Psychologists believe human sexual identities are made up of three separate components. The first shows the direction of a child's sexual orientation, whether he or she is heterosexual, homosexual, or bisexual. The second is the child's style of behavior, whether a female is a "tomboy" or homemaker-type and a male is a "macho guy" or a "sensitive boy." The third component is what psychologists call the core gender identity. According to an article in the May 12, 2001 issue of New Scientist, it is the most difficult to ascertain but is essentially the deep inner feeling a child has about whether he or she is a male or female (Encyclopedia, 2006). Do not use the Encyclopedia in professional writing unless you are using to describe what it generally known and citing it for that purpose, such as you might use Webster’s dictionary to show how a term is generally defined. Your work is assumed to be scientific in nature and the Encyclopedia is not considered a scientific reference.
In spite of conscious attempts to reduce sex role stereotyping in the final decades of the twentieth century and in the early 2000s, boys and girls are still treated differently by adults from the time they are born. The way adults play with infants has been found to differ based on gender. Girls are treated more gently and approached more verbally than boys. As children grow older, many parents, teachers, and other authority figures still tend to encourage independence, competition, aggressiveness, and exploration more in boys and expression, nurturance, motherhood and childrearing, and obedience more in girls (Encyclopedia, 2006). 
Most experts believe that children begin showing the first signs of their own gender awareness at the age of two. Kohlberg suggested that a two-or three year-old learns that there are two kinds of person and that he, or she, belongs to one of them. Thus the child may be able to tell you that it is a boy or girl, but it doesn't mean very much. A boy believes he could become a girl if he wanted to by playing girls games or wearing dresses or growing hair long, and vice versa. Later on they can classify people on the basis of their genitals (Bland, 2002).
The ability to recognize gender differences becomes more prominent once the child reaches preschool age.  Both boys and girls at this age become aware of their own gender and begin to make correlations between activities, toys and adult occupations. At age three, children begin to apply gender labels and stereotypes, identifying gentle, empathic characteristics with females and strong, aggressive characteristics with males. Even in the twenty-first century, most young children develop stereotypes regarding gender roles, associating nurses, teachers, and secretaries as females and police officers, firefighters, and construction workers as males (Encyclopedia, 2006). 
Some time between four and six years, comes what Kohlberg called gender stability, the understanding one stays in the same gender throughout life. As an example, he suggested that the child can answer questions like "When you were a little baby, were you a boy or a girl?” (Bland, 2002).  Kohlberg's age of gender constancy begins at age of six or seven years, and coincides with Piaget's concrete operational period, where the child can manipulate objects in its mind in a complex way, but visualizes them in concrete terms. For Kohlberg, the child finally grasps the idea that gender stays the same with time and across situations. It learns that gender does not change with age or size, or by wearing clothes or having a different hairstyle (Bland, 2002).
Once the child reaches approximately six years old, they (Number disagreement.) begin to take on gender roles and become influenced by gender stereotyping. Little boys may become more fascinated by machines and begin to play with only other boys. Little girls may become more fascinated by dolls and begin to play with only other girls. Children at this age develop strong stereotypes that aren’t necessarily expressed by adults.  The child can have a variety of different influences including culture, ethnicity, family life and his parent's social and economical status. For example, a young boy who grows up in a predominantly female household may be less affected by stereotypes, for example, thinking that females aren't as physically capable as males, than a boy who was raised with out substantial female influences. The child's friends and the physical make-up of the family may greatly influence a child's attitude toward himself and others of the same and opposite sex.  These ridged stereotypes become more flexible as the child gets older (Corsini & Wedding, 2000).  Good.
Socially, the differences between male and female gender development as the child gets older may not necessarily be as drastic as it was when the child was of preschool age. Girls and boys begin to socialize with each other more and have an understanding of the opposite gender. Young boys may be taught to not show emotion and become assertive, dominate and competitive. Young girls may be taught to be feminine and show compassion, warmth and be nurturing. Taking on these traditional male and female roles has the potential to impact the child’s development into adulthood (Papalia, 2001). 
