chapter 5:Parenting,gender and stereotypes

I read an article about Gender role stereotyping of parents in children's picture books: the invisible father written by David A. Anderson. In the present study, we examined the parental roles presented to picture book reading parents and children. The results indicate significant imbalance in the portrayals of mothers and fathers. Mothers were shown more often than fathers as caring nurturers who discipline their children and express a full range of emotions. Fathers were under represented and portrayed as relatively stoic action who took little part in the lives of their children. A risk of stereotypical portrayals is that they may socialize children and parents at important periods in their development, when parents identify their role in the spectrum from affectionate caregiver to deadbeat absentee, and when children form their expectations of their parents. Whereas Weitzman and others 1972 sought the invisible woman, we must now be similarly concerned about the invisible fathers. Reviewed by 1080951.