Real boy and girl differences

[EveryoneLoves09876]

There is so much debate about real differences in sex (as opposed to gender and culture norms). You also get so much gender disappointment and I know mumsnet is mostly girl preference, but I've had jobs working in communities where boys are enormously favoured, so don't feel too sorry for boys lol. This doesn't give the real picture.

I'd be really interested in seeing what mumsnetters think are the main differences are between their girls and boys - if they have both!! Or do you really think the differences are nothing to do with their sex?

I have a baby boy and try to be as neutral as possible, giving him all sorts of toys and clothing (e.g. dolls as well as trains, clothes from boys and girls section although I haven't actually put him in a dress!) I don't want to bring him up in a sexist way but I'm sure I am without realising it! I try not to see his traits as sex related, although family already go on about his energy and appetite as if that's a male thing. I have no daughter to compare him to!

Do you feel like this is a real difference and what are they if so?

My advice as a parent to both is raise them as the individuals that they are. Girls and boys aren't different imo and if you respect the individual's needs and personality regardless of sex I think you'll go a long way towards ending up with happy children.

Society will put different stereotypes and expectations on your children but this is a talk that you can have later when they hear ideas like boys don't carry My Little Pony backpacks or girls don't like football.

Once they start nursery they learn (not intentionally) that some things are not for them. Gender differences become more rigidly observed. Mine were home schooled till 8, I think it made a huge difference. When they started school they found the "rules" about who could do what/wear what etc really baffling.

Interesting how many posters are convinced there is no difference when a quick review of the scientific studies shows that there is. Not for every child, and it may be social rather than inate, but that’s a different debate.

Almost every study shows an overall difference in toy choice between girls and boys, with the youngest I could find being 3-8months. There are also multiple studies of monkeys and some very interesting studies on the toy choices of girls with a rare hormonal disorder where they have more male-like hormone patterns.

I think that people (myself included) get caught up with the “women can do anything” and feminist debate, and the rebellion against stereotypes. This is excellent imo and we’re raising our kids as stereotype free as we can, but that doesn’t mean that there aren’t real differences at the overall population level.

I think @SimonJT ‘s perspective is very interesting. It’s probably fairly unusual to be able to see how the same child is treated if they are assumed be both sexes (at different times obviously). I think we all like to think that we treat our boys and girls the same. I’m another one whose boy has shown a lot more interest in cars and diggers and I’ve gone out of my way to raise both my children with ‘gender neutral toys I’m about 75% convinced he’s more drawn to those things, but I can also see he’s more drawn to dolls than my dd too. I think so much is socialisation, even if we don’t realise it happens. I remember my dh lifting weights in the garden one day when dd was about 3 and she came out and said ‘oh daddy I could do that if I had some little pink ones’. We both looked at each other horrified. We had never even had ‘pink stuff’ in the house at this point, never discussed girls and boys things. I’ve always exercised as much as dh in front of dc, with these same weights. She had 100% picked this up from the outside world and I don’t even know where from(she hadn't even started nursery at this point).

boys are biologically stronger and faster but must use that strength to help and not to hurt. what about the boys who are physically weak? Are we teaching them they'll never be real men?
Girls need to understand they have an advantage using words and recognising emotional responses and how to use that for the greater good and not to put down their brother. and if they don't have the linguistic skills? Are thry destined to not be real women?
Boys need to know that their physical courage and bravery are good things and can save lives. and the female firefighters, police officers, army personnel?

They need to understand they were made taller to protect, to reach things put up high and not to look down on others. and the ones who are physically short? Or who have disabilities that mean they cannot do the physical stuff?
Girls need to learn they have beautiful, softer bodies to cuddle, to comfort and protect not to flaunt across the Internet. I don't even have words for the softer bodies to cuddle.

Not for every child, and it may be social rather than inate, but that’s a different debate.

I thought this was exactly the debate? Are they different because they are born this way, or because we start treating them differently even before they are born?

I have boy/girl twins
I would say the only really difference is that one of them had a penis and the other a vagina
One of them is emotionally intelligent, sensitive and cautious who can spend hours reading and doing craft
The other is a daredevil who never sits still and is very physically strong.
Guess which is which?

*has a penis

I wonder if it has anything to do with your sex and how you perceive yourself? I’m quite tomboyish and would probably select “male” toys when playing with a baby girl, because I’m a girl and that’s what I’d choose to play with myself.

Females often talk earlier and have better communication skills as adults. This is shown with females getting better grades at languages at GCSE Males apparently have better spacial awareness. That may be because of the building type of toys they play with.

The evidence about girls with hormonal disorders would be interesting. To be honest whether there is or isn’t a difference, it is likely to be small Difference on population level - hard to see with small sample size. Encouragingly lots of people are open to kids liking stuff not in the gender stereotype.

