Young single women's and men's cognitive scripts for the event “a first date” were examined to determine their content and to test for hypothesized differences in behavioral expectations. Participants were asked to list 20 expected actions involved in a first date for a woman and for a man. High agreement among participants was found for the content and sequence of actions that hypothetically would occur on a first date. The respondents listed a total of 19 different actions for women, and 27 for men. The scripts for women and men differed significantly. The scripts for women emphasized the private sphere (concern about appearance, conversation, and controlling sexuality); the scripts for men focused on control of the public domain (planning, paying for, and orchestrating the date). Gender roles were more prevalent in experienced daters' scripts. The results indicate that young adults' interpersonal scripts for dating maintain the traditional gender-power ratio.

https://www.jstor.org/stable/pdfplus/189985.pdf

A Girl's Guide to Dating and Going Steady

Young singles' scripts for a first date

The oneliner ‘No sex under my roof’ is used to reinforce the rule of premarital abstinence of sexuality until teenage children marry or move from home. In the USA, most parents still stick to this norm, whereas in the Netherlands since the late 1960s, a new rule developed, allowing teenage children to have sex, provided they ‘feel strongly for each other’ and feel ‘ready’ for it. This paper describes and compares developments in the USA and in the Netherlands since the 1880s, focusing on the social regulation of teenage sexuality, and based mainly upon such sources as reference books and sexology studies. The paper proposes an explanation of the two trajectories from national differences in the functioning of good societies, particularly in the regulation of social competition and social mobility. The rise in the USA of a highly competitive dating system and a complicated sexual morality indicates a smaller decline of power differences between classes, genders and generations, which partly explains the persistence of the old rule. Further explanation is found in America’s lower level of social integration and more open competition between various centres of power and good societies. The build up to the rise of a new rule among Dutch parents was an informalization of ‘getting engaged’, the diffusion of verkering (going steady) and of parental policies to stay ‘in the scene’, indicating higher levels of social integration and larger declines of power differences between classes, genders and generations. Yet, the long preservation of a homogeneous good society created a widening gap between a facade of decency and backstage realities. When this gap was washed away in the 1960s Expressive and Sexual Revolutions, it also washed away the old rule, and increasing numbers of parents allowed their teenagers openly to have sex, even at home.

/pdf/no-sex-under-my-roof-teenage-sexuality-in-the-usa-and-in-the-2az696nep3.pdf

‘“No sex under my roof”: Teenage sexuality in the USA and in the Netherlands since the 1880s’

Cette etude a pour but de comparer l’evolution du processus sociologique des bonnes societes neerlandaises et americaines depuis les annees 1880, alors que les usages pour faire la cour etaient encore sous le controle strict des parents. Elle decrit de quelle maniere le systeme de rendez-vous aux Etats-Unis, celui du verkering aux Pays-Bas (un « engagement » informel analogue a celui de « sortir ensemble »), ainsi que la propagation de nouvelles directives parentales pour « rester dans le coup », permirent aux jeunes de s’emanciper de la domination de leurs parents. Lorsqu’entre 1945 et 1965, le concept de « sortir ensemble » prit de l’importance aux Etats-Unis, les trajectoires de ces deux pays convergerent. Il fut cependant a noter qu’apres la revolution sexuelle, le traditionnel tabou du sexe avant le mariage redevint predominant aux Etats-Unis alors qu’il diminua drastiquement aux Pays-Bas lorsque les parents neerlandais autoriserent de plus en plus leurs adolescents a avoir des relations sexuelles, meme sous leur toit. En s’appuyant sur les recherches en sexologie, mais aussi sur l’etude de livres de moeurs, l’auteur decrit les deux trajectoires de la reglementation du sexe avant le mariage. Il explique comment elles furent intimement liees aux differences nationales en matiere de reglementation de la competition sociale, de l’equilibre de pouvoir entre les classes, du sexe et des generations, et enfin du niveau d’integration sociale de ces nations.

/pdf/sexualite-des-adolescents-et-concurrence-des-classes-2gc6dfw3r7.pdf

Sexualité des adolescents et concurrence des classes sociales : étude comparative entre les États-Unis et les Pays-Bas depuis les années 1880

/pdf/internet-dating-and-doing-gender-an-analysis-of-women-s-3dfybxjqzu.pdf

A Girl's Guide to Dating and Going Steady

Citations

Young singles' scripts for a first date

‘“No sex under my roof”: Teenage sexuality in the USA and in the Netherlands since the 1880s’

Sexualité des adolescents et concurrence des classes sociales : étude comparative entre les États-Unis et les Pays-Bas depuis les années 1880

Internet dating and "doing gender": an analysis of women's experiences dating online