The Difference Between Gender And Gender Identity

In biosocial terms, gender is not the same as sex. Most people believe gender and sex are kindred, but they’re not. There is a difference between gender and sex. Sex is how society classifies a person’s genetic and biological anatomy. Gender is how an individual views their identity, regardless of sex. Sex is biological in nature and determines one 's biological destiny. Gender, on the other hand, helps define one 's role within society. Lorber wrote: “Individuals are born sexed but not gendered, they have to be taught to be masculine or feminine” (1994). What if children aren’t taught to be masculine or feminine? Of course, these social cues are what mainly divides men from women, and nature from nurture, but does it also divide sex from gender?

“The formation of gender identity has been approached in different terms by Lawrence Kohlberg (1927-1987), who formulated the concept of gender constancy, the awareness that gender remains fixed throughout a person 's lifetime. Kohlberg noted that while children are aware of their own gender and the gender of others by the age of three, they do not really begin assuming appropriate gender-based behavior until the age of about seven, when they first understand that gender is permanent—that they cannot change gender the way they can change their clothes or their behavior. Kohlberg believed that children do not start systematically imitating the behavior of members of their own sex until that point” (Psychology). For most people, being treated a certain way because of ones gender begins at a young age. If you’re a female, you are expected to feel, act and present yourself in a feminine way and if you’re a male, you are expected to be masculine. This strongly influences behavior in relationships and sexuality. We perceive gender identities to be based on our sex, by the toys we play and what we wear, which we think is natural but they are in fact based on culture, which is not natural. Natural is the observation and intellect of what is seen through the human eye. Children don’t understand sexuality till puberty, but the interactions and feeling they discover beforehand, helps them figure out their gender

Johnson, “Like sex, gender is a multidimensional construct that refers to the different roles, responsibilities, limitations, and experiences provided to individuals. Gender builds on biological sex to give meaning to sex differences, categorizing individuals with labels such as woman, man, transsexual, and third gendered”. There is a range of genders, such as transsexual, transgender, and transvestite. According to Susan Scutti, “Transsexuals are people who transition from one sex to another. A person born as a male can become recognizably female through the use of hormones and/or surgical procedures; and a person born as a female can become recognizably male. Transgender, unlike transsexual, is a term for people whose identity, expression, behavior, or general sense of self does not conform to what is usually associated with the sex they were born in the place they were born. Transgender, then, unlike transsexual is a multifaceted term. One example of a transgendered person might be a man who is attracted to women but also identifies as a cross-dresser. Other examples include people who consider themselves gender nonconforming, multigendered, androgynous, third gender, and two-spirit people” (2014, p.1). Gender is cultural and is the term to use when referring to women and men as social groups. Sex is biological; used when the biological distinction is predominant. Sigmund Freud a neurologist, claimed that “anatomy is destiny, that is, one 's gender