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Gender Intensification

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Encyclopedia of Adolescence

Overview

The gender intensification hypothesis suggests that girls and boys experience increased pressure to conform to culturally sanctioned gender roles during adolescence (Hill and Lynch 1983). These pressures are thought to come from a variety of sources and are intended to prepare adolescents for their adult roles as women and men. This entry summarizes the gender intensification hypothesis and reviews evidence for the intensification of gender-role identity, gender-role attitudes, and gendered behavior during adolescence. The entry concludes by considering limitations in current investigations of gender intensification and directions for future research.

Terminology

The study of gender development is complicated. Although gender is one of the most well-recognized social categories, its identifiers are diverse and multifaceted (Twenge 1999). Cultures identify “masculine” and “feminine” attributes by the likelihood that each attribute is associated with one sex and not the other....

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Acknowledgments

This research was supported, in part, by funding from the National Institute of Mental Health (F31MH084476) and the Eunice Kennedy Shriver National Institute of Child Health and Human Development (T32HD049302). The content is solely the responsibility of the authors and does not necessarily represent the official views of the funding organizations.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Simpson College, Indianola, IA, USA

    Heather A. Priess-Groben

  2. Population Health Institute, University of Wisconsin-Madison, 610 N Walnut Street, WARF 370, 53705, Madison, WI, USA

    Sara M. Lindberg

Authors
  1. Heather A. Priess-Groben
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  2. Sara M. Lindberg
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Corresponding author

Correspondence to Heather A. Priess-Groben .

Editor information

Editors and Affiliations

  1. Indiana University, Bloomington, Indiana, USA

    Roger J.R. Levesque

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Priess-Groben, H.A., Lindberg, S.M. (2016). Gender Intensification. In: Levesque, R. (eds) Encyclopedia of Adolescence. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-32132-5_391-2

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-32132-5_391-2

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  • Online ISBN: 978-3-319-32132-5

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