Nurturing of course plays a significant role but differences are present from birth.
Female neonates, compared to males, make more eye contact, are more likely to orient to faces and voices, are rated as more cuddly, and exhibit stronger emotion contagion (e.g., contagious crying) and imitation. That’s not learned behaviour. It’s sex differences.
Boy babies show significantly more joy and anger, more positive vocalizations, fussiness, and crying, more gestural signals directed towards the mother, and more escape behaviors than girls.
Girl babies are significantly more likely to show interest, to gaze at objects, and to use self-regulatory behaviors such as diverting their attention to objects and to thumbsuck than boys.

There are innate differences. Not recognising that means we aren’t really meeting all their biological needs. That doesn’t mean individuals aren’t at different places on the range of behaviour or that girls can’t climb trees but ‘gender neutral’ ideas are nonsense. Boys and girls are different. They can do many of the same things and each sex has different advantages but to suggest there are no differences is a bit empowers new clothes. Raising boys as girls and vice versa is not the way to address male violence or equality issues. Different but equal is far healthier.

How about raising them as individuals?

I have 3 boys - all have been so different, youngest potty trained in days/ independent/ great speech - I know for a fact if he was a girl people would have said 'it's because he is a girl'

What ive noticed over the years is that those with two of same sex put differences down to them being different people, but people with DC of different sex out the differences down to sex differences.

THIS @Aroundtheworldin80moves

I think any differences in mine as young children will be down to different personalities and the HUGE impact of being 1st vs 2nd child not necessarily them being a boy and a girl.
I have no doubt that there are differences that appear later though but I hate it that people say babies are being typical boys / girls.

My wider family is overwhelmingly female over three generations. Among ten siblings and cousins there’s only one boy. The girls vary greatly in their personalities and interests. The boy was quiet and shy but the only one who, from age 2 or 3, was interested in how things work.
We joked that he would be an engineer. Not one of the girls ever cared about gear wheels, magnets or gravity the way the boy did.

@Namenic here is a recent paper looking at toy preferences of primary age kids with adrenal hyperplasia (hormone change in the womb) compared to their siblings. Figure 2 is particularly interesting- give the choice between playing,say, dolls with a boy, or cars with a girl, the girls chose equally. The vast majority of boys choose “cars with a girl”, and so do the vast majority of girls with the hormone change.

www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3085977/#!po=35.9155

Yes @CherryPavlova. And, if you were to read Cordelia Fine, you would read an evidence-based takedown of the social narratives into which these experiments on babies have been pressed, as well as the flaws and biases in the studies themselves.

2 boys , 1 girl , from a very early age girl far more perceptive to my mood , tone , facial expression . i am unable to do a wordless communication such as eye to eye with say my mother / husband , she knows straightaway and wants to know what i mean ! but straight over boys heads at the same age.
I am not conscious of rearing her any differently at all from my boys but i did find my boys far less complex , she is easily offended and strops off , but will talk about her feelings and is thoughtful and caring.
My boys don't talk /show their feelings i so wish they did, but i don't know if these are individual traits or gender .

@peajotter - thanks! It’s a small study, but they say their findings corroborate with other studies which are referenced.

It is interesting that they do mention that there is probably a social aspect at play - influencing boys not to play with girl toys. Nevertheless the difference between girls with CAH and girls without does suggest some influence in biology - if only small and easy to be outweighed by social factors.

I have sons and a daughter, grandsons and granddaughters. One of them is the most sensitive and perceptive of others moods. From a very early age you could see this. He happens to be a boy, just a boy who is sensitive and perceptive.

Not one of the girls ever cared about gear wheels, magnets or gravity the way the boy did. My husband loves to repair things, build things, totally fascinated by electronics. He assumed, wrongly, that if he had a son he would love doing these things with him. My sons and grandsons couldn't care less although they do like being able to put broken toys, computers etc on his desk and leave him to fix them.

I do think the large majority of differences are socially taught (even indirectly) rather than innate.
Kids are sponges after all and they absorb a lot more than people think.
I don't believe there are that many fundamental differences purely down to someone's sex, apart from, yknow, the obvious.

I think for something to be a 'real' difference between boys and girls it has to be an almost universal constant (clinical anomalies aside) rather than a tendancy to a particular trait.

So, baby boys pee in your face; baby girls don't do that.

I've got two boys and they're as different in personality and interests as any boy and girl might be.

Ds1 is more like me - reading, collecting, non-sporty, ds2 is more like dh - cars, balls, v sporty.

Ds2 is more into sparkly, colourful things, clothes & soft toys.
Ds1 couldn't care less what he wears and was never that bothered about teddies.

How does all this work with the trans issue? It's something that's discussed a lot on here, and there must be overlaps. Are there differences between the sexes, and if not, what is transgender/transsexual? If the differences are mostly socialisation and stereotypes, surely nobody is born in the wrong body. Or are they? It's confusing.