Understanding the Differences
between Boys and Girls

Adolescence brings out the distinctions in the sexes in unmistakable ways. Biologically, the secondary sexual characteristics emerge, along with a great deal of interest in the opposite sex. Teens move from palling around with “buds” into the world of flirting, romance, and dating.

I remember my first experience of this when our boys started attending the junior high ministry. It was a large ministry, over two hundred kids, and I was a small group leader. I dropped some kids off, parked the van, and headed into the building. As it wasn’t time to go inside and start, the kids were outside on the grass.

It was chaos: kids running, laughing, yelling, tumbling, wrestling, darting back and forth between small clumps of other kids. I thought I was looking at a gigantic litter of puppies. The kids looked more like high schoolers than preteens, but they definitely didn’t act like high schoolers.

Beneath the chaos, I noticed a pattern. The boys and girls were engaged in very different activities. The girls clustered in groups, giggling and talking to each other behind their hands. They weren’t running around; they were either standing still or walking slowly. And they were watching the boys.

The boys, on the other hand, talked less but more loudly. They yelled and did goofy physical stunts to get the girls to look at them. For these kids, it was the beginning of the eternal dance of the sexes.

While it’s easy to see that the behavior of boys and girls differ, the differences go deeper than that.

Characteristic Differences between Boys and Girls

The following types of differences between girls and boys are not well-defined, so they have lots of exceptions. But in general, boys and girls differ in:

Cognitive and intellectual performance. During adolescence girls are generally more verbally advanced than boys. They can reason, conceptualize, and form ideas better. Boys, however, often have stronger competencies in the mathematical and task arenas.

Emotional expression. Girls have a more complex and intuitive emotional range than boys and can connect more successfully with feelings. They are more aware and can talk about shadings of emotions, such as slight anxiety, resentment, and wistfulness, while boys do well to know if they are scared, mad, or sad. This gender difference often carries through into adulthood.

Impulsiveness and aggression. Boys are somewhat more aggressive. They take more risks and initiative than do girls and are more impulsive. Boys are more likely to get into trouble via defiance and impulse: breaking rules, fighting, and substance problems.

Girls, on the other hand, confront less directly and are more manipulative. Their troubles lean more toward social issues, such as loyalty and betrayal, and toward inward problems, such as depression.

While these differences have to do with gender, other differences have more to do with how boys and girls relate to their parents, as we shall soon see.

How Boys and Girls Relate Differently to Mom and Dad

A baby boy is born to his mother, and after a while, he begins to move past his union with her toward the world. The first relational stop in that new world is Dad. Being male, Dad is more like the boy. So it is easier for a boy to be aggressive and launch out away from Mom. He is moving to connect with someone a lot like him and to leave behind someone unlike him.

But a baby girl has a different situation and task. She is leaving “like” to connect with “unlike,” and she has to exert more work and effort to make a connection. So it is more difficult sometimes for girls to be assertive, though they usually overcome this developmental hurdle.

This dynamic repeats itself in the teen years. Adolescent boys have an easier time moving toward Dad than do girls. That’s one of the reasons Dad needs to be there for his teen daughter. She needs his help in order to separate from Mom. Father-daughter outings, events, and talks are especially important during the teen years.

Gender issues are real, so here are some parenting tips to keep in mind:

If you’re parenting a girl:

	Help her identify with her mother and yet be able to respectfully disagree with her.
	Help her learn how to be close to her dad, but not to be coy and seductive to get what she needs from him.
	Encourage her to be feminine, yet clear about what she wants and needs.
	Teach her that the girls who are cliquish are girls to avoid, and the girls who like her for herself are girls to hang out with.

If you’re parenting a boy:

	Help him accept discipline from Mom and not see Dad as having all the power and authority.
	Help him learn to be emotionally close, affectionate, and verbal about his feelings.
	Give him healthy structures for his aggression, such as sports, scouting, and outings.
	Show him that some risks are smart and some aren’t. (For example, I once jumped off a roof on a dare and was on crutches for a month.)

These two lists have some things in common, because the genders are so similar. So look at these suggestions as points of emphasis, and bear in mind that gender is not as important as character.

Keep Gender Issues in Perspective

The sexes are not as far apart as it may seem. Who a teen is inside makes a world of difference. These are the things that matter:

1.	How connected or isolated is your teen?
2.	How responsible or irresponsible?
3.	How self-absorbed or others-oriented?

Do not chalk up differences to gender. This is a common mistake that leads to the assumption that things will never change. For example, I heard one parent say, “Boys are just more aggressive and girls are more passive, so let them be.” But parents who “let them be” can raise a rageaholic man and a dependent woman.

Parents need to understand that character attributes can certainly change. A boy’s aggression can be structured and limited so that he is loving and responsible. He can be helped to become loving, relational, and connected. A girl’s aggression can be developed and encouraged so that she is decisive, forthright, and in control of her life. She can be helped to connect at deep levels in ways that bring her safety and security.

So vive la différence between boy and girl teens. But don’t let those differences keep you from helping your teen become a full and complete person, ready to encounter life with the required set of capabilities.