Getting girls to play with/buy LEGO

[BrickBob Studpants]

Interesting discussion I have to say

Well, from a psychological point of view, girls and boys do have innate differences that show at a certain age (mostly at ages 3 +), but those concern the way children are playing and interacting with each other and not necessarily the choice of their toys (which is mostly left for nurture, which some of you already pointed out ). But I think there could be another reason (besides social reinforcement) why boys play with construction toys more often than girls, and that's the boys' advantage in mental rotation, which could explain the bias IMO. Getting girls to play with Lego can be tricky, you'd either have to change the gender stereotypes (which is almost impossible I'd say) or change the marketing, e.g. by showing girls that play with Lego in commercials or by creating specific themes (which again reinforces the stereotypes though). About the nature vs. nurture debate: Ask yourself, are girl-oriented toys pink because girls like that colour or do girls like pink because every single mainstream girl toy has that colour?

Edited February 4, 2011 by Lego-Freak

[slopemodified]

So far, I very much like the suggested idea fairytale set or a zoo set with lots of animals. Soon we'll be competing with those Schleich plastic animals I keep seeing at toy shops.

How about a theme or set based on Amazons? Would that be too outrageous? Could have Hippolyte and other famous woman warriors.

I was just looking at the 9349 Fairytale Minifig set and there's a female Imperial soldier and a woman holding dynamite! That's interesting! I wonder why TLC displayed them like that? Those should be expanded upon! Such as:

- An Imperial Flagship or Pirate ship with female crews!

- Bringing back the Western theme - a ranch with cowboys/cowgirls taming those wild stallions! A western saloon with a card game, piano and dancing entertainment. A gold mine with prospectors seeking fortune!

Oh, my imagination is going nuts!

[mikey]

The arguments about an innate difference in the biologically determined brain structure, or the socially determined construction of a gender identity might never really be fully solved.

I do not really understand the physiological evidence, but I do understand the sociological, and that tends to sway me towards a 'post-modern' position that most of the constants that 'white middle class western civilization' holds dear are no more than an illusion. I personally think in the last thirty years that children have become increasingly targeted by advertisers, and of course they will use the best methods available to them to sell product. The gender roles that children have learned by the age of 8 may well but boys off from playing with Lego if it might also be associated with girls? I don't know, but I have a strong assumption that the Lego R&D office have conducted extensive research...

Perhaps this image tells more about the period it was released, than it does about Lego. Maybe the advertising agency had a social agenda, maybe they were buying into the latest 'hot topic'? Perhaps then Lego was just 'Bricks', and not 'Themes', so it could be marketed as gender 'neutral'?

Edited February 4, 2011 by mikey

[Sleepytiger]

I have 3 kids. I have an 8 year old girl, and a soon to be 7 year old girl. I also have a 4 year old boy.

I see two issues with Legos for my girls.

A) The sets are inherently skewed to males, in that literally all the minifigs are male. If we find a set with a female we cheer. Even then, we are lucky if is one female.

B) The themes.

My 8 year old enjoys Star Wars. I love Star Wars. What do we see with so many of the Star Wars sets? There are shps, weapons and more ships.

Power miners and Atlantis were/are interesting themes, but it seems like every set is a vehicle or a transforming vehicle.

There is the kingdom line, but now we are back to conflict and next to no female characters.

There is a line dedicated to cars.

The issue here, is that time and again th themes and sets seem to revolve around vehicles and conflict, with predominantly male minifigs.

My girls do not have interest there. They want a set, where the can delve into a world of pretend, where they can explore the characters, and have something more than a vehicle to creat that world of play.

The issue with the Creator line, is there just isn't enough for them to sink their teeth into. As for city, no, they don't want to explore police, firefighters.

Ther are two lines that have drawn their interest, although one can"t quite be called a line.

Harry Potter has been a HUGE hit with them. Just looking at female minifigs... Hermione, Ginny, Bellatrix, Professor M,, Luna. They have created Cho. They have a range of female characters and male characters to choose from. The sets are not all about vehicles. The sets have a ton of accessories, that ramp up the pretend value. Big spiders, mni spiders, wands, food, owls, etc., etc. The sets are wonderful sets to build and aren't a joke like Bellville.

