Cross cultural research explains the causes of gender roles and how they differ between cultures. If roles are similar in different cultures it suggests a biological explanation. However, if they vary between cultures, it suggests that gender roles are influences more by social factors.
MEAD studied three different societies of Papua New Guinea using an ethnographic approach which is where you study culture though participant observations and interviews. She found that in The Arapesh, both men and women exhibited unaggressive, sensitive, peaceful and caring personas. In Tchambuli it was found that men and women were uncooperative, aggressive, insensitive and warlike. In Mundugamor it was found that women were dominant with economic and political influences. The men were submissive and took care of the children at home.
GEWERTZ observed the Tchambuli in the 1970’s and found males to be more aggressive than females. He argued that Mead studied these tribes when they were facing a transitory phase in their lifestyle. Freeman (1952) also criticised Mead’s work finding that the three tribes (and others studied) were more westernised in their gender roles than she first observed.
The empirical evidence by MEAD has been heavily criticised due to a methodological flaw. Mean used research methods and tools which were relevant and applicable in her culture but alien and non-applicable to the cultures in Papua New Guinea. This is known as imposed etic.
The theory has also been criticised for failing to consider the importance of nature. The theory that gender is culturally relative suggests that all behaviours and gender identity is learnt through a process of reinforcement and social learning theory. The theory does not take into account any biological factors and out rules the chance of gender identity being innate. As the theory only considers the role of nurture and ignore the role of nature the theory is not a holistic account into the explanation of gender development and so the theory’s internal validity was lowered
MEAD was being criticised for being ethnocentric as she was using Western ideas of what is means to be masculine/feminine and suggesting that this is the norm and the Samoan societies deviated from this.
Since Mead used an ethnographic approach, there may be cultural bias in interpreting data. Translation is often necessary and sometimes the meaning will be distorted across languages.
One study conducted by WILLIAMS AND BEST, the study explored gender stereotypes in 30 different nations involving 2800 university students as participants. They were given a 300 item adjective checklist and asked to decide whether an item was most associated with men or women. What they found out was that there was a broad consensus across countries with men being seen as more dominant and aggressive and women being seen as nurturing and defendant. This supports the common stereotype of both genders, that males are “dominant and aggressive” and that females are “nurturing and defendant”.
The findings from this study do have strengths, due to the sample used. The studies sample firstly was large and also very diverse in terms of culture, religion and ethnicity (expected of universities) and because of this the population validity of the findings increases and makes the results more generalisable and representative of the wider population, this means the conclusion of gender roles being consistent throughout cultures is applicable to the general population.
However there is a flaw within the study, you could say that although the sample was drawn from a large geographical pool, which should indicate representativeness, they were all students who share common attributes and viewpoints and so they may not being necessarily representative of the population of their country and all social groups within.
Also the construction of the checklist did not include an equal category alongside the male and female category, so this means that the division between the male and female categories may be exaggerated, thus prompting the students to believe that there is a gap between men and women and thus making them draw upon their inner stereotypical views.
Women are said to conform more than men but in cross-cultural studies, it was found that women conform more in tightly knit societies but less in societies where they are highly valued and seen less as a mean of reproduction. This supports the influence of social factors on gender.
Conducting research into cross cultural studies also holds problems as research methods used in Western societies can be alien to other cultures. Observations are also difficult to conduct if the researcher doesn’t have sufficient knowledge of the culture he/she is observing and this can lead to misinterpretations. Also, instead of observing behaviours, having a researcher bias may cause the researcher to try and find evidence to support the popular idea that men are more aggressive and women more nurturing.
In western society, gender is based on biological sex. In other societies, there may be a third or even fourth gender. One example is the ‘fafafinis’ in Somoa. They are men dressed as women who carry out takes that females usually do but in different ways. These societies cannot be compared to Western societies and therefore pose problems for a researcher in cross cultural studies.
BARY ET AL found when conducting research across non-westernised cultures that nurturing characteristics were deemed as important dominant feminine characteristics, whilst self reliance was deemed as an important dominant masculine characteristic. The findings suggest that gender is culturally universal in that it supports the theory’s suggestion of that men are innately dominant and women innately caring. Supporting the theory’s suggestions the study improves the theory’s internal validity.
Psychologists have criticised the theory for being reductionist. The theory ignores the role of nurture as it suggests that gender behaviours are innate and developed from nature. The theory does not take into account any social influences in the development of gender identity. With the theory only considering the role of nature, the theory fails to be provided as an holistic account and thus lacks internal validity
Since cross-cultural studies can be viewed as natural experiments it allows us to unravel cause and effect thus providing a good basis to our knowledge about gender.