Physically, girls mature faster than boys, are physically healthier, and are more advanced in developing oral and written linguistic skills.  Boys are generally more advanced at envisioning and manipulating objects. They are more aggressive and more physically active, preferring noisy, boisterous forms of play that require larger groups and more space than the play of girls the same age (Encyclopedia, 2006). Both the social and physical aspects of gender development influence what type of job the person pursues, how they are treated by their peers, and how they handle stressful situations.
Along with physical differences in the body, the child’s mind is inherently different too. New studies are now proving what scientists have been hypothesizing for years; there are strong biological differences between the male and female brain. These differences between the female and male brain are relevant to people in all stages of life, not just children. In several recent studies, men and women were asked to complete a series of tasks while having their brains imaged. These MRIs showed the clear difference between men and women in areas such as language acquisition, visual-spatial information, the recognition of faces and emotions, hearing and vision (Sax, 2005). Good.
Children show the same differences. Boys are much better at visual-spatial information. Tests show that not only can boys complete visual-spatial puzzles faster, but also with more accuracy. Boys also use a much smaller portion of their brain to do so. MRI scans show that only a small portion of the right Occipital lobe is engaged when answering visual-spatial puzzles while girls use the right portion of the Occipital lobes and small portions on both sides of their Temporal lobes. This shows that girls need to think harder and longer about the correct answers to visual-spatial problems than boys do (Sax 2005). In several other tests, boys and girls were shown faces and asked to identify the emotion that the face was showing. The MRI images showed that girls were able to answer with far more speed and accuracy then boys were. Again, only a small portion of the female brain was engaged during this task than the male brain was. Experts believe these differences have been hardwired for centuries and were vital for the survival of people who lived many civilizations before us (Sax 2005). 
It has also been proven that girls between the ages of birth and ten years old, have better hearing than any other group of people, be them male or female, throughout the life span. Janel Caine published work that shows that even premature baby girls hear better than premature baby boys. In her study, premature baby girls who listened to music were discharged from the hospital six days earlier than premature baby girls who didn’t listen to music. Premature baby girls who were sung to by their mothers were discharged an average of twelve days earlier than premature baby girls who weren’t sung to. When this study was performed on premature baby boys the presence of music, prerecorded or sung, made no difference. None of the premature baby boys were discharged from the hospital early (Sax 2005).  Very good.
Experts believe that the difference in hearing could be partially to blame for the over diagnosis of ADD and ADHD in elementary age boys. The male and female minds are so intrinsically different and few educators really understand these differences. A portion of the problem that many young boys have is that they cannot hear the teacher well enough, there for they cannot keep their attention focused; not that they actually have a clinical diagnosis for ADD or ADHD (Sax 2005). 
 As adults, those who have strongly identified with gender stereotypes demonstrate them in their daily lives. A boy who has been taught to be dominant and competitive may be overbearing and jealous as an adult. A girl who has been taught to be demure and passive may become dependent or not have the self esteem to stand up for herself when she becomes an adult. These issues can become so deep seated that they can affect a person’s adult relationships. These behaviors can strain a relationship or make it next to impossible to have a healthy and appropriate adult relationship.
Both of the children who were interviewed are well rounded and quite active. Garrett loves sports, especially basketball and is in the first grade. Sara loves horses and her grandmother owns four of them. She is a good student and has many friends. Sara and Garrett both live in stable homes and have strong parental-like figures in their lives.
Garrett is a six-year-old boy who lives with his biological parents and his two sisters. Garrett is the youngest of three children and has been raised in an upper-middle class home. When Garrett was asked about his best friend Spencer, he said they were best friends because they both like to draw and read books about airplanes. Since the boys have similar interests, it is obvious to Garrett that they must be friends. He also claims that he is friends with mostly boys, because he knows more boys than girls.  When asked about boys and girls acting differently, Garrett seems to be aware of the differences but cannot quite seem to place them. "I don't know why boys and girls act different, they just do. But I know that boys are better at basketball than girls." When asked if there is anything that girls are better at, Garrett replied, "Well, I know Megan is better at jump roping” (personal communication, November 12, 2006).   Garrett's statements are prime examples of Albert Bandura's social cognitive theory. Bandura's theory states, "Gender-typing is a result of interpretation, evaluation and internalization of socially transmitted standards" (Papalia, Diane E., et al, 2001, p. 288). It is also a good example of Lawrence Kohlberg's cognitive-developmental theory. Kohlberg's theory states, "Once a child learns that she is a girl and he is a boy, (the) child sorts information about behavior by gender and acts accordingly" (Papalia, Diane E., et al, 2001, p. 288). Garrett is also very close to his father. He enjoys camping with his dad and has even joined Indian Guides, a club for fathers and sons. Garrett's uncle, who he is also close with, spends much quality time with him. "Uncle Frank is my favorite because he wrestles with me” (personal communication, November 12, 2006). This also shows validity to Sigmund Freud's psychosexual theory about children identifying with the parent of the same sex. 