With Harry Potter they have developed a theme that is VERY accessible to not just boys, but girls as well. There are good guys and bad guys, so a sense of adventure is still there.

The other line they have enjoys are the two winter themed sets... The toy shop and bakery.

They like it for very similar reasons.

The set has more than one female, and there are kids.

In addition th set has tons of accessories to really increase the pretend. skating pond, horse, wagon, Christmas tree stand, bread, presents, skates, skis, Christmas tree, toys......

The issue is that too often Lego goes for the vehicles/conflict themes, without throwing in enough females, or accessories/items to reallly open things up further.

I think the upcoming Pirate of the Caribbean set is an example of that, although they could surprise me.

For the pirates, they chose to go with POtC. They could have gone with something like Peter Pan.

With Peter Pan, you still have pirates, but you have much more. There are girl characters in Wendy, Tger Lily, Mermaids and Tnkerbell. There are kids in the lost boys. Besides pirate ships and pirate fights, there could have been a mermaid lagoon and Peter Pan's home. Skull rock would have been cool. With a theme like that, you can really customize it to have a wonderful sense of adventure. Now, I do understand that some may consider Peter Pan to be to 'young', but my point is more along the lines, of a set like that could appeal to everyone, while I suspect whatever they do with PotC will again be fixated mainly on the battle/conflict element.

I think there are many themes out there that could really be made to not just appeal to one gender, but they are not creating them.

I think adding more female minifigs, having a theme without the utter focus being conflict/vehicles, and insuring there are enough accessories so kids can really delve into pretend, would make a difference.

Tammy

I wanted to highlight one other aspect this thread mentioned, without it getting lost.

Yes, girls want to build as much as boys

My daughter could not be pulled away from building Hogwarts.

For her 7th birthday she will receive Diagon Alley.

Sets like Bellville, which are a joke when it comes to building, I find to be almost an insult.

Tammy

[NickyBlade]

To anyone who was offended by my Twilight comment, I apologize. It was a joke. Most of the girls I know around our area are so into vampires... slap a picture of Edward onto a turd and it will sell. lol.

In all seriousness, we have two daughters. Our oldest was straight up girly when she was little. She liked Barbie, arts and crafts, and dress up. Our youngest liked matchbox cars, lego, and a hint of girly with Bratz dolls.

I guess you could get a child to play with just about anything if you're playing with them. Like someone else mentioned, kids even like housework if they are spending time with mom or dad. It's what they play with when they are alone that is their real personal interest.

[fred67]

Expanded reply: at this point I think we're close to derailing the thread, but I would hate for anybody to be left with the impression that I've coerced, manipulated or brainwashed my girls into following my radical feminist agenda, so I have to respond to this in a little more detail...

Actually, I don't believe I said that. I believe you read it, and thought about it over and over again until you were convinced I was insulting you personally.

Generally speaking, it's not a good idea to open your argument by accusing people of manipulating and coercing their children.

I didn't; the idea of manipulating your children one way or another to suit some social agenda (rather than, say, teaching them to speak) is ridiculous. I was replying to your own words. Perhaps I took them the wrong way, since in your first response you said you were responding to someone else, but I thought the suggestion was terrible. I don't recall accusing you of anything.

Dude, I don't even have to think about this one: veterinary medicine and animal sciences.

Yeah, I believe a lot of us suggested something like this already.

I've heard this song before. "Sorry, we really did want to support balanced gender roles, but we just can't put girls in action roles because it's not historically accurate."

And yet, forcing more females into the historical themes, even if they're not particularly accurate, doesn't seem like it would satisfy the people complaining since, as I said already, even with females it's still more male biased. I know the discussion is to expand the core audience, and I never said they shouldn't do women, but I will suggest that for every 1 woman in some historical action theme there are hundreds if not thousands of men. Even if you want to change it to suit some modern social agenda, it's still going to be male biased.... 100 to 1? 10 to 1? People will still complain.

