Gender roles are the particular sets of human behavior that the society and culture in which we are raised assigns to us and expects us to follow (there are also other roles which we are socialized to recognize, such as those associated with age and socioeconomic status). These roles are not necessarily based on the true capabilities of either gender; for example, gender roles in the US in the 50's - girls who said they wanted to become scientists were laughed at and told to become secretaries, despite the fact that there is still no hard evidence that the capabilities of the genders differ when it comes to math and science. Yes, the test scores of teens today show that boys are doing better, but this is because people are still raising their kids to conform to the traditional gender roles. Look around you. How many females do you see who are hard-core scientists? How many males do you see that have absolutley amazing artistic talent, and have no use for football and keggers? Lots.