| Are there gender differences in understanding personalities?
Posted: 11/6/2009 5:14:44 PM | I ran into an article "Testing the differentiation of personality by intelligence hypothesis" which was interesting, but when I looked at the sample size for the study, I was astonished that 381 women and 135 men had participated in IQ and personality tests to form the conclusions.
I do not know how the authors determined that the split should be nearly 3:1 females to males. But my interest was piqued if there is a perception among forum participants whether there is more of a leaning among females towards understanding factors that control personality. Among my female friends I have found definite leanings towards interest in astrology more than my male friends, and the same holds for finger nail polish.
So what do you think? Do females have more interest in how people tick and males follow Yosemite Sam in saying "I yam what I yam", or do you think empirical evidence can do nothing but make generalities about differences between the sexes? | |
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| Are there gender differences in understanding personalities?
Posted: 11/6/2009 6:00:59 PM | No. I think there are gender differences in interpreting personalities, not in understanding them.
Among my female friends I have found definite leanings towards interest in astrology more than my male friends, and the same holds for finger nail polish.
You may have a point with astrology, although I'd like to see the numbers -- some men won't admit to liking astrology, and some women may not like it "that much."
But since so few men use fingernail polish, that observation is skewed. Like, hardly any women I know are interested in jock straps, because we don't wear them. | |
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| Are there gender differences in understanding personalities?
Posted: 11/6/2009 6:38:28 PM |
"Testing the differentiation of personality by intelligence hypothesis"
I don't understand the topic of the article. Were they trying to find correlations between intelligence and certain personality traits?
Where did you run into this article? In some kind of journal, or in Cosmo? Did the authors choose the participants, or were they self-selecting?
Yosemite Sam ..."I yam what I yam"
...Popeye?
whether there is more of a leaning among females towards understanding factors that control personality
Hmmm...dunno. | |
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| Are there gender differences in understanding personalities?
Posted: 11/6/2009 7:26:29 PM | A woman's brain and a man's brain react differently to different stimuli... women tend to use both side of their brains equally whereas men are more right brained. The verbal, sorting, detail-oriented side of the brain is the left, whereas the spatial intuitive nonverbal side is the right. Also, cognitive and emotional 'spikes' happen more frequently with females for whatever reason, perhaps a throwback from 'fight or flight' days and protecting offspring.
Its kinda a joke but I think its not just that women are more interested in this stuff... its something we excel at. We can often tell the emotional temperature of the room before the actual temperature. Hence there is more 'Dear Abbys'... Judge Judy's...Oprahs....The View ladies... etc. Our left brains go wild with this stuff.
Of course there are exceptions: (1) many men and women don't fit the typical mold, (2) lefthanders often are the exception, (3) the average woman may have better access to both halves of the brain and (4) men often seem to shift from wholly left to wholly right and back rather than find a middle ground with ready access to both halves (as might the average woman). Take Dr. Phil, he is clearly a left brain type of guy... so is Geraldo Rivera... writers... performers... etc. | |
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| Are there gender differences in understanding personalities?
Posted: 11/7/2009 5:16:30 AM | | I have to say I think it may be pretty equal. I really do not like surveys because they do not really cover EVERYONE. They only cover certain geographic areas, genders, and places where people may not live in that think the way others do. I am interested in people's personalitites because I have such an off the wall one myself; and it takes a lot for me to be interested in someone. Plus I need to know "why" to a lot of things and I ask questions. I am not one of the sit here and just take me as I am kinda person. | |
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| Are there gender differences in understanding personalities?
Posted: 11/7/2009 5:59:28 AM |
do you think empirical evidence can do nothing but make generalities about differences between the sexes?
Yes.
Although I am with Zephyr that understanding astrology and nail polish are very unrelated and based on the fact of what that person uses...lol @the jock strap analogy.
To me, and I didn't read the article, the title of it and their testing results seem to try to produce different things. Did they separate it by what a man thinks vs. what a female thinks or was that just the testing pool?
I didn't read the article because these generic test patterns and polls are then published to be the 'norm'. With the population of the world, you can't believe that based on a random sampling of 500 people that this is the way life is supposed to be. What kills me is that these polls are splashed all over the news/media to often sway people to think as the 'limited' mass they polled.
I don't think wanting to know how people tick is gender specific. If it was, there wouldn't be so many threads in AAG from men wondering what a woman is thinking lol | |
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| Are there gender differences in understanding personalities?
Posted: 11/7/2009 7:31:04 AM | I guess I march to a different drummer, go against the cultural grain. I have no interest in either astrology or fingernail polish (exception: I do paint my toenails in the summer), but I LOVE SPINACH. I yam what I yam! | |
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| Are there gender differences in understanding personalities?
