Originally appeared at BuzzFeed.com
You hear conservatives say it all the time: men should ‘naturally’ be more rational and less sensitive, whereas women’s ‘natural’ brain structures wire them for language and empathy.
But what if these differences aren’t so cut and dry (or even that drastic)? Consider some of these studies:
1. Between infancy and first grade, boys express their emotions more passionately than girls.
Boys are taught to keep a stiff upper lip, but Harvard med school researchers found that young boys smiled, cried, and laughed more to researchers than girls did. By elementary school, boys become less likely to express sadness or distress, perhaps because of the influence of parenting and culture.
2. Worldwide, boys aren’t any better at math than girls.
Math scores in 86 countries show that K-12 boys don’t significantly do better at math than girls, either in general or at elite levels. And the “math gap” in the US has been closing over time. In the 1970s, the ratio of boys to girls with high math cores SATs was 13:1. By the 1990s, it was 3:1.
3. Young men are more emotionally vulnerable to troubles in their relationships than young women are.
Florida State researchers found that men between the ages of 18 and 23 were much more likely be emotionally affected by relationship woes than women. The study authors wrote, “for young men, their romantic partners are often their primary source of intimacy,” whereas women feel more encouraged to confide deeply with family and friends. Contrary to what every frat joke tells you, men aren’t just naturally detached.
I mean, just listen to Usher here. Or actually, any guy band at all.
4. Men are less rational investors than women.
A study of 35,000 households in MIT’s Journal of Economics found that men traded stocks with irrational confidence in their judgment. Single men traded less rationally than married men, and married men traded less rationally than single women.
5. Men aren’t worse than women at reading emotional cues.
When asked to correctly identify emotions of people in video clips, men were no less capable of reading nuances in emotions than women were. (Interestingly, parents were much better emotional detectives than non-parents.) So men can read moods, but whether they do anything about this emotional information may be a matter of cultural upbringing, which can change.
6. Men monitor their partners more than women.
Women are always been portrayed as jealous, smothering, overly attached girlfriends and wives, but statistics from McAfee show that men are more likely to obsessively check in on their partners online.
7. Men are four times as likely as women to commit suicide after divorce.
The suicide risk for men doubles after divorce, but divorced women aren’t more likely to commit suicide than single or married women. The suicide risk of men is already twice as high among men, so that means men are four times as likely to end their lives after the breakup of a marriage.
8. In anonymous settings, men aren’t more aggressive than women.
Yes, men are encouraged (and praised for) being physically and socially aggressive, but what happens when you remove societal expectations? In one experiment, men and women were told to win a video game by dropping bombs on others. Playing together in the same room, women dropped fewer bombs than men. But when playing anonymously, women dropped more bombs and sought out other players more aggressively than men did.
And finally…
120% of all cosmic surveys show that men and women should just enjoy whatever flavor of Pocky they want. Yes, men still process spatial information faster, and girls still outperform boys in reading comprehension, but ‘nature’ does not set ideals for behavior – people do.
Flout all the silly rules and binaries. They harm everyone.
Here’s a couple more: – According to a major 2004 study commissioned by the U.S. Department of Education – In studies that ask students about offenders, sex differences are less than in adult reports. The 2000 AAUW data indicate that 57.2 percent of all students report a male offender and 42.4 percent a female offender with the Cameron et al. study reporting nearly identical proportions as the 2000 AAUW data (57 percent male offenders vs. 43 percent female offenders) – More women (58%) than men (42%) are perpetrators of all forms of child maltreatment. – One in six adult men… Read more »
I remember reading a study some time ago that showed that girls with hands-on Dads during the first two years of life were more likely to excel at math and sciences — which may be why the ender gap is closing in math scores in the US. How and why this should be is still something to be examined,
Archy.
What do you mean by “dictates”?
There are various tests where the solution to three-dimensional problems is timed. Is that what you mean?
I mean does social upbringing or a particular way the brain develops by a gender do it? I’ve heard men are better at spatial info but is that because they are taught to be better or does the male brain have actual advantages before any socialization?
Archy, I have kids, grandkids, nieces and nephews. I have not seen any indication of differences in the way kids are taught about spatial relationships. When my granddaughter, going on five and a half, and I go for a “benture”, she wants to make a map. I remember when she was four and a half trying to explain to her boy cousin of the same age what a shortcut was. She knew, but, as she said several times, “It’s hard to explain.” So she’ll probably be ahead of a lot of boys. But ithe map thing is not because of… Read more »
Am a girl and i fucking hated playing with dolls when i was young .I have always preferred active playing.
Hi Archy
Have you tried this test?
http://www.bbc.co.uk/science/humanbody/sex/add_user.shtml
Angles, 18/20 – Male Spot the Difference, 43% – Balanced female-male Hands – Left on top – Right half dominant brain – Excel in visual, spatial, and intuitive processes Your empathy score is: 11 out of 20 Average score for men: 7.9 out of 20 Average score for women: 10.6 out of 20 –Seems I am just above average for a woman for empathizing 😛 Your systemising score is: 17 out of 20 Average score for men: 12.5 out of 20 Average score for women: 8.0 out of 20 –Way above average male Eyes – Reading Emotions Your score: 8… Read more »
Hi Archy
I am impressed!
This was goooooood! Great results.
And I knew you would get a top score on empathy.
Thank-you 😀 It was an interesting test.
I was similar. Very male when it came to spatial tasks, but feminine when it came to empathy and word skills. I’m just bloody good at everything! And I prefer feminine faces, so at least now I know the heterosexuality is for real, regardless of some people’s assumptions to the contrary. This harkens back to a conversation I had with my mother earlier this year; I’d just taken my kids out to my old childhood haunts and had been reminiscing and since most of me memories involved tree climbing, rock scrabbling action role play I said “you know remembering how… Read more »
“Yes, men still process spatial information faster, and girls still outperform boys in reading comprehension, but ‘nature’ does not set ideals for behavior – people do.”
What dictates spatial info, etc?
There remain organic, neurological differences which may or may not cause differences in such things.
Point is, whose business is it to direct others on how to behave, emote, relate?
If a guy wants to be Schwyzer’s “sturdy oak”, it’s nobody’s business to tell him to be a willow.
#8. Absolutely. For one thing, now that Facebook and texting has removed the physical barrier, girls are more likely to engage in bullying behaviour than boys.