Her gender identification is not based on fantasy or idealization. Freud and others focus on the girl's discovery that she lacks a penis, blames this on the mother and turns to the father. This account has been greatly criticized, but Chodorow finds some merit in parts of it. The psychoanalysts emphasize that the oedipal crisis is not resolved the same absolute way for girls as it is for boys. Chodorow suggests, therefore, that a girl's relationships are more complex and more defining of her than a boy's.
Most women are genitally heterosexual.
Men, however, are not usually imbedded in close personal relationships, but rather in dominance and power. They are not so connected with their children and their relationships with other men are based on abstract role expectations rather than affective ties. These masculine and feminine personalities are a result of boys and girls experiencing similar interpersonal environments and developing differently. Girls' sex role development is characterized by continuity. She is constantly with her mother and other women and learns through these relationships.