Girls and boys are different. But is it culture that does it? Or are they “naturally” different? My guess is that, generally speaking, nature slants the field of possible behavior and culture does the rest.
New research into friendship dynamics among elementary age girls and boys seems to muddle the question of gender differences more than it clarifies it. But maybe any previous, presumed clarity was premature, anyway.
A lead paragraph to the news release states:
In a Duke University study out Tuesday, researchers found that pre-teen girls may not be any better at friendships than boys, despite previous research suggesting otherwise. The findings suggest that when more serious violations of a friendship occur, girls struggle just as much and, in some ways, even more than boys. [source]
Okay, so boys and girls are similar in that they don’t like violations of friendships. The researchers did find a difference, however, in the strength of their dislike.
The girls also reported they were more bothered by the transgressions, felt more anger and sadness, and were more likely to think the offense meant their friend did not care about them or was trying to control them.
In reading the news release a second time I was left with a number of questions, including these: What type of friendships are we talking about? What type of transgressions and conflict of interests? Would the results be the same in different settings, in different cultures, and for different age groups?
As for this one study, I have no strong feeling about its significance. What I do take away from it is that we should be cautious when we nod in agreement to simplistic stereotypes about males and females.
As regular readers of this blog are aware, while I believe that there are significant average differences in male and female traits, those differences tend to get blown out of proportion. Furthermore, average differences don’t apply all that well to individuals. For example, there are many women on the leading edge of the bell-curve of one trait or another that are actually stronger in the allegedly ‘manly’ trait than the average man. Etc.
Yesterday some new research caught my eye that seems to challenge my “Yah, we’re definitely different, but more similar than different, and only relatively different” position.
Lead researcher Marco Del Giudice of the University of Turin concludes from the study that, “the true extent of sex differences in human personality has [therefore] been consistently underestimated.” [source]
What data was the opinion based upon? Good question.
The researchers used personality measurements from more than 10,000 people, approximately half men and half women. The personality test included 15 personality scales, including such traits as warmth, sensitivity, and perfectionism.
Of course, these larger differences could be largely cultural. I first assumed that the subjects were Italian, and further assumed that Italian culture may have more distinct gender roles and expectations than American. But the subjects were U.S. citizens.
Interesting. At this moment, I don’t know what to think. Besides, “I need to read the entire study.”
Let’s face it, grandmothers and grandfathers have sex. We may find that fact disturbing if we visualize the act with one or both of our own grandparents playing a leading role. Or maybe if we aren’t elderly ourselves, so have yet to have the personal experience of perceiving an aged member of the opposite sex as sexy. We may also find the image somewhat distasteful because our “lets-make-babies” genetic tendencies would prefer a real shot at procreation. Of course, grandfathers can still become fathers. Their sperm remain viable, though counts go down.
Why would post-menapausal women have sex? After all, they can no longer procreate. As I see it, there are two reasons. First, that sexual interest and activity persists beyond menapause may simply mean there have been no selective pressures to eliminate it. Or, in other words, it doesn’t bear a cost, so hasn’t been trimmed away by the need to survive. Second, we must consider potential non-procreative benefits to sex.
What got me thinking about this? A new study, of course. In Sexual satisfaction in women increases with age, I read of data gathered from 800+ women over 40 years. Researcher Elizabeth Barrett-Connor reports:
“Despite a correlation between sexual desire and other sexual function domains, only 1 in 5 sexually active women reported high sexual desire. Approximately half of the women aged 80 years or more reported arousal, lubrication, and orgasm most of the time, but rarely reported sexual desire. In contrast with traditional linear model in which desire precedes sex, these results suggest that women engage in sexual activity for multiple reasons, which may include affirmation or sustenance of a relationship.”
Interesting. The above seems to suggest a strong relationship component to elderly female sexuality. And maybe an identity-slash-self-esteem component. And for elderly males? It seems logical that they are likely the ones initiating much of the late-life sex. In their case, are their genetic procreative instincts behind the continued interest in sex? There is likely a relationship/identity/self-esteem element to it as well. But maybe not as much. Maybe. I think.
Is Wikipedia biased? A “gap” in male-female contribution and editing behavior at Wikipedia has been highlighted by researchers from the University of Minnesota. But is a gap always the result of bias?
