Getting a shot in the doctor's office. Skinning a knee. Suffering from a headache. In these and other encounters with pain, girls and boys may differ in how they behave, express their pain, and perhaps even how they perceive pain, according to Patricia McGrath, Ph.D. , professor of paediatrics and director, Paediatric Pain Program, Child Health Research Institute, University of Western Ontario, London, Ontario. Girls and boys have different pain responses A child's age, past experience with pain, and family and cultural styles, McGrath said, influences his or her response to new, painful situations.
Parents serve as models.
Young children often fall down, she observed, and then look at a parent for cues on how to react. In general, the younger the child, the greater his or her overt distress, and the more the child has to be physically restrained, she said, the more painful the experience will be. Sex differences in pain responses may be apparent but are not always explainable. Boys rate having braces tightened as more severe than do girls, for example, while girls rate having a broken arm as more painful than do boys. Even so, girls, in general, grade many procedures as more painful than boys do.