Men and Women Are Psychologically Very Similar
...despite appearances:
[Photo by Mr November]
That's it, I've had enough. I'm fed up with endless bogus stories claiming substantial differences between men and women which pass for news in the popular press. With the help of Janet Shibley Hyde of the University of Wisconsin-Madison and literally thousands of psychology studies, this myth can be banished forever (Hyde, 2005).
Hyde has reviewed evidence from studies on:
- Cognitive variables. Including reading comprehension, perceptual speed, science, mental rotation, spatial visualization, attribution of success to effort.
- Communication. Including assertive speech, self-disclosure to a stranger, smiling and understanding facial expression.
- Social and personality variables. Including aggression under provocation, helping behaviour, sexuality, leadership, agreeableness and extraversion.
- Psychological well-being. Including self-esteem, happiness, life satisfaction and coping.
- Motor behaviours. Including throw velocity, sprinting and flexibility.
- Miscellaneous. Including moral reasoning, cheating behaviour, computer use and job attribute preference.
Fully 78% of the differences between men and women are small or close to zero. There are three main areas of differences between men and women:
- Sexuality - in particular attitudes to sex in uncommitted relationships.
- Aggression - men are generally more aggressive.
- Motor performance - this is where the largest differences are seen with men being better at throwing, jumping, sprinting and so on.
The bottom line is that if someone tells you men are more aggressive, have better motor performance or have different attitudes to sex than women, then you can believe them. If it's anything else, the differences between men and women are probably very small or non-existent.
Continued overinflated reports of differences between men and women are damaging to all of us:
- If men and women are told they 'speak a different language', they may not bother trying to patch up their relationships.
- If women continue to believe they are the 'nurturers', they may be penalised in the workplace. Similarly, men who believe they cannot be nurturant may be penalised in their family and relationships.
- If girls believe they cannot achieve in maths, this affects their actual achievement. Similarly, if boys think they are poor at communicating or working together, this may be detrimental to them.
Ultimately men are not from Mars and women are not from Venus. We're both from Earth, so don't let anyone tell you otherwise.
Reference
Hyde, J. S. (2005). The gender similarities hypothesis. American Psychologist, 60(6), 581-92.
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Finally, someone who is making sense. and even several of the categories that remained 'differences' are arbitrarily defined as there are achievers in all areas, irrespective of gender. what do you get when you mate a dog and a fly? what about a bird and a cat? ...dunno? well, i dunno either. but it is amazing how ALL the time, EVERY time, that men and women bear offspring it is another HUMAN, of their SAME species. let's all grow up, shall we?!? until there is peace in a household, there is no reason to expect an attainable peace on the planet. it is just, JUST simply about RESPECT. period.
How can women and men only be 78% the same, when we know that all humans are 99% the same as chimpanzees?
But seriously, women and men feel differently about sex? Then that's huge, because sex is what men are thinking about 75% of the time. (And what women are thinking about 3% of the time.)
You and your prof can go look up the FBI and DOJ figures that show:
Women initiate domestic violence more often than men.
They are more likely to murder their spouse.
They are also more likly to commit child abuse.
That's not my opinion.
That's not some survey.
Those are the actual crime statistics, year after year for as long as the FBI and DOJ have compiled them.
And it's worse in other countries like the UK.
Anon #2, do you think it's possible the stats you quote might have a lot to do with women's position in society? In other words the culture in which we live causes these particular differences rather than it being the result of inherent psychological differences.
"How can women and men only be 78% the same, when we know that all humans are 99% the same as chimpanzees?"
Nature & Nurture, you seem to be confusing those two.
yes 98,5% of the chimp. genome is the same yes, but the order in which the genes are placed makes a very big difference.
Jeremy, thanks for this. Like TC, I'm glad to see someone talking sense! I'm so tired of this institutionalized discrimination endorsed by the professional community.
Thank you. As a clinical neuro-psychologist who is well aware of both the similarities and the differences WITHIN genders as well as between, I am delighted to see someone getting the perspective correct on the internet.
Yes, there are differences in the brain wiring and brain area sizes between the average male and the average female. The emphasis is on "average". But
1. There is a HUGE overlap between characteristics which are "male" and those which are "female". While the tallest people will be male and the shortest people, all males are not taller than all females and vice versa. The same is true for other sex-associated characteristics like mathematical and verbal ability.
2. Sex associated characteristics vary in the degree to which they ARE sex related. The less they are associated with sex organs and hormones, the less strong is the association. Deep voice is strongly associated with maleness, but some women also have very deep voices so the distinction is not absolute.
3. The size of the differences, even in strongly linked sex associated characteristics, is often so small that you need carefully controlled studies to show it up. In practice, the differences are not worth accommodating.
4. Socialization, environment, education and intelligence may modify characteristics which are sex associated. During my professional education in psychology my classmates and I were all measured on a "male/female/androgenous" scale. In spite of the mixed genders, all but a couple of students scored in the "androgenous" to "mainly male" range. The reason for this is that characteristics identified as "female" or "very male" were not the antithesis of those needed to succeed in competitive studies, higher level research and yet display compassionate and empathic characteristics while dealing with clients.
I agree! Almost all these things we are told about men vs. women are perpetuated by what we are TOLD to believe as true. For instance, the whole "men aren't emotional like women". They probably are, but they're just so used to the "men don't cry" status mark, that it become their mindset. If people keep believing that women and men are so fundamentally different, than we won't be able to get along. =(
No wonder divorce rates are so high.
There are just as much psychological differences as physiological differences among men and women. In fact I will venture to say that men and women are not only different but in many ways opposites. Think about it before listening to the garbage that men and women are exactly the same. Think about what the purpose of having two sexes to perform functions in a pair bond to begin with. Men and women, our biological purpose and assets sought in each sex in sexual selection by the other are entirely different.