The Princess Makes the Product

Thesis: The Princess makes the Product. Disney Consumer Products simply provided merchandise to satisfy the needs of young girls when it created more than “25,000 Disney Princess items,” (Orenstein, “What’s wrong with Cinderella?”).  Andy Mooney came up with the marketing idea at a “Disney on Ice” show when he saw little girls in makeshift princess costumes.  His idea was to provide products that “allow these girls to do what they’re doing anyway: projecting themselves into the characters from the classic movies.”

Orenstein’s article mentions psychological theories of gender constancy; oftentimes young children believe that they will be able to choose their gender and “until permanency sets in kids embrace whatever stereotypes our culture presents.”  The reason for this is more broadly related to the child’s cognitive development in general.  As a child matures, she tries to make sense of the world around her by categorizing and using schemas.  When she learns that she fits into category “girl,” much of the evidence from developmental psychology suggests that she actively seeks out gender differences and sex segregation as part of forming her gender identity.  In Paley’s Boys & Girls: Superheroes in the Doll Corner, a yearlong observation of a kindergarten classroom reveals many aspects of gendered behavior in young children.  The children in Paley’s kindergarten class cheer whenever she announces that an activity will be done separately by sex.  The girls choose to play house in the doll corner or draw, while the boys prefer to play cops and robbers or make cities with blocks.  The children in Paley’s classroom even tell stories that they think are “feminine” if they are girls (stories about families and flowers and furry animals) and “masculine” if they are boys (stories about super heroes and adventures and violence).  When one boy told a story about a little boy named “Pretty” the other boys laughed and he quickly learned to tell stories that followed the gender guidelines.  These example and other studies confirm the finding that children are eager to differentiate between the sexes. 

Even before children can label themselves as boys or girls, young girls show preference for dolls and young boys for trucks, (Cole, Cole, & Lightfoot, Development of Children).  More biological evidence for gender preferences comes from a study done in which female monkeys chose a pan or a doll over a truck and male monkeys chose the truck over the pan or the doll, (Cole et al.).  

So if young children have within themselves these gendered ideas of how to behave or at least have within themselves the eagerness to find and create distinct gender differences, providing a product that fulfills their desire is harmless.  Young girls want to be distinctly “girl”; they want to be secure in their gender identity and separate from boys.  The categories they impose at this young age will become more sophisticated and flexible as they grow and mature and learn more about their world.  Thus the passion for Princesses is just a passing phase of girlhood, one that Disney has tapped into as a marketable source.   

Which Came First: The Princess or the Product? (a 3 part post: part I)