Maternal stress during pregnancy has been repeatedly associated with lasting changes in offspring physiology and behavior. Despite evidence linking maternal stress during pregnancy to premorbid abnormalities associated with depression, such as difficult temperament, cognitive deficits, and, in animal studies, brain abnormalities and biological profiles linked to depression, very few studies have examined maternal stress during pregnancy in relation to offspring depression itself and no study has examined sex differences in this association. The current study used data from 1,711 mother-offspring dyads enrolled in a longitudinal birth cohort study. Maternal narratives collected during pregnancy provided a direct, prospective measure of maternal stress during pregnancy and were qualitatively coded for stressful life events and stress-related themes by two independent raters. Latent class analysis (LCA) was used to identify distinct subgroups of offspring based on exposure to maternal psychosocial stress during pregnancy and other known developmental factors from the prenatal, childhood, and adolescent periods that have been previously associated with depression and/or maternal stress during pregnancy. To examine sex differences, LCA was conducted separately for males and females. Subgroups derived from the LCA were compared to determine whether and to what extent they differed on adolescent depressive symptoms. LCA revealed a subgroup of “high risk” females, characterized by higher maternal ambivalence/negativity about the pregnancy, lower levels of maternal positivity about the pregnancy, higher levels of reported routine daily hassles during pregnancy, lower levels of maternal education, higher maternal age, higher maternal pre-pregnancy body mass index (BMI), higher levels of maternal worry about finances and health concerns during childhood, higher levels of inhibition and conduct symptoms during childhood, decreased cognitive functioning during childhood and adolescence, lower levels of perceived paternal and maternal support during adolescence, and higher levels of maternal depression during adolescence. These high risk females exhibited elevated depressive symptoms during adolescence relative to both the “low risk” female group and the mean of the sample. A subgroup of males defined by similar indicators was not found to have elevated depressive symptoms during adolescence. Our findings appear to be in line with an emerging body of evidence suggesting that prenatal stress may have a lasting and sex-specific influence on offspring development. / Psychology

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In adult populations, it is generally accepted there is an overall male advantage on spatial tasks and an overall female advantage on verbal tasks. These differences are inconsistent in children. The present study examined relations among age, sex, EEG hemispheric activation, and performance on spatial and verbal tasks. Thirty-two eight-year-olds (16 boys) and 32 college students (16 men) had EEG recorded at baseline and while performing a computerized 2-dimensional Gingerbread Man mental rotation task, a computerized 2-dimensional Alphanumeric mental rotation task, a computerized 3-dimensional Basketball Player mental rotation task, and a computerized Lexical Decision-Making task. Additionally, participants completed a paper-and-pencil Water Level task and an oral Verbal Fluency task. On the 2-dimensional Alphanumeric and 3-dimensional Basketball Player mental rotation tasks men performed better than boys, but the performance of women and girls did not differ. On the Lexical Decision-Making and Water level tasks, men performed better than women, while there was no difference between boys and girls. No sex differences were found on the 2-dimensional Gingerbread Man mental rotation task or Verbal Fluency task. Analyses of task-related data also indicate that computer familiarization or computer related task demands might contribute to sex differences on computerized tasks. EEG analyses indicated that, on the 2-dimensional Alphanumeric mental rotation task, men exhibited more left posterior temporal activation than women, while there were no differences between boys and girls. Additionally, there was evidence that simple, or 2-dimensional, mental rotation tasks are associated with left posterior brain activation, while 3-dimensional mental rotation tasks are associated with right posterior brain activation. On the 2-dimensional Gingerbread Man mental rotation task, males exhibited more activation of the left parietal area than females, while on the 2-dimensional Alphanumeric mental rotation task, men exhibited more activation of the left posterior temporal area than women. On the 3-dimensional Basketball player mental rotation task, all participants exhibited greater activation of the right parietal area than the left parietal area. / Ph. D.

