Social Identity and Sexuality

Social Identity Theory: Who Am I?1. Categorization: Status in social structure.2. Identification: Self.3. Comparison: Referent others.4. Social: Normative expectations for behavior.

Ideology: Who Should I Be?1. Gender role expectations.2. Age effects.3. Cohort effects.4. Period effects.

Social Identity and Sexuality

Gender Role Theory: What is a Man, a Woman?1. Shared expectations about behavior.

• Men: Agentic (Task Oriented).• Women: Communal (Social Oriented).

2. When men and women interact, they reinforce these shared expectations.

Social Identity and Sexuality

Expectations States Theory: Who rules?1. In American society, men are defined as leaders and

men are expected to behave as leaders.2. Apart from leadership skills, men take on the role of

leaders to conform to expectations that they do so.

Example: Social trumps self.

Cultural Lag and Masculinity

Aaron Lipman, 1962

Socialization• We learn the common value system of society.

We “learn” to be male and female.• In an information age, the functioning of society

depends mainly upon intellectual skills.• Intellectual skills are the most highly rewarded

monetarily. • Men are socialized to be leaders.• Therefore, men should place high value on

intellectual skills.

Cultural Lag and Masculinity

Aaron Lipman, 1962

Socialization• High school boys do not place high value on

intellectual skills, preferring instead to be thought of as athletic or popular.

• Functionally, our normative expectations for masculinity lag behind the needs of society.

• Young men in urban societies, not having as much opportunity to exhibit traits of traditional masculinity as their rural counterparts, substitute new ways of exhibiting physical traits.

Cultural Lag and Masculinity

Aaron Lipman, 1962

Socialization• Urban men exhibit “toughness,” “courage,”

“mechanical skills,” and so forth as a way of linking masculinity with physical attributes.

• Contemporary society demands that masculinity be redefined from the physical to the intellectual.

• We need new, positive, urban-oriented values that articulate the needs of both the culture and the young man.