THE ROLE OF PSYCHOLOGICAL GENDER IN THE COMPUTER-RELATED ATTITUDES AND ATTAINMENTS OF PRIMARY-SCHOOL CHILDREN (AGED 6-11)

As computing has become an increasingly male-dominated activity, femin ine (sex typed) individuals would be predicted by psychological gender theory to underperform upon computer-related tasks. This is particula ry significant as computer-based tuition now forms a compulsory compon ent of the National Curriculum within primary education (ages 5-11) wi thin the UK. The present study examines the computer-related attitudes and attainments of 48 primary (6-11 years) school-aged children. The results show boys hold more favourable attitudes towards computers tha n girls, a difference that becomes non-significant when controlling fo r psychological gender. Additionally, masculine sex typed schoolchildr en hold more positive attitudes and achieve higher levels of computer- related attainment than feminine sex typed schoolchildren. (C) 1998 El sevier Science Ltd. All rights reserved.