Question

Define ego boundaries and explain how they typically develop in masculine and feminine people, noting both similarities and differences in development. How permeable are your ego boundaries? If you have more permeable ego boundaries, how do these enrich your life and relationships? How might they constrain and restrict you? If you have more rigid ego boundaries, how do these enrich your life and relationships? How might they constrain and restrict you?

Answer 1

ego boundary - the concept that individuals are able to distinguish between self and not-self. Someone who is said to lack clear ego boundaries blurs the distinction between himself or herself and others by identifying with them too easily and too much.

Contrasting the phenomenal worlds of males and females in terms of
experiences of self and other, space and time, constancy and change,
Gutmann examined traditional criteria of ego strength (capacity for delay~
future orientation~ firm ego boundaries, objectivity) and noted that these
criteria are relevant to the masculine world, but essentially irrelevant
to the feminine world.
The first study addressed the issues raised by Gutmann by testing
four hypotheses derived from this formulation.
Self and others. According to Gutmann's formulation, in the masculine
world" ... others are a class of objects to be tested and investigated as
such. Objectifying others~ we also objectify ourselves, and thereby come
to experience our own separateness... ~" while in the feminine world " ... the
self derives its definition and its 'names' from the groupings to which it
belongs~ the distinctions between self and others are blurred over...
and " ...we come to know the other and predict the other in terms of (our)
wishes.. Two hypotheses were derived from t,his formulation:
Hypothesis 1. Males tend to experience and represent the self in
individualistic terms; females tend to experience and represent the self in
terms of interpersonal relatedness.
Hypothesis 2. Males represent others in objective~ classifying terms;
females represent others in subjective, interpretive terms.

permeable ego boundaries: masculine or feminine?

February 4, 2016

Abbie M

How permeable are your ego boundaries? If you have more permeable ego boundaries, how do these enrich your life and relationships? How might they constrain and restrict you? If you have more rigid ego boundaries, how do these enrich your life and relationships? How might they constrain and restrict you?

Permeable ego boundaries are typically associated with women, and feminine characteristics. This means that women typically are more empathetic and means that there are less distinct boundaries between the person and other people, whereas the characteristics associated with the masculine gender are a less permeable ego, meaning sympathy rather than empathy, and a more rigid boundary between the self and others.

I would say I have a less permeable ego boundary than is typical for most women. I have been socialized to understand that women empathize, and feel the feelings of others, and yet, if a friend is sharing something with me, I often have a difficult time experiencing the emotions they are going through and rather look at it as a completely objective third-party.