But since gender is to do with feelings, thoughts, behaviour and fantasies related to sex that aren't primarily due to simple biology, the variations, the grey areas and the uncertainties can multiply rapidly. The picture is further complicated by each society's idea of what is appropriate for males and females and by what cues, clues, rewards or punishments you have been given about being 'male' or 'female' since you were born as a blank page on which other people and influences would write. Gender identity is our sense of feeling of to which sex we belong. Again, for the majority of people there is little problem with this. Most children will have the confirmed conviction that they are undoubtedly a boy or a girl by about the age of three, and this conviction about their 'core' gender identity will stay more or less constant for the rest of their lives.
Gender role is the public face of personal gender identity.
That is, everything that you say or do that indicates to others to what degree you are 'male' or 'female', and from the feedback might be made to adjust your own gender identity. There is obviously an acceptable gender role in every society and men particularly learn their acceptable gender roles and internalise them from their earliest years. This is how the myths like 'Real men don't cry' are born and maintained and any man who doesn't pay at least lip service to them is open to social ridicule. There are a few curious factors to be considered when we look at cross-dressing. For a start, it is a mainly male activity.