Parents favor daughters: A meta-analysis of predictors of differential treatment
18 comments
·February 24, 2025roguecoder
bitshiftfaced
I was following you until the end.
> "Why are boys not being taught to be conscientious?" seems like a more fruitful question than "how can we make parents be meaner to girls?"
Woah now, hang on just a bit. I think you made a bit of a leap there. Let's recall that the authors reported a "slight" preference and a "small" effect. One thing that could explain this is simply how girls mature at a faster rate in childhood and adolescence. After all, the authors report, "Results showed that when favoritism was based on autonomy and control, parents tended to favor older siblings." If you control for age, then I'd expect sex-related differences in maturity to become more pronounced.
piltdownman
'Why don't we teach parents proper pedagogy' seems like a more moral position than 'Lets continue treating boys as defective girls'.
https://www.johnlocke.org/boys-are-treated-like-defective-gi... https://www.foundationfather.com/p/boys-are-not-defective-gi...
dauertewigkeit
Isn't conscientiousness a biologically driven psychological trait? I always assumed that to be the case. I don't think you can train conscientiousness or any other psychological trait for that matter. But I am no expert and would be delighted to be convinced otherwise.
null
watwut
That still does not imply it is somehow favoritism if parents have less conflicts with a kid that does not bully siblings, does homework and only needs to be asked to do chores to actually so them.
I know it is somewhat caricature. But "my brother is lazier and parents never have him do any chores so that there is less conflict" is not fairness despite there being no conflict.
Less conscientious kid means there have to be more conflict.
subjectsigma
Thank you, this is why whenever I see a surprising headline I scan the top comment before reading the article.
Is there a chance that boys and girls are favored in different ways and that’s just not being captured correctly? I know my parents treated me (male) and my sisters very differently but it’s hard to say if anyone was “favored”…
arjie
A related phenomenon is in IVF for sex selection. I remember reading that Americans prefer girls to a great degree except for those of Indians/Chinese origin who prefer boys. Both my wife and I have the common reflexive distaste for being too predictable (we're an Indian/Taiwanese couple) but for us the choice was made since pre-implantation genetic testing revealed that our only healthy embryos (until gene therapies currently in trial reach fruition) will be girls.
I do confess that, if we were fortunate enough to have three children, I would prefer at least one of them be of the other sex but the preference is exceedingly mild and I'd rather have all the children we can have than have ones of any specific gender.
magicalhippo
Same in courts[1], another place where innocence is judged and punishment handed out.
[1]: https://journalistsresource.org/criminal-justice/courts-leni...
heathwhohath
Reminds me of the Arcade Fire song Suburbs
"So can you understand why I want a daughter while I'm still young? I want to hold her hand and show her some beauty before this damage is done. But if it's too much to ask, if it's too much to ask Then send me a son"
Spooky23
Totally. In bigger families, girls get bonus points, and the oldest usually does too. In my Irish-American family, traditionally younger boys are fodder for the army or priesthood.
This stuff is all cultural. Girls are seen as (and in reality are) more vulnerable in general, and in many cultures primogeniture was the norm and "feels right" at some level. As society progressed, inheritance isn't so strict, and women are empowered to live as full citizens.
But the old cultural norms are still baked in. Alot of the madness in our current society is the collision of the modern world with assumptions.
triceratops
> Conscientious and agreeable children also received more favored treatment
I'm not surprised. Parenting is a tough gig. It's natural to favor the child that makes it easier.
jancsika
Now you've got two problems:
1. Child who isn't favored feels alienated
And choose one of the following:
2a. When the agreeable child grows up and learns valuable skills-- how to say no, how to assert themselves and their needs-- they'll feel the "natural" favored treatment from their parents start to change, and that will damage their relationship
2b. Agreeable child doesn't develop the skills to assert themselves for fear of damaging their relationship with their parents (which they "naturally" know is based on their agreeableness) and harbor resentments among other unhealthy habits
bityard
> Child who isn't favored feels alienated
You say that as if it's a foregone conclusion?
We have two children, each one on their own extreme end of the agreeability spectrum. One has been a breeze to raise, the other is its own full-time job. The end result is that our "easy" child sometimes feels ignored while the more challenging one soaks up most of our attention and time.
> 2a. When the agreeable child grows up and learns valuable skills-- how to say no, how to assert themselves and their needs-- they'll feel the "natural" favored treatment from their parents start to change, and that will damage their relationship
Again, I don't see why that would be the case. A _good_ parent teachers their child to be independent and make their own decisions and is proud of them when they do.
> 2b. Agreeable child doesn't develop the skills to assert themselves for fear of damaging their relationship with their parents (which they "naturally" know is based on their agreeableness) and harbor resentments among other unhealthy habits
If that happens, that is the fault of overbearing and/or controlling parents. Good parents teach their kids when to speak up for themselves, accept valid criticism, and otherwise teach effective communication.
triceratops
> Child who isn't favored feels alienated
Well...yeah that's why you shouldn't favor children.
I never said it was problem-free. Only natural.
ajb
I don't know about that - the squeaky wheel gets the grease. It would be interesting to know what they counted as "more favoured" (It's behind a paywall)
0cf8612b2e1e
I passed this along to an Asian woman and she had fighting words for the authors about the racial composition of the study.
skywhopper
In what context? Globally? United States only? Unfortunately the paper is not accessible so there’s no way to know. Not really fair to the authors to invite judgment based on the abstract only, this probably should be removed from the front page.
Wild that that is the click-bait headline they went with when the conclusion in the actual study is: "after controlling for other moderators, our models suggest that parents report they slightly favor daughters over sons (a small effect). Children report no differences." and "Past meta-analytic data show that girls are significantly higher in effortful control, on average, than boys (Else-Quest et al., 2006)."
But this paper seems determined to ignore that granting freedom to different children will have different results. It says: "Conscientious and agreeable children also received more favored treatment. For conscientious children, favoritism was strongest when based on differences in conflict (i.e., more conscientious children had relatively less conflict with their parents)."
That seems less like "favoritism" and more like "the natural consequence of acting in a trustworthy manner".
The paper addresses that criticism by claiming, without citation: "Whether differential control is developmentally appropriate or not, siblings may not see it as fair".
We can talk about more-effective mechanisms to support good behavior, but the idea that every child should be treated the same regardless of how trustworthy they are seems patently ridiculous. Actions have consequences, even for children.
"Why are boys not being taught to be conscientious?" seems like a more fruitful question than "how can we make parents be meaner to girls?"