Can anyone suggest why girls at 6 change their view of girls' ability to be brilliant?

La

I still didn't get it. As a monkey doesn't even know was a truck is, how can he decide it's for boy monkeys?

Xenophile: animal models especially primates are incredibly useful for studying human behaviour. In this case even more so as we're eliminating all the human influences that we claim affect children's behaviour.

My apologies, I thought we were discussing humans, it appears you're actually discussing various species of monkey.

Some references here

xenophile and datun yy I wondered if I was missing the definitive statements and research about sex and toys, but it seems not.

To come back to your original question, italian I wonder if it's related to maturity. Studies have shown girls mature earlier than boys and this impacts on how they process their environment.* If they're maturing into a patriarchal society, it follows that their perception of both their abilities and their achievements will gradually wane. It would be interesting to see if the results were replicated in matriarchal societies.

• Newcastle University study

This link talks about the different components in male and female eyes, but again it puts it all down to testosterone.

www.google.co.uk/amp/amp.livescience.com/22894-men-and-women-see-things-differently.html

Zero citations, so can't give it much credence.

La

I really can't understand that study. Trucks are an invention from less than a hundred years ago. How can an interest in them be 'innate'?

According to Alexander, one possibility is that girls have evolved to perceive social stimuli, such as people, as very important, while the perceived worth of social stimuli (and thus, dolls that look like people) is weaker in boys

There is no doubt that there are physical differences in men and women. Even our eyes see things differently.

Guys' eyes are more sensitive to small details and moving objects, while women are more perceptive to color changes, according to a new vision study that suggests men and women actually do see things differently.

That's not an innate preference for gendered objects though.

www.livescience.com/22677-girls-dolls-boys-toy-trucks.html

And here's a link for the difference in the toys girls/boys prefer: [http://www.livescience.com/22677-girls-dolls-boys-toy-trucks.htm]

I have boy/girl twins.They have both grown up doing ballet/modern dance,piano lessons,athletics,football/rugby.They're both very good at sport,musical,love cooking ( DD makes cakes whereas DS is big breakfasts and soup)and popular.The main difference I can see is that my DS is dyslexic and academics can be a struggle but his sister finds work easy.Also DD tends to 'wound' with words whereas DS physically will often try and thump his brother ( very occasionally his sister).
DS has had to suffer endless comments about his ballet and music though over the years from both pupils and parents.Dd has always been utterly convinced she's superior to her brother in every way.The increasing feminisation of Primary education has reinforced this.However at Secondary School level my 17 year old DDs friends ( co-ed) have all given up on Maths and Science subjects whereas dd1 (girls school) is heading for an A/A* in Maths and Sciences.

I believe studies show that at 1 year old most girls will pick out a doll from a group of toys and boys will pick out toys with wheels. Ans this is independent of the clothes they were dressed in and the toys their parents give them to play with.
Boys and girls are different, they are innately different as they are genetically different .

But I very much doubt that the difference in girls' perception of how able they are has much to do with the toys and clothes divide. I would say one of the major influencing factors is the fact that in most families the mother doesn't work or has reduced hours whereas the father does the serious important job.

And just out of interest, in the country I come from girls are considered better at Maths and Maths degrees at the best universities have a much higher proportion of girls than boys. So this concept is not only but potentially specific to only some cultures / countries.

Teddies are the boys' version of dolls. Most of them are very fond of their teddies. But wouldn't dream of playing with a Barbie. But only because it is perceived as girly.

I know this is just an anecdote, but my youngest loved his Barbie (given to him by my mother, so as far as he was concerned it wasn't particularly gendered). He came home from school one day and reluctantly asked me if it was girly. Despite my explanations, he never played with it again.

Still loved his teddies though.

The interesting thing about my two boys is that although the eldest wouldn't play with dolls or teddies when very young, my youngest DS who's two does! He likes a wider variety of toys than my eldest.

datun yes I agree about the hormone thing.
I think hormones can cause some differences, but that these are amplified by socialisation.

Here is a 1998 meta analysis on parents' gender-typed interaction I dug up in a quick Google Scholar search.

psycnet.apa.org/journals/dev/34/1/3/

www.google.co.uk/amp/s/amp.theguardian.com/news/datablog/2014/aug/21/gcse-results-2014-biggest-gap-11-boys-and-girls-a-c-pass-rate?client=safari
This article shows the gap in achievement and puts it down to coursework being more suited to girls, but I think there's a lot more to it than that.
The underachieving boys are quite often ones who get into trouble and are turned off school. 9 times out of 10 the child standing outside the head teacher's office is a boy.
As educators it's our job to identify those underachieving, whether they're boys or girls. It just makes me sad when I see certain boys displaying really antisocial behaviour and getting into loads of trouble with their main class teacher ( a man, as it happens) and then coming into my Literacy lesson and responding really well to a bit of praise and understanding. Boys often get labelled as being naughty so they live up to the label.

I don't think anyone is denying there's a difference between boys and girls. I should imagine it's a lot to do with hormones, not brain structure differences.

Girls can't possibly like playing princess or pink or tea sets as an innate charactistic. None of that existed pre-history. They may well identify with their mother, as the person closest to them, and mimic her behaviour. But superficial choices can't possibly be innate as they are entirely socially imposed.

Maybe hormones like testosterone are related to strength, which is displayed through physical activity. Hence boys rushing around.

Although, when I was a kid the physical games were about the only way we spent our leisure time. Outside. On bikes, playing British bulldog, 4040, etc. No-one suggested the girls go inside and play with dolls. We could have of course, but wouldn't have dreamt of it.

There's also a great book by Cordelia Fine, Delusions of Gender, where she argues that a lot of neuroscience studies which claim to show differences between 'male' and 'female' brains have the maths on them done completely wrong.

(I think, it's ages since I read it, but it's a great book on this topic anyway.)

Does anyone know who did the study or where it appeared, please?

It's Barbara Rothman 1988. There's more in Melissa Hines: Brain Gender, where she interestingly says that 10 studies might be done on innate brain gender differences, 9 of which will show there is no difference, and 1 will show there is, but that it is invariably the 1 showing difference that gets the attention.