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| Finally - why women can't read maps |
| 2005-01-24 |
| MEN frequently despair at women's map-reading skills - or rather their lack of them. Now scientists believe they have pinpointed the reason for this conflict between the sexes. Researchers say it is all down to differences in the reliance of the sexes on either grey matter or white matter in their brains to solve problems. They found that in intelligence tests men use 6.5 times as much grey matter as women, but women use nine times as much white matter. Grey matter is brain tissue crucial to processing information and plays a vital role in aiding skills such as mathematics, map-reading and intellectual thought. White matter connects the brain's processing centres and is central to emotional thinking, use of language and the ability to do more than one thing at once. Professor Rex Jung, a co-author of the study at the University of New Mexico, said: "This may help explain why men tend to excel in tasks requiring more local processing, like mathematics and map-reading, while women tend to excel at integrating information from various brain regions, such as is required for language skills. "These two very different pathways and activity centres, however, result in equivalent overall performance on broad measures of cognitive ability, such as those found on intelligence tests." Previous studies have shown that women have weaker spatial awareness than men, making it harder for them to read maps. Research has also found that in childhood, girls' vocabulary develops more quickly and that in later life women can speak 20,000 to 25,000 words a day compared to a man's 7000 to 10,000. For the study, published in the online edition of the journal NeuroImage, researchers performed a series of brain scans on 26 female and 22 male volunteers using magnetic resonance imaging equipment. All the volunteers were in good health, had no history of brain injury and the average IQ scores of the two sexes were similar. Their brains were scanned while they carried out tests designed to assess their general intelligence. Researchers then created a map of a brain showing the varying levels of activity in the brains of men and women. About 40 per cent of the human brain is grey matter and 60 per cent white matter. |
| Posted by:tipper |
| #15 Do a survey of 2nd Lts next... seems no gender bias there at all - the only difference I ever saw is that the West Pointers will be damn sure they know where they are and not listen at all when told where they REALLY are, especially by a corporal or sgt. |
| Posted by: OldSpook 2005-01-24 11:12:58 PM |
| #14 Do a survey of 2nd Lts next... seems no gender bias there at all - the only difference I ever saw is that the West Pointers will be damn sure they know where they are and not listen at all when told where they REALLY are, especially by a corporal or sgt. |
| Posted by: OldSpook 2005-01-24 11:12:58 PM |
| #13 Do a survey of 2nd Lts next... seems no gender bias there at all - the only difference I ever saw is that the West Pointers will be damn sure they know where they are and not listen at all when told where they REALLY are, especially by a corporal or sgt. |
| Posted by: OldSpook 2005-01-24 11:12:58 PM |
| #12 researchers performed a series of brain scans on 26 female and 22 male volunteers Bad science, guys, unless the purpose was to support the grant proposal for the definitive study. A study like this needs a huge base to account for the fact that the variation within each sex is about as broad as the average variation between the sexes. I conform to stereotype in this matter, Barbara and all those female engineers out there do not. And I don't think socialization factored into my own lack -- my father had me map out directions for every single bloody new location he drove me to, until I escaped to the college dorm, and I'm still hopeless as a co-pilot. |
| Posted by: trailing wife 2005-01-24 10:51:08 PM |
| #11 Another good question to ask is, just because something shows up on brain scans of 25 year old women (or 12 year old girls), doesn't mean it wasn't the result of socialization and reinforcement instead of the result of some sort of genetic destiny. |
| Posted by: Phil Fraering 2005-01-24 9:52:19 PM |
| #10 I've never had trouble reading a map. At least, one that's accurate. |
| Posted by: Bomb-a-rama 2005-01-24 9:43:50 PM |
| #9 Of the people who've been with me travelling, the two who were actually the best navigators were both women. I'm always a bit skeptical with "brain scan" studies like this, and wonder how much is just cultural expectations steering people in a particular direction. |
| Posted by: Dave D. 2005-01-24 9:38:30 PM |
| #8 Barb - good point - I know guys I wouldn't trust to park my car... |
| Posted by: Frank G 2005-01-24 9:32:14 PM |
| #7 Personal experience: I read maps very well (I even made some in college). From my experience training ambulance attendants (vol. rescue squad), I can tell you that both men and women have a problem reading maps. It's been about equal in my trainees, and those who didn't learn very well were also deficient in other areas. I think it's mostly about training and incentive to learn. For instance, I'm a bit of a control freak, so I always want to know where I'm going and what the alternate routes are. And I'm not willing to trust someone else to take care of it unless I know from experience they're good at map-reading and thinking in terms of alternative routes in case of problems on the main route. |
| Posted by: Barbara Skolaut 2005-01-24 9:27:14 PM |
| #6 Correction.. "...in later life women can speak 20,000 to 25,000 words |
| Posted by: Captain America 2005-01-24 9:07:29 PM |
| #5 yes but they were women scientists, so he didn't listen |
| Posted by: Frank G 2005-01-24 9:03:47 PM |
| #4 anybody tell Harvard President Summers? |
| Posted by: mhw 2005-01-24 8:56:54 PM |
| #3 it's the multi-tasking - we |
| Posted by: Frank G 2005-01-