Parents' good intentions for online search still tend to be sexist
"Is my son gifted?" "Is my daughter overweight?" are among the questions parents are typing into Google. And despite their good intentions to learn more about their kids, parents' searches are showing clear gender biases.
In this file photo, a man raises his hand during a meeting at Google offices on October 17, 2012.
Mark Lennihan/AP/FILE
According to a recent聽New York Times聽op-ed titled 鈥溾��, parents鈥� Google search trends teach us a lot about parents鈥� biases toward their sons and daughters. Specifically, parents tend to search the Internet for information affirming their sons鈥� brilliance, but when it comes to their daughters, they focus on physical appearances 鈥� revealing our deeply held cultural beliefs that聽boys should be smart听补苍诲听girls should be pretty.
Internalized sexism is alive and well in America today, embedded in the subconscious of well-intended parents.
Now, because I鈥檓 a professor with an interest in girls鈥� media culture, I read a lot of scholarly studies about girls鈥� socialization. So when I read this op-ed, I immediately thought of studies that show how parents鈥� unspoken biases can harm their daughters. Specifically,聽聽that when mothers feel critical about their daughters鈥� bodies, their daughters are significantly more likely to have poor body esteem 鈥� even if the mothers have kept those critical feelings to themselves. Our kids are savvy and attuned to us; they can pick up on our unstated feelings.
Therefore, if Seth Stephens-Davidowitz鈥檚 op-ed is right 鈥� if parents across the US are asking Google if their daughters are thin and pretty 鈥� daughters across the nation must be feeling pretty badly about their bodies, even if they never catch wind of their parents鈥� search strings.
How heartbreaking.
When I posted to聽聽about this, my colleague and friend Melissa Atkins Wardy responded: 鈥淚鈥檓 not sure why, but this article shocked me a bit. I have never in eight years of raising a daughter searched anything about her appearance. I鈥檝e searched health and development stuff on both kids, but the difference shown in this article feels like a canyon in my heart right now.聽
She added, "And how are we supposed to teach parents to do better when it comes to the media when they are such a huge part of the problem themselves?鈥�
It鈥檚 a good question. If we parents are trying to do right by our kids, and trying to teach our kids to resist the stereotypes found in our culture 鈥� but, paradoxically, we鈥檙e part of the same culture we want our kids to resist 鈥� what can we do?
First, we can take stock of what we already know about media stereotypes in kids lives. For example, we know that media portrayals of boys and girls mirror cultural attitudes.
For example,聽聽that kids feel it鈥檚 really important for boy characters in the media to be smart and for girl characters to be pretty 鈥� mirroring their parents鈥� search strings. Girls identify with female characters they consider attractive, whereas boys identify with male characters they consider intelligent. This is probably because of the biases they they pick up on at home, at school, and from other media.
When television shows and toys show girls in stereotypical roles, with stereotypical traits (boys who are valued for being smart and girls who are valued for being pretty), they鈥檙e reflecting widespread cultural ideas about girlhood and boyhood. But those stereotypical representations also聽reinforce聽those attitudes 鈥� making it cyclical.聽This means we need to break the cycle.
Therefore, my take is this.聽Effecting change requires three things:
- Consciousness-raising (helping us all to see our own biases, so that we can overcome them);
- Media literacy work (to help parents and kids break down and resist the biases they see on screen); and
- Activism, to hold media producers accountable when they perpetuate these biases.
There鈥檚 so much work to be done, it鈥檚 overwhelming. But it鈥檚 important, and it鈥檚 time.
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