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In the previous article in this journal issue (Meissner, S.J., 2005), I reviewed some of the elements contributing to the formation of gender identity and gender-related differentiations and masculine attributes in males. In the present article, I pursue the same objective for females in the development of feminine gender identity and associated differential feminine attributes and behaviors. I also briefly comment on similar issues in homosexuality. I conclude with an attempt to integrate these findings with the theory of the self-as-person.
Fischer (2002) listed five conceptual shifts that have contributed to reformulating feminine psychology: introduction of the concept of primary femininity, awareness of inner space, female genital anxiety, early attachment to the mother and subsequent separation, and finally the multitude of social and environmental influences shaping gender identity and gender-role functions and sexual object choice. Stoller (1964, 1976) had postulated a state of nonconflictual primary femininity as fundamental to establishing core gender identity in girls.1 The basis of gender in girls begins with core gender identity, the primary nonconflictual sense of being female. As Tyson (1986) commented:
The infant girl builds a female body image through oral, anal, urethral, and genital activities and sensations in the context of reciprocity with the mother. Aided by cognitive maturation, especially the capacity for representational thought, the infant girl's genital libidinal sensations are integrated into her “body ego,”2
Page 29and a vital part of her self representation, which reaches at least a rudimentary form by fifteen to eighteen months, includes the sense of being female, with female genitals. (p. 358)
The awareness of and pleasure in the genitals in girls emerges at about 22 months (de Marneffe, 1997; Mayer, 1995). Between 18 and 36 months, children could label themselves as boy or girl, but could not so label anatomically co