Gender roles possess socially assigned rules that govern male and female behavior. Societal rules dictate that women exhibit passive, nurturing and dependent behaviors, while men are encouraged to exhibit aggressive, competitive and independent behaviors. If these rules are not followed, conflict arises. The woman who is aggressive and competitive at work will face conflict from her male coworkers. The man who chooses to stay at home and nurture the children while his wife works full time will face gender conflict from other men. However, as society evolves, it is becoming more common for women and men to behave in manners that conflict with their traditional roles. This suggests that as society continues to change, the rules governing social roles will evolve as well.
Family roles have been typically defined by a patriarchal power hierarchy. The traditional power hierarchy began with the father as the head of the household, followed by the mother and then the children. However, as times have changed, so has the typical family structure: Some children are being raised by single parents or grandparents, some mothers work full or part time, and some fathers stay at home with the children.
While the actual structure has changed, many of the assigned roles within a family have not. For instance, the children are expected to respect and obey their parents, attend school and have a job/extracurricular activities. Mothers are still expected to put family first and their husband's job before their own. In practice, however, the roles will depend upon each family's particular structure. For instance, in a single-parent family, the mother/father may have to make work the top priority in order to financially provide for the family.
Traditionally, work roles have focused primarily on men. Men were expected to be the sole providers for their families, even sacrificing family priorities for work priorities. As women have entered the workforce, the dynamic of the workforce has changed, creating new roles and reinforcing old ones. If women were in the workforce, typically they were in subordinate roles to men, and were expected to act in an "idealized" feminine way: quiet, humble, docile, submissive and intelligent without being threatening.
This archetypal female role has of course changed as women have risen to power within the workforce, yet conflict often arises when women in the workforce behave in a more typically male fashion: demanding, tough, ambitious and focused. These women have a harder time gaining the respect of male co-workers and are often victims of harassment and derogatory language.
Gender roles also play a part within age roles. For instance, a six-year-old female child is expected to play with typically female toys, like dolls and Barbies, and play games like "house" and "school." A six-year-old boy, on the other hand, is expected to roughhouse, play sports or play games like "Cowboys and Indians." As girls become women, their expected role morphs into the "mother" role, in which her family is more important than anything else, including herself. The little boy role changes into the "provider" role, where work is the most important male priority. As women and men continue to age, their expected roles evolve. The "mother" role becomes the "grandmother" role, while the "provider" role becomes the "retired" role. The grandmother role continues to enforce family as a woman's first priority, while the retired role allows men to replace their priority of work with hobbies or other small jobs.