Posted: 11/7/2009 7:55:44 AM |
You can't believe that based on a random sampling of 500 people
Actually the real science of statistics is all about determining a confidence interval based on the tests. For a higher confidence interval, you need a larger sample size. Whether 500 is enough depends on the confidence interval of the study. That seldom is ever discussed in such articles. | |
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| Are there gender differences in understanding personalities?
Posted: 11/7/2009 8:29:59 AM | This sounds less interesting than watching paint dry.....however.....
"I was astonished that 381 women and 135 men had participated in IQ and personality tests to form the conclusions.
I do not know how the authors determined that the split should be nearly 3:1 females to males."
Well just looking at the digits there were 3 X as many women participating and the results a ratio of 3:1........irony, bad math....I think someone didn't pass a required stats class.
Just saying!  | |
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| Are there gender differences in understanding personalities?
Posted: 11/7/2009 10:26:28 AM | Astrology?
I guess I march to a different drummer, go against the cultural grain. I have no interest in either astrology or fingernail polish
And don't tell me our numbers match either.
This sounds less interesting than watching paint dry
What else can I say? My naked nails don't care. | |
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| Are there gender differences in understanding personalities?
Posted: 11/7/2009 10:35:12 AM | based on forum posts, i'd say the level of introspection is about equal. introspection being a good way to understand self in order to parse similarities in others.
on a side note ....
What kills me is that these polls are splashed all over the news/media to often sway people to think as the 'limited' mass they polled.
i work in mainstream media and i can tell you that there isn't a whole lot in the way of mind-control conspiracies there. as popular as it is to believe such things exist. we don't have time; we're slaves to the light-speed pace of the internet age.
newsgathering and research are the same thing. the appeal of polls to the mainstream media is that they take almost no work (time) on our part, because some researcher has already compiled the info and written it up in a report, which we take a couple minutes to summarize before we put on a web page or your tv.
it's the path of expediency. | |
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| Are there gender differences in understanding personalities?
Posted: 11/8/2009 4:41:15 AM | | I can understand that but then that poll becomes the next water cooler/coffee pot discussion of the day in the office. You wouldn't believe the amount of people that will agree with the poll or change their view so they don't appear different. Could it be the office or general dynamic of the population? Maybe. Could it be a conspiracy? lol no. But it's the impact they have vs. the intent of why they are put out there...make sense? | |
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| Are there gender differences in understanding personalities?
Posted: 11/8/2009 10:41:31 PM |
I think males are interested in this topic as much as females......provided the game isn't on.
I recently went to a baseball game with two of my daughters, a girl from Germany and my sister. I was the only one that stayed for nine innings and didn't have any interest in cotton candy, beverages or souvenirs. I was busy trying to analyze why I felt closer to Ken Griffey Jr than the people I arrived with. Hopefully I am not representative of all my gender - sentimental only about sport personalities I have never met!
Like, hardly any women I know are interested in jock straps, because we don't wear them.
Zephyr, I'm not sure I buy that argument, since there was that wonderful trend 20 years ago for women to wear men's boxers over tights. Maybe it is only a matter of time?!
I don't understand the topic of the article. Were they trying to find correlations between intelligence and certain personality traits?
Correct. The summary of the study was that individuals scoring higher on IQ tests exemplified a higher variation in personality types.
Where did you run into this article? In some kind of journal, or in Cosmo? Did the authors choose the participants, or were they self-selecting?
Elsevier's Personality and Individual Differences. It was a Canadian research effort. I haven't gotten the original article yet, just read the abstract when I noted the ratios of male to females and wondered why. I have read a review of the article in a subsequent article that compared younger to older adults. In that study the ratio was 2:1 women, and they advertised by radio and newspaper for participants and paid them $40 each. But I can't answer the question about the specific article I found.
...Popeye?
How could I mix up the comic characters of my youth? Where is that confounded rabbit anyway? Oooooooooh!
A woman's brain and a man's brain react differently to different stimuli... women tend to use both side of their brains equally whereas men are more right brained. The verbal, sorting, detail-oriented side of the brain is the left, whereas the spatial intuitive nonverbal side is the right. Also, cognitive and emotional 'spikes' happen more frequently with females for whatever reason, perhaps a throwback from 'fight or flight' days and protecting offspring.
Now that I would not have guessed, I guess it results from teaching engineering types. Generally, the women engineers are more "large-picture" oriented, whereas the gentlemen are usually more, "show me the process, and I'll do repeat it." Can you lead me to a reference that indicates a greater tendency among females toward being more heavily operating in the left sphere? I'd be much obliged.
