CHANGING SEX
ROLE
STEREOTYPES
THROUGH CAREER DEVELOPMENT
PETER KALUNIAN GRETCHEX LOPATICH SANDY CYhlERMAN
Newbury
Junior
College Welbsley
Public Schools
Lesley College Graduate
School
Nine out
of
ten women will be gainfully employed some time during their
lives. Of the women between the ages of
18
and
65,
over
SOY0
are in the labor
force, and the percentage is expected to increase. Yet, until recently, career develop-
ment for women has been markedly deficient.
For many years it
was
assumed
that young girls grew up and became housewives and mothers. Those who wanted
a
professional career were usually channeled into teaching, nursing, secretarial work,
and other socially accepted occupations.
It
is increasingly recognized that there
has been
a
large disparity in work opportunities and financial earnings between
men and women. A great deal of this can be credited to sex discrimination policies;
but who supports these policies?
And where do they come from? The problem is
attributed not only to attitudes that are developed
early
in life, by both boys and
girls, but also to the limited goals and aspirations that young girls have
as
they
move through school.
Iglitzin
(1972)
investigated
sex
stereotyping by administering
a
series of
questions to
437
fifth-grade children from three Seattle, Washington suburbs. The
results of the study indicate that concepts of traditional social roles are very strong
by the fifth grade and that social stereotypes may restrict girls in expressing a
free choice of future goals and roles. The study showed, for example,
a
pattern of
sex typing. In reply to career choice questions and an open-ended essay (‘(Imagine
that you are grown up. Describe
how
you would spend a typical day.”), it
was
evident that the aspirations of girls and the descriptions of their lives as adults
differed from those of most boys. While boys wanted to be craftsmen, engineers,
scientists, professionals, athletes, and pilots, the girls wanted to be teachers, artists,
stewardesses, and nurses, all of which are recognized as traditional roles for women.
Because counselors, educators, and parents
are
concerned with developing
human potential and
more
of our nation’s resources, young girls should be encouraged
to broaden their aspirations and to increase their knowledge of job opportunities.
In addition, young boys should learn that girls can and should have an equal
opportunity to choose among jobs in the world of
work,
while also learning that
they, too, can have more job opportunities. Because sex-role stereotypes are
so
pervasive, counselors and teachers may find it helpful to work together in “con-
sciousness-raising” groups and to study the influence that their ideas and behavior
have on children.
Adults serve as role models. Their attitudes toward sex roles,
male-female differences, and the changing world of work have an important influence
on the attitudes and decisions made by children.
One approach to career development at the elementary school level, drawn
from the work of Ihlunian, Lopatich, and Cymerman
(1973),
consists of a three-
step process
:
increasing awareness, reconditioning role perceptions, and developing
new attitudes.
The first component of this approach is awareness-awareness of self-others,
and emphasizes the development of
a
positive self-concept. Children learn to