Parental socialization of emotions has been a topic of interest in developmental research for decades because of the importance of understanding how children learn about their emotions. The influence of the sex of both parent and child, however, are often not considered, and research on parent emotion socialization has often focused on infants and young children. Not considering these constructs during middle childhood ignores the importance of this developmental period, during which children have a more established gender identity and thus might recognize a shared identity with a parent. Emotion socialization from both parents during this developmental period has the potential to differentially inform children’s expectations of gender norms related to emotions. Men and women interpret and express their emotions differently and may differentially socialize their children regarding emotions along these patterns. The current study examined parental emotion coaching and elaboration observed during discussions of positive and negative emotions between 44 children with their mothers and fathers, with specific focus on the sex of the parents and children. I expected that mothers would engage in more emotion coaching and use a more elaborative style than fathers. Additionally, I expected that parents of girls would be more encouraging of positive emotions than parents of boys and that parents of boys would be more discouraging of negative emotions than parents of girls. Children between the ages of 6 and 9 visited the Children’s Emotions Lab with their mothers and fathers on separate occasions and participated in an emotion talk task with each parent. Each pair discussed a time when the child was happy and a time when the child was upset; each discussion lasted two and a half minutes each. I found a significant emotion valence by child sex interaction: parents were more elaborative and encouraging when discussing positive emotions with daughters than with sons and that parents were more elaborative and encouraging when discussing negative events with sons than with daughters. There was also specific parent gender by child sex interaction: mothers were less elaborative and encouraging with daughters than sons and that fathers were less elaborative and encouraging with sons than daughters. Findings from this study suggest that parents’ experiences with their own emotions influence their emotion socialization practices with their children. Recommended practices for future studies and interventions are suggested. / M.S. / Emotion socialization refers to the ways we come to understand the rules, expectations, and understanding of emotions. Research often looks at the ways that parents socialize, or teach, emotions to their children by examining parent attitudes about children’s emotions, parents’ reactions to children’s emotions, and parent-child discussions of emotions. However, often this research is limited in scope, examining only mothers’ parenting, only examining socialization of negative emotions, or using only parent-report data. Research has previously found that boys and girls are socialized differently when it comes to emotions, and I want to build on established research to examine these differences further. For this study, I have observed parent-child conversations about positive and negative emotions, including both mothers and fathers. Forty-four children participated with both their mothers and fathers. I looked at parental elaboration, which is how parents ask for and provide information within a conversation, and parental encouragement of emotions, which relates to how parents validate children’s emotions and help children to understand cause and consequences of their emotions. I hypothesized that mothers would be more elaborative, that is ask for and give more information in conversations, and encouraging, that is helping children to accept, understand and respond to their emotions, than fathers. I also hypothesized that parents of daughters would be more elaborative and encouraging when talking about positive emotions and that parents of sons would be less encouraging of negative emotions. Only parts of my hypotheses were supported by the data from my study. Mothers and fathers did have different strategies of emotion socialization, and fathers of daughters were more encouraging of positive emotions. However, parents of sons were more encouraging of negative emotions. Further, parents were less elaborative and encouraging of their same-sex children’s emotions. These findings suggest that parents’ own experiences, and possibly even the ways their own parents socialized them, is related to the ways they socialize their children.

The area of cognitive research that has produced the most consistent sex differences is the area of spatial ability. Particularly, males usually perform better on mental rotation tasks than do females. One argument for these differences is that experience with spatial activity drives these differences, such that traditionally more masculine activities require more practice of spatial abilities. Another argument is biological in nature, such that there is either 1) a critical period of development that leads to differential lateralization of the brain, or 2) differential activation of the brain by circulating hormones. Performance on mental rotation tasks has been associated with right parietal activation levels, both during task performance and prior to performance during baseline recordings. The present study examined the relations among sex, age, EEG hemispheric activation (at the 10.5-13.5Hz. frequency band), and 2-dimensional mental rotation task ability. Nineteen eight-year-olds (10 boys) and 20 college students (10 men), had EEG recorded at baseline and while performing a mental rotation task. Men performed better on the mental rotation task than women, while there were no differences between boys and girls. After covarying for baseline EEG high alpha power values, EEG results during the mental rotation task indicated an interaction, with men exhibiting more activation (lower EEG power values at 10.5-13.5Hz) than women in the parietal and posterior temporal regions, while boys' and girls' power values 10.5-13.5Hz did not differ in the parietal or posterior temporal regions. Furthermore, during the baseline condition, men generally exhibited more activation (lower EEG power values at 10.5-13.5Hz) throughout all regions of the scalp. Results support the hypothesis that hormones, or hormonal influence, may result in a biological change which affects both brain activation and performance on mental rotation tasks. / Master of Science