In folklore, which obviously isn't always historically accurate but fits well with the very-loosely-historically-based tradition of the Castle theme, there are dozens of examples including the Amazons, the shieldmaidens of Scandinavian tradition (inspiration for the Valkyries and Eowyn), female Pictish warriors, and female monks who supposedly invented several varieties of martial arts and led peasant rebellions at various times throughout Asia.

Wouldn't bother me, but I suggest millions of upset mothers thinking that "Amazons" would be worse than nothing, although I have no problem with a fairy tale/folklore themes...

In fact, I'm not suggestion LEGO not have more female centric sets - I'm not arguing against it at all, and I never was, I'm suggesting two things, however:

1. It's not the responsibility of the LEGO company to participate in social engineering. Yes, I know they get involved in education (completely gender neutral), and I know they participate in things like energy and environmental policy - but the latter is definitely the responsibility of a company like LEGO (whose products, with very few exceptions, are entirely plastic). That doesn't mean they can't, that means they're not exactly obligated to do anything except make decisions that can expand their business.

2. You don't pick sets in order to effect social change. You pick sets based on what will sell, and then if you want to make them more gender balanced, then that's great.

If you want to find archetypes of women who can reasonably exist alongside the heroic male minifigs in historical and action themes, the examples are there to be found, despite the significant male bias. Susan B. Anthony is not the only famous woman in history, or the most interesting one.

Sure... I haven't said anything to the contrary; the queen is almost always there along with the king - and I even suggested figures like Joan of Arc; but as you agree - there is still significant male bias. For 1 Joan of Arc there's thousands of male soldiers.

It makes a lot more sense to try to balance things out in modern sets than historical ones. Female police officers: yes; female doctors: yes; female shop owners: yes; female athletes: yes.

[BrickBucket]

Hey, I was reading this thread and generally enjoyed reading peoples comments until it turned negative and would like to shift the thread back to the topic on

getting girls to play with Lego and specifically what sets.

I have 3 little step sisters (as well as a little step brother) and I've gotten them into some Lego and seeing how'd they'd take to it.

They had Duplo, so they are familiar, but weren't too crazy about it.

Last month I got them this:

For the whole lot:

-an old 50th anniversary set I bought for myself for nostalgic reasons but never used.

-green base plate

For the two younger girls:

-small pink brick box 5585

-house building set 5899 bricks and more (now discontinued after one year) :(

oldest girl:

-city camper 7639

The boy is 4 so I got him that really cool my first Lego starter kit with the thick green base plate, I had something similar as a first set as a child. Boys are easy to please with Lego.

The result was they took too it like crazy. I called my Dad up and I hear they play almost every day and one of the girls wants Lego for her next b-day/Christmas present. Success! at least for now.

The sets I got them were all girlyish, and from what I observed, they liked it all. They wanted me to build creatures (dragons specifically) out of the 1x1 printed googly eye bricks and they really took to those.

They put minifigs on them and rode them around. They keep fighting over the base plate and are constantly fighting when one of them breaks the other's house :S

Things I observed:

They liked animals/creatures, googly eyes, minifigs, little accessories (lamp, cups, flowers, fences, pet faces), blocks to build houses

They weren't crazy about the cars or wheels, but I think a few to have around isn't bad

Now what do I get them in future? Well I bought some stuff while it was on sale so I could give it to them later and here are my thoughts.

The oldest girl 8 wasn't crazy about the camper but was more into building mosaics and houses with the basic bricks, I'll try giving her the Lego Beach house 4996 so she can build a proper house and have lots of bricks to build whatever, otherwise she can stick to the basic bricks that are already there.

I got 2 large pink Lego brick boxs for the two youngest, they are girly girls so will like the pony, accessories and the pink bricks.

I also got a small blue brick box cause it has a bunch of googly eyes for building creatures.

For a special occasion I'll give them the city house special edition 8403. This is probably the ultimate gift cause it's essentially a family home with tons of accessories, minifigs, a dog ect..

It is also a set not pandering to females as it has a relatively gender neutral theme, but still has enormous appeal to girls. Probably the best set to give a girl, but I'll have to wait to see what happens.