Our left brains go wild with this stuff.
This gives me a different vision for what a "wild woman" should be perceived as!
Women by nature are relationship builders... personality typing helps facilitate understanding and the rapport process.
I've heard that quite a bit, yet, I suspect there is some conditioning in it as well. I have received an eMail from a gentleman telling me the post was a waste of time. When I wrote him a response, apologizing for wasting his time, the eMail was deleted and unread. I wonder if we are conditioned to blow our own perspective loudly and then shut off a bit more as males.
I really do not like surveys because they do not really cover EVERYONE.
Certainly, you are right. Neither does this question include everyone, but such surveys provide some more contemplation for why we act as we do. Ultimately, I hope that the bridge between my personality and the thought processes among my students are not asynchronous. I can form opinions about how they are learning, but in the end, I would like to intentionally reach them.
Did they separate it by what a man thinks vs. what a female thinks or was that just the testing pool?
There were some conclusions that were gender specific, but they were looking more at the bulk tendency of personality variations and cognition. Given there were 20 different personality traits, it seems that only 100+ gentlemen are going to make it hard to make conclusions about higher variations of personality types for high IQ results.
I didn't read the article because these generic test patterns and polls are then published to be the 'norm'.
The article was published in a technical journal, and I don't see a lot of academicians that look glowingly on peers research in my discipline. I can hardly imagine it is different for psychologists. I wonder if the more main stream media has that tendency because they have broader-interest audiences and have to try sell the information as interesting.
... there wouldn't be so many threads in AAG from men wondering what a woman is thinking lol
Touche!
... but I LOVE SPINACH. I yam what I yam!
Go Girl!!
Actually the real science of statistics is all about determining a confidence interval based on the tests. For a higher confidence interval, you need a larger sample size. Whether 500 is enough depends on the confidence interval of the study. That seldom is ever discussed in such articles.
I tend to disagree with you there. Most of the education journals I read go into depth discussing statistical significance of the results.Even political polls have gotten into the habit of posting margins of error. I surmise again that it is often an editorial decision, whether the more technical statistical findings are audience-appropriate.
irony, bad math....I think someone didn't pass a required stats class.
Okay, I admit it. I went out to see Tootsie with my girlfriend instead of studying for my statistics final. I was more into empirical evidence of smaller samples sizes I guess when it came to guessing about the differences between men and women back then. Oh, hoot, I was only 17, I guess I didn't qualify as a man even!
What kills me is that these polls are splashed all over the news/media to often sway people to think as the 'limited' mass they polled.
I guess mass-media listeners should be referred to pof forums! Certainly you can't get away with much here without have a blistering critique - sometimes even based on a logical premise. Doesn't information provided by a mass-medium automatically require a "caveat emptor" label?
newsgathering and research are the same thing .... it's the path of expediency.
Agreed. No party is at fault if the glimpse into reality is faulty or fleeting. Just because there is a lot of information shown to us doesn't mean that we can expect flawless production and reproduction. Maybe we should just be thankful that we didn't have to try to organize the studies, drum up funding, and then find creative ways of disseminating the information, so we can start the whole process over again with a related or completely new topic. I can bicker about mainstream media not getting my research right, but I'm usually better off considering how people will perceive it, before I publish it.
You wouldn't believe the amount of people that will agree with the poll or change their view so they don't appear different.
I made the mistake of questioning the validity of one of my sociologist colleague's research sampling by pointing out those actively interested in screwing up the results. I say I made the mistake, because I was treated to a lengthy treatise of how they do cross-correlated questioning to screen out inconsistent responses. Not being a person that works with the highly variable human population, I must admit I tipped my hat to them after the conversation. I came back to my office humbled and promised myself to do a more careful job of cross-checking my results in my own inanimate research.
I wonder, too, if there is a particular type of research that would actually hinder the water-cooler misapplication of poll results, too. I think there will always be a calling for devil's advocates or ego-maniacs to take things out of context. I am certainly guilty!!
I showed my dog your question and now he is laying down in the middle of the street waiting for a car to run him over.
I will note your pooch's depression to the authors of the article with the following complaint.
"I am protesting your research to the local PETA chapter. Please in the future have an equal representation of males and females, both of the human and canine persuasion, to limit the debilitating sense of loss for not having had adequate gender/species inclusion in your scientific endeavors!"
Seeing how psych deparments of all schools are predominantly female, I think women tend to have a lot of interest and a lot of success in the subject.
Really? My university is DEFINITELY atypical then! | |
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