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Thesis (MA (Psychology))--University of Stellenbosch, 2005. / The primary aim of this study was to determine the content and number of fears expressed by 1st year students at a tertiary institution both retrospectively and currently. The expressed retrospective profile aimed to determine the content and number of fears recalled by the sample group when they were six years old. The expressed current profile aimed to determine the content and number of fears currently being experienced. The study also aimed to establish whether there were significant gender differences in the two profiles. This study found that there were no significant differences between males and females in terms of content or number of expressed fears for the retrospective profile. Both groups indicated the most reported fears for Dark/Night, followed by fears of People and Animals, although in different rank orders. The fears were of a specific nature as the five highest ranked categories accounted for almost 70% of the fears expressed. In addition, the actual fear profile of pre-school children as found by Loxton (2004) was compared to the retrospective fear profile as the sample group recalled it. This study confirmed Loxton’s findings as the three highest ranked categories of the retrospective expressed profile covered the five highest ranked categories in the actual profile. This study found that males and females shared four of the five most common ranked fears for the current expressed profile, namely Failure, Harm to Others, Animals and Future. This study did not confirm the expected decline in animal fears as predicted by the literature, but the other fears would appear to comply with the body of research for the content of the late adolescents’ expressed fears. These fears were more diverse in nature and the ten highest ranked categories accounted for about 70% of the fears expressed. Statistically significant gender differences were found in terms of Dark/Night, Being Alone, Violence/Crime, Separation and Relational Problems. The expected decline in the number of expressed fears was not confirmed as the average number of fears per participant increased slightly from the retrospective profile to the current profile. There was no significant difference with regard to gender. The secondary aim of this study was to establish whether any of the expressed fears have remained constant from the retrospective profile to the current profile. The fear of Animals appeared to be one fear that, rather than decline with age, remained stable. Other fears that appeared to show continuity were related to Harm to Self and Harm to Others. Fear of Being Alone appeared in both the retrospective and current expressed profiles for females only. A fear that was indicated in the literature to be relevant at the late adolescent stage of development was the fear of Acquired Immune Deficiency Syndrome. This study found no evidence to support these predictions, which is a thought-provoking problem. Although beyond the scope of this study, the implications of this apparent lack of fear for a life-threatening problem of epidemic proportions particularly for this age group, is of concern.

The literature surrounding individual trade policy preference has traditionally relied on economic self-interest as the impetus for opinion formation. However, every survey-based study has observed a significant and baffling gender bias, with women being consistently more likely to oppose international trade than their male counterparts. One explanation for this phenomenon focuses on the specialized, economic training required to understand the complex subject of international trade. This study uses a unique sample of undergraduate students from Ball State University, stratified by academic department. The survey instrument is aimed at comparing departments that emphasize economic training with those that do not and how this effects the individuals trade policy preferences. The results show that controlling for economic training eliminates the significance of gender in predicting trade policy preference. / Department of Sociology

Mate preferences provide an opportunity to explore the validity of evolutionary and social role origin theories of sex differences in human behaviour. In evolutionary models, preferences are sex-specific adaptive responses to constraints to reproductive success. In social role models, sex differences arise from the allocation of men and women to different gender roles. I explored the effects of the status of women on preferences to assess the validity of the origin theories. I developed an adequate measure of female status (i.e. resource control), and explored its effects on female preferences in an online survey (Chapter 3), a mail-shot survey (Chapter 4), and a sample of non-industrial societies (Chapter 5). Results implicated a role of constraints on women in the expression of female-typical preferences. In an experimental manipulation of female perceptions of their status, results enabled greater confidence in the attribution of causal direction to relationships (Chapter 6). In Chapter 7, I explored the conditions under which the relationships of interest occurred. In Chapter 8, to further explore the origin models I investigated the effects of resource control on the magnitudes of sex differences in preferences. In Chapter 9, I explored relationships between a characteristic more closely related to the male gender role (i.e. apparent intelligence) and femininity in female faces. Women who were considered to look more intelligent were perceived as less feminine. In Chapter 10, I investigated the effects of reproductive strategy on mate preferences. Results were consistent with evolutionary models of behaviour. I argue that “status” is a multidimensional construct, and that its effects on mate preferences are complex, that while results were generally more consistent with an evolutionary than the biosocial model, integration of models would provide greater insight into human mate preferences.

Schizophrenia is a debilitating psychiatric condition affecting almost one percent of the US population. Typical antipsychotics (e.g., haloperidol) have been in use for several decades and are generally very effective in treating the emotional and cognitive effects of schizophrenia, but are used as the last line of treatment due to their severe extrapyramidal motor side effects under chronic exposure. The present study was conducted to investigate the role of sex in determining the oromotor side effects of typical antipsychotics via measuring different behavioral dimensions of male and female Sprague-Dawley rats licking sucrose after haloperidol treatment. The results showed a stronger sensitivity in female rats than male rats within total licking responses and inter-lick intervals. The present results suggest closer attention needs to be paid to the role that sexual hormones play in the motor slowing and behavior-reducing effects of antipsychotics.