A link to this awesome set

<RANT>

I have to say I'm very disappointed with TLG for making this special city house a short one time only thing. They released it in the Summer of 2010 and it's now discontinued 6 months later! I mean seriously, of all the city sets, the one thing such as a normal city house is a special item??? WTF!! Even as a boy growing up with Lego I ended up buying the Holiday Home with Campervan 6388 cause I wanted something normal to complement my city. I mean I'm sure it would at least make money for TLG, sure of a lot more than some of the Toy story sets I see languishing in clearance for a few months at Walmart. I think at the very least TLG should always have a few gender neutral Lego City family house or building that can appeal to girls at any given time. Unfortunately the Lego creator houses, though welcome, are a bit bare in minifigs, accessories and details that girls would probably like. The only thing that comes close now, fortunately is the Lego City corner (7641).

</RANT>

I've also gotten the collectible minifigs, which I'm sure they will love, especially the girl ones. But the future for Lego sets that appeal to girls will look sparse, but I'm sure they'll manage.

Have these marked as great potential sets for girls:

-Lego Building Fun 5549

-My Lego Town 6194

-Lego Deluxe Box 5508

There is also Harry potter, but I want them to use their imagination more and they can get into those themes later if they want. We didn't have licensed themes as a kid, so I'm biased against them.

So apart from the basic sets, I do really like the bricks and more stuff (would love it better if there were more girlish sets available too), finding Lego stuff girls like isn't easy but it's out there.

I suppose in the future I'll just throw them the catalog and they can point out stuff they like, but when your trying to make it a surprise it's a bit harder.

As an maniacal Lego builder in my youth I want my step siblings to experience the same fun I had as a child.

[fullnovembermoon]

I think it's interesting that growing up I never had "Girl" Lego and neither did any of my cousins who were the ones who introduced me to Lego. My oldest cousin was a boy and had two younger sisters, and we played for hours and hours building everything from cars to houses etc. To think back now it was some of the most "genderless" playing those kids did. Most stuff for kids at that time (mid 80's here) was rather gender specific and it was one of the things that my family marveled at. The typical boy/girl fighting went all but silent during the times we played with Lego. If anything I don't believe you have to GET anyone to play with Lego girl or otherwise. Give anyone a bucket of Lego and if they're in the mood you won't hear a peep out of them other than the clinking of the Lego. That's why they are so loved don't you think?

[fred67]

Hey, I was reading this thread and generally enjoyed reading peoples comments until it turned negative.

Disagreement leads to discussion... if people are just always going to agree so as to not go against the grain, the discussion is not productive.

It's not "negative."

[Peppermint_M]

Disagreement leads to discussion... if people are just always going to agree so as to not go against the grain, the discussion is not productive.

It's not "negative."

Well this right here is pretty negative.

Can we stay on topic? I mean the real topic, not the major discussion on social theory.

[BrickBucket]

I think it's interesting that growing up I never had "Girl" Lego and neither did any of my cousins who were the ones who introduced me to Lego. My oldest cousin was a boy and had two younger sisters, and we played for hours and hours building everything from cars to houses etc. To think back now it was some of the most "genderless" playing those kids did. Most stuff for kids at that time (mid 80's here) was rather gender specific and it was one of the things that my family marveled at. The typical boy/girl fighting went all but silent during the times we played with Lego. If anything I don't believe you have to GET anyone to play with Lego girl or otherwise. Give anyone a bucket of Lego and if they're in the mood you won't hear a peep out of them other than the clinking of the Lego. That's why they are so loved don't you think?

Yup I totally agree, back then there was a lot of gender neutral sets, the basic sets were white, then they were red and blue, now they are blue and pink. The really old ones had girls on the front of the box playing Lego.

Lego has become less gender neutral, and I think this is why it has been seen more now as a boy's toy, with girls seen as an after thought.

[fred67]

Well this right here is pretty negative.

Umm... no.

Can we stay on topic?

Sure... here's my daughter's comments on the subject:

[gunm]

My daughter enjoys playing with legos.

I believe her interest is based on the fact that her father and older brother enjoy them and she wants to be included.

She likes to play pretend with the minifigures and vehicles in particular, since she has an interest in cars and the act of driving.

She is not as interested in the actual building process, like my son is, although sometimes she will build something random and abstract on her own.