in a classic study, children were shown a video of men and women playing a game, with the men performing one kind of ritual and the women another. Girls copied the women’s ritual, and boys the men’s, but only after they had confirmed for themselves that this is what women (or men) in general did, and not just one particular woman or man. ‘Thus a parent,’ suggests David, ‘no matter how loving or loved, cannot be a model for appropriate gender behaviour, unless the child’s exposure to the wider world (for example, through friendship groups and the media) suggests that the parent is a
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It needs a village.
