The role of parents in the process of sex-role socialization of children and adolescents in pedagogical discussions in the early twentieth century

Abstract

Most researchers considered sexual education as a system of precautionary measures that should protect young people from vulgar in terms of the morality of deeds, develop a sense of shyness and neatness, and strengthen the will. The teachers were determined a special roles to the issue of family participation in the sexual education of children. Parents were offered: firstly, to develop the physical and spiritual qualities of children, and secondly, to create an atmosphere in families that promotes the formation of correct moral qualities, to seek the trust of children in their parents; thirdly, to strive to protect children from corrupting sources of information, and finally, fourthly, to acquaint children in delicate and accessible way with the birth of life, to warn from wrong actions.

The great experience of foreign and domestic teachers, psychologists and hygienists in the field of sexual education at the beginning of the 20th century became the source of the researching: M. Andreevskaya, J. Bedley, A. Bernshtein, P. Blonskii, A. Virenius, M. Volkov, G. Zorengfree, K. Zhytomyrsky, V. Zhuk, K. Lebedintsev, B. Liberman, E. Lozynsky, A. Molly, F. Paulsen, V. Polovtsev, V. Polovtseva, M. Rubinshtein, I. Simonov, L. Sedov, V. Tarnovsky, etc…

1. Lozinsky made a lot of interesting and useful material regarding therequirements for the preparation of parents for sexual education by E. Lozinsky: from the indication of the necessary moral qualities of parents, the ability to keep the rules of hygiene, the right way of feeding and dieting children, as well as the creation of the so-called «hygiene of chastity». His ten-rulled-program included both, physical-hygienic and moral-educational components.

Among parents, one can give a classification regarding their attitude to the special task of the sexual education of children: the first category – fathers and mothers, whose due to their moral qualities and way of life are not able to consciously relate to their educational tasks in general; The second category is the parents who care about the upbringing, and especially about sexual education, is simply not due to the difficult and unceasing extraction of means of life. The third category is made up of those parents who, on the one hand, are constantly worried about the proper education of their children to the smallest detail of their lives, and on the other hand – by all means, avoid managing children anything related to the sexual area and systematically reject all conversations with them on this topic, motivating it by the fact that they themselves were brought up this way. And, finally, the fourth category of parents who also consciously relate to their educational responsibilities, but at the same time, fundamentally deny the need and utility of familiarizing children with the sexual sphere of human life, considering that it is quite sufficient for healthy sexual development of the child to surround him or her with pure family-moral situation, removing from it anything that can affect the imagination and feelings.

It should be noted that in the history of domestic pedagogical thoughts and contemporary literature devoted to this problem, the role-sexual principle in the sexual education of children was often put forward: the daughters in these matters should be brought up by  the mother and the sons – by father (K. Sidorovich); some researchers were categorically against of the participation of parents in the sexual education of children (V. Caneline), noting that, most parents have a moral impact on children and do not have the appropriate psychological and pedagogical skills and abilities, and therefore should be done by specialists: either a teacher, or even better – a doctor.