Here’s the relevant information:
University of Minnesota researchers reveal Wikipedia gender biases
In their research paper, “WP:Clubhouse? An Exploration of Wikipedia’s Gender Imbalance,” the researchers from the University of Minnesota’s GroupLens Research Lab present a scientific exploration of gender imbalance in the English Wikipedia’s population of editors. Using self-reported gender information from more than 110,000 editors over a period of time from 2005 to January 2011, the researchers explored three broad areas related to the gender gap.
First, they looked at the nature of the imbalance itself. Their research showed that only 16 percent of new editors joining Wikipedia during 2009 identified themselves as female, and those females made only 9 percent of the edits by the editors who joined in 2009. To make matters worse, female editors are more likely to stop editing and leave Wikipedia when their edits are reverted as newcomers. [italic and bold mine]
Hmm. A few questions. First, is Wikipedia really a clubhouse? No, this word choice isn’t a huge deal, but if the authors title their paper that way I kinda wonder about their own biases. A clubhouse is something you join and generally does have membership and can be exclusive. Wikipedia strikes me as far more democratic. Socially ‘organic,’ even. A better question might be, “Do the males who contribute to Wikipedia bring a clubhouse-like attitude to it more than the females do?”
Secondly, is a gender imbalance always bad? No. There is certainly one in body-building behavior (more men) as there is one in studying foreign languages (more women). Do these differences qualify as imbalances that need to be balanced? I don’t think so.
Lastly, and reflecting the core of my concern, the “to make matters worse” wording implies a problem. Importantly, it seems the problem resides in the outside world. Ah yes, it is always the world that causes a person to behave as he or she does. Because we all know that there is nothing in the person him or herself at all. No, we are all merely empty vessels blown about by the social and cultural winds.
Not.
Of course, if biased behavior on the part of Wikipedia were documented, constituting a social wind strong enough to impede the progress of women wanting to contribute — that would be another issue.
[recycled material - first appeared here]
Three recent, separate studies have illustrated how chemicals and chemical levels can influence thoughts, feelings, behavior: human psychology. In two of the studies, the chemicals were endogenous, or internally produced, in the third, exogenous.
1) Dopamine and pleasure.
The first sentence to the news release tells it:
Enhancing the effects of the brain chemical dopamine influences how people make life choices by affecting expectations of pleasure, according to new research from the UCL Institute of Neurology. [bold added][source]
Drugs that influence dopamine levels in the brain include cocaine, nicotine, and amphetamines. Caffeine, too.
2) Carbon dioxide and fear.
Yes, your body creates carbon dioxide. Oxygen comes in through the lungs, carbon dioxide out. Higher levels of carbon dioxide have been found to trigger fear and anxiety.
A new study by University of Iowa researchers shows that carbon dioxide increases brain acidity, which in turn activates a brain protein that plays an important role in fear and anxiety behavior. [source]
Like the above on pleasure, this finding on fear has important mental health implications.
[T]he study team, including first author Adam Ziemann, M.D., Ph.D., found that making brain tissue less acidic (raising brain pH) blunted fear behavior produced by carbon dioxide and reduced learned fear. [bold added]
This is your brain; this is your brain with an altered pH. This is your emotional state and behavior; this is your emotional state and behavior with acidic brain tissue.
3) Phthalates and effeminate play.
Phthalates do not naturally occur in the human body. They are used by industry to soften plastics. When humans are exposed to these the can be absorbed. And when in a mother’s body, the can influence the developing fetus.
Phthalates are also found in vinyl and plastic tubing, household products, and many personal care products such as soaps and lotions. Phthalates are becoming more controversial as scientific research increasingly associates them with genital defects, metabolic abnormalities, and reduced testosterone in babies and adults. [source]
The news release containing the above information reported this very interesting finding:
In Swan’s study, higher concentrations of metabolites of two phthalates, di(2-ethylhexyl) phthalate (DEHP), and dibutyl phthalate (DBP), were associated with less male-typical behavior in boys on a standard play questionnaire….Girls’ play behavior was not associated with phthalate levels in their mothers, the study concluded.
Phthalates have previously been recognized as anti-androgenic compounds: they act against or disrupt the male hormones. How could the mothers’ exposure to this chemical affect their boys’ style of play?
Swan hypothesized that phthalates may lower fetal testosterone production during a critical window of development – somewhere within eight to 24 weeks gestation, when the testes begin to function – thereby altering brain sexual differentiation. [bold added]
Who knew that studying chemistry in school could aid your understanding of human psychology? We now know better.
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