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Full-Text Articles in Social and Behavioral Sciences
You Lead Like A Girl: Gender And Children’S Leadership Development, Alexa J. Trumpy, Marissa Elliott
You Lead Like A Girl: Gender And Children’S Leadership Development, Alexa J. Trumpy, Marissa Elliott
Faculty Creative and Scholarly Works
Recent leadership initiatives encourage children, particularly girls, to defy gender stereotypes. Yet, those creating and participating in these initiatives, like all members of our culture, have their own gender biases, have received gender socialization, and live in a society where the masculine is more valued than the feminine. We conducted participant observation of two gender-segregated leadership summer camps to examine how camp counselors and directors teach leadership to boys and girls. We find counselors unintentionally reinforce gender stereotypes and promote gender-typical behavior while attempting to break down these same stereotypes and behavioral expectations. We argue the gender-segregated environment leads to …