Not a medical doctor
Beyond their development stage
This demonstrates that Dr Polly Carmichael (& it seems many other psychologists & medical doctors who have chosen to specialise in 'gender services) have ignored well-established knowledge of child development and age-specific understandings of sex difference.
May 2019 Dr Katie Alcock (Chartered Psychologist, Senior Lecturer in Psychology at Lancaster University) article:
'Young children, reality, sex and gender'
(extract)
I’m a researcher in developmental psychology, and I’m interested in how young children learn symbols and how they think about the world. Most of my research is on children learning vocabulary but as a feminist (and mum of a boy and a girl) I’m also very interested in how children learn about sex and about stereotypes.
This is a rough summary of a talk I gave on April 27th in Lancaster as part of an event I and other members of For Women Lancashire organised entitled Gender Identity: Safeguarding Children and Young People. The talk itself was recorded and this isn’t a transcript, it’s more me writing up my notes and adding some thoughts." (continues)
What have psychologists found out about children’s developing knowledge of sex and gender?
Well, this research has been going on for a loooong time. All the studies I’m going to talk about are really robust — well replicated — this means that lots of researchers have found the same thing time and time again. We have known about some related aspects of children’s thinking since the 1920s or earlier and some of the main, older studies in this area are from the 1960s. This is not a flash in the pan.
What this also means is that terminology has changed. When this area of research first started, everyone knew, and was clear, that they were talking about children’s knowledge of biological sex. The terms “sex identity” and “sex constancy” were used, to mean children’s knowledge of whether they were a boy or a girl, and whether they or others could change into the opposite sex. Around the 1990s everyone started getting squeamish about the word “sex” and started using “gender” as a euphemism. Researchers, however, still meant a child’s knowledge of biological sex." (continues)
So researchers are clear that we are talking about children’s knowledge of sex, and that this can’t change. A nice quote from a 2003 paper:
“Categorical sex is an essential, immutable attribute of people that is maintained (by self and others) independent of changes in physical appearance (e.g., in hairstyle, clothes, or make-up) and of changes in behaviour (e.g., cross-sex play behaviour or homosexuality).” (from Trautner et al., 2003, in the International Journal of Behavioral Development)
Nevertheless, it takes children some time to work out both whether they themselves are a girl or a boy, and that both they and others cannot change sex. Working out which they are themselves happens earlier, and is based in all the studies that have been done on physical appearance and stereotypes. Have a look at what James, aged 3, has to say on the matter:
www.youtube.com/watch?list=PLd6suGdLIPWWnUIXHJYllSnnpWB7oeONx&time_continue=62&v=_BFDgO_y9cc&feature=emb_logo
So, based on the idea that girls have long hair and boys have short hair, James is also age-perfect in thinking that when appearance changes, sex changes too. Until the age of about 7 (yes, 7 — in some children it’s older) children think that when something changes its appearance, its underlying reality changes too. This doesn’t just apply to sex, it applies to pretty much everything." (continues)
medium.com/@katieja/young-children-reality-sex-and-gender-3421f4f165f1
see also important articles by Dr Alcock:
December 2019 'But HOW CAN YOU TELL'
(extract)
So, how do we tell whether someone is male or female? Well, we are very good at it and — like a lot of human cognitive skills — we base it on a number of cues (pieces of information). In fact, we’re very good at it from the time we are tiny babies.
One of the best ways to tell a male body from a female body is gait — how you walk. You don’t need a whole body in front of you, or even the outline of a body, to tell male from female bodies. A nice little point light display will do the trick. Adults and babies aged 4 months or older can tell male from female in this type of video " (continues)
medium.com/@katieja/but-how-can-you-tell-7901324d0919
'Sex stereotypes and the development of Gender Identity Disorder in children.'
2nd March 2020
fairplayforwomen.com/stereotypes/
