Psychology (Sex and Gender) AQA GCSE

Chromosomes - The chromosomes we have determine nearly everything about us including our sexuality. Boys have ** and girls have XY.

Hormones - Females produce more Oestrogen and progesterone.

Gonads - The reproductive organs differ boys have Testes and woman have Ovaries.

Genitalia - Woman have a vagina and boys have a penis.... it's fairly self explanatory.

Sex is the sexuality we are defined by biological factors.

Gender is the sexuality you psychologically relate yourself to.

The biological staus of being male or female.

Our sense of being male or female.

Id - our basic urges and instincts we possess. Present from birth.

Ego - Develops around the age of three and is the process of thinking about something and the safest way to obtain it.

Superego - This develops as around six years of age the moral compass of the human, instructing us of what is wrong or right.

Ego defence mechanisms are used when we experience anxiety. They are..

Displacement - Transferring our negative feelings towards something that cannot harm us.

Sublimation - Channeling negative energy into an acceptable activity such as sport.

Identification - Adopting the behaviour sof another.

Oedipus complex - This is where a boy experiences desire for his mother but fears his father will castrate him. To resolve this anxiety he Identifies with his father and adopts his characteristics.

Electra complex - This is where a girl experiences unconscious longings for her father, and experiences penis envy of her father. Feeling she has already been castrated she is not afraid of her father. She then identifies with her mother and adopts her characteristics.

A: To treat Little Hans phobia and explore tha factors which contributed to it in the first place.

P: Little Hans was five years old, when he saw a horse fall in the street, and subsequently developed an extreme fear of horses. He feared that they would bite him or fall down. Hans told his father he wanted a much larger penis and agreed that he wanted to be like his father.

F/C: Freud interpreted this as the Oedipus complex, noting evidence of the boys sexual longings for his mother. Freud proposed that the horse represented Hans father, who Hans wished to be dead, he also feared his penis would be cut off and Freud said this was related to being bitten by the horse.

Data gathered from a persons memories.

A detailed study of an individual.

Social learning theory suggests that we learn through Observation Imitation and Reinforcement.

We observe a model and then we imitate their behaviour in order to identify with them and fit in.

We are more likely to do this if the model is similar to us or if they are being rewarded (Vicarious reinforcement) or we are rewarded for copying them.

A: To investigate the role of media and Gender stereotypes.

P: They analysed all advertisments on the TV channel over seven evenings, except for repeats and those portraying children or fantasy. The total sample was 170. They noted the central figures in terms of the product.

F: 70% of figures giving authorative messages were male and 65% of product users were female. 64% of figures seen in work were male and 73% at home were women.

C: Males were more likely to be portrayed as authorative workers. The women were more likely to be shown as dependent and home - based. These are the models which appropriate gender behaviour.

A: To find out if children prefer playing with children of the same sex.

P: They observed children of up to five years playing with each other.

F: These are the ages of children and the percentage of the time they approached a child of the same sex.

18 months       52%

Three years    62%

Five years       70%

C: This shows that as age progresses children tend to prefer playing with other children of the same sex.

This theory suggests that gender development develops in three stages.

1. Gender labelling - This occurs in children up to the age of three. This is where a child can tell what gender it is and what gender others are and does not yet know we stay the same gender throughout the entirety of our lives.

2. Gender stability - This occurs in children of three to five years of age. This is where the child realises that their sex is stable.

3. Gender constancy - This occurs in children aged six and upwards and is where the child realises that other peoples sex is also permanent.