Boys and girls who conform to gender stereotypes do worse at school

[noblegiraffe]

Interesting article in the Independent about a study that asked Y11s questions designed to identify how well they fit gender expectations, and then collected their GCSE grades once sat and compared outcomes.

[https://www.independent.co.uk/news/education/gcses-boys-girls-masculine-stereotypes-study-a9647316.html]]

What I found quite interesting was that the percentage of boys who didn’t strongly conform to gender stereotypes was 69%.

The headline seems to suggest it’s a small group rather than the majority, and I know boys and young men who feel that they are ‘wrong’ because they don’t fit the expected gender roles.

“The study said a large sub-group of girls, who conformed fairly rigidly to some traditional feminine norms, could be at risk academically.”

I thought the traditional feminine norms were being quiet and studying hard so I wonder what they are talking about here? An interest in boys, hair and make-up?

I'd like to see more detail of the evidence.

Fortunately neither of my ds's have experienced this. Both are quite NT though, middle'ist, not extreme.
Most of the schools nearby are very easy going and no one cares if anyone else is .... anything: gay, bi, trans, very into something. The studious ones are respected, supported and encouraged. No one is teased for doing well, quite the opposite, it's nicely competitive.

I think the idea behind the paper -to examine why certain groups are not performing well at school rather than the usual boys vs. girl narrative is good but it doesn’t look at parental attitudes to education or external factors.
If you think of the traveller community where gender presentation is very pronounced between the sexes but it’s more the fact that children are discouraged from education after the age of 13.

i would have thought it was stating the obvious.
at the local mixed sex sec-modern, the girls perform femininity to a massive extent, false eyelashes, fake tans, concern over looks from yr 7.
at the single-sex local grammar, the girls dont seem to bother with that at all.
(i have dc at both. yes, the grammar has better results)

I think I heard a podcast say similar a couple of years ago. I think it was an american podcast, so possibly hidden brain or this american life. The more young women identify as a princess the more likely they are to drop out of college. And they had different taste in men - went for providers.

@JanMeyer I’ve sometimes wondered if I am autistic.

It's not "putting down other women" to state the facts about your experience with something

The poster claimed she was a "high achiever" - this apparently required her to hang out with the boys rather than the "cliques" of no doubt lesser and silly girls.

@Helmetbymidnight

i would have thought it was stating the obvious. at the local mixed sex sec-modern, the girls perform femininity to a massive extent, false eyelashes, fake tans, concern over looks from yr 7. at the single-sex local grammar, the girls dont seem to bother with that at all. (i have dc at both. yes, the grammar has better results)

That's just your local area. I'm live in the area of a mixed comprehensive, a single sex girls comprehensive and 2 single sex grammar schools. If I was to comment about girls who were made themselves appear more feminine e.g. with eye lashes and everything, I would single out the girls grammar school. This is probably due to the ethnic mix of the children who attend the schools.

well unless the survey was done only in my local area then its unlikely to be a feature of just my area...

@JanMeyer at no point did I mention anything about class though did I? You have completely misread my post

I could have worded it better. It was just bad syntax.

As it happens there were two other very high achieving girls in my class but there was quite a rivalry, and neither liked the niche music that I did. You are so determined to put words into my mouth that you are just assuming things!

If you take simplistic cliches of extreme girl and extreme boy though, neither features doing homework and studying for exams that strongly. The footballers and make-up obsessed airheads are not the ones clutching bunches of A stars in results day.

The real, but boring story is that those who work hard tend to get better results.

It would be interesting to see a study looking at high earners and how much they conform to gender stereotypes.

With youths, it could be (for want of a better expression) that they are often the ones most preoccupied with fitting in and perhaps prioritise their social life more than academia. Boys trying to get buff in the gym and girls worrying far too much about their makeup and brows etc.

But I'd imagine that in many senior roles where you're viewed as 'a leader', it can be harder to step outside the norm. So many male senior executives have 'the look'. You rarely see one who's a killer barrister, extremely formidably versed in business, but rocks a bright blue mohawk. It's all clean shaven, short back and sides, respectable family man.

Maybe it's different for women though, because they arguably have to adopt 'masculine' stereotypes to be successful - things like assertiveness which aren't really gendered but are often seen as being male characteristics.

I think I would have originally put it more that the nerdy creatives tend to do better at school.

People who don't fit the mould generally.

There was always an accusation that you shouldn't be a swot (bizarrely in my year group cohort it was mostly swots.)

Or creative nerds.

Interesting...I wonder if children from working class backgrounds feel more pressure to conform to gender stereotypes whereas perhaps in middle class homes there is not that pressure?

No. As a working class girl I was painfully aware of my options, and that I had nothing to fall back on - I had to find something that I could do that would support me financially, or risk betting it all on a husband (and taking on the drudge in return). Being a short and fat working class girl, it was an easy choice to make - but it has formed my whole life - every subject choice was weighed to make it more likely I could rapidly get into a well paying, but not requiring connections or long time training, job.

My sister took the other path.