditional. Measures of children’s gender development were generally unrelated to parental sexual orientation. Parents’ attitudes and behaviors were more strongly associated with children’s gender development than was parental sexual orientation.

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Acknowledgement

We gratefully acknowledge the University of Virginia’s Center for Children, Families, and the Law for support of this project, as well as National Institute of Health’s U.S. Public Health Service Pre-Doctoral Traineeships awarded to the first and second authors.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Psychology, Washington & Lee University, Lexington, VA, 24450, USA

    Megan Fulcher

  2. Wake Forest University School of Medicine, Winston-Salem, NC, USA

    Erin L. Sutfin

  3. University of Virginia, Charlottesville, VA, USA

    Charlotte J. Patterson

Authors
  1. Megan Fulcher
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  2. Erin L. Sutfin
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  3. Charlotte J. Patterson
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Correspondence to Megan Fulcher.

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Fulcher, M., Sutfin, E.L. & Patterson, C.J. Individual Differences in Gender Development: Associations with Parental Sexual Orientation, Attitudes, and Division of Labor. Sex Roles 58, 330–341 (2008). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11199-007-9348-4

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s11199-007-9348-4

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