Sara is a twelve-year-old girl who lives with her paternal grandmother and her grandmother's children, who are between the ages of six and nineteen. She has been raised in a lower-middle class home and is in the seventh grade. When Sara was asked who her best friend is and why, she said Angela was nice, caring and always there when Sara needed her.  Sara also said she has more friends who are males because "Girls are catty, and with them, everything has to be perfect” (personal communication, November 12, 2006). Sara's answers prove to be more thoughtful, and to focus more on her personal relationships than on simply the common interests she shares with others her age. Unlike Garrett, who, at age six, hasn't fully developed any personal relationships with anyone outside his immediate family. While Sara says she notices the differences in the ways boys and girls her age act, she thinks of them as equal in terms of their physical ability. When asked if there was 
anything that boys were better at then girls, Sara replied, "No. Boys and girls are pretty much equal, they can be the same in sports and school and in all different things" (personal communication, November 12, 2006). Sara doesn't seem to be as affected by the gender stereotypes about physical ability between sexes as Garrett is. However, she is very aware of the gender stereotypes imposed by our culture about the way a woman should look and act. This could be due to Sara's age and maturity verses Garrett's lack of personal relationships and experiences. Nonetheless, they both understand gender roles and recognize they exist. Sara insists that all boys, not only the ones her age, are much more outgoing than girls. "Guys don't care about anything, like the way they look and how they do things. Guys joke around and like to make people laugh…they're outgoing and they don't care what other people think." While she's sure that most females always act in the same ways, quiet but perfect. "Girls back off because everything they do has to be perfect…girls watch what they do because they don't want to get made fun of” (personal communication, November 12, 2006). Sara's comments about how males and females should act, seems to prove Sandra Bem's gender-schema theory. Bem's theory states that, "(the) Child organizes information about what is considered appropriate for a boy or a girl on the basis of what a particular culture dictates, and behaves accordingly. Child sorts by gender because the culture dictates that gender is an important schema" (Papalia, Diane E., et al, 2001, p. 288). Sara also states that while most of the girls she knows act as the most perfect of wallflowers, she herself isn't satisfied by acting as such. She insists that she is more of a tomboy, which is why she is friends with more boys than girls and wishes that she could act more like herself, but she isn't exactly sure how to do so. This too can also give validity to Albert Bandura's Social cognitive theory.  Good.
When Sara gets older, she wants to become an actress, a dream not unlike most for girls her age. She likes Sandra Bullock and Meg Ryan because she says they have the personality that she thinks she has, strong and smart. She also enjoys the television shows 7th Heaven and Gilmore Girls because she thinks she can identify with the female characters that are about her age. "They go through similar things and they can see things from my point of view” (personal communication, November 12, 2006). Garrett wants to be an artist and work at Cedar Point when he gets older. His favorite television shows and movies are ones involving Scooby Doo. He enjoys Scooby Doo because, "Scooby's afraid of everything and it's funny” (personal communication, November 12, 2006).
 Both children are aware of their gender roles and differences, but to different extents. While Sara is almost fully aware, and is beginning to face some of the hard realities imposed by our culture, Garrett is just beginning to recognize the major differences between boys and girls. Both Sara and Garrett are right where they should be in the way of cognitive development and have the potential to become bright, well-rounded adolescents. 

References
Use hanging indents.

Bland. J. (2002) About Gender: Cognitive Development
http://www.gender.org.uk/about/02psycho/23_cogdv.htm 
 
Corsini, Raymond J., & Wedding, Danny (2000). Current Psychotherapies. Belmont, CA: Brooks/Cole.

Gender identity. (n.d.). Encyclopedia of Children's Health. Retrieved December 04, 2006, from Answers.com Web site: http://www.answers.com/topic/gender-identity

Papalia, Diane E., et al. (2001). Human Development. Boston: McGraw-Hill.

Sax, Leonard. (2005). Why Gender Matters. New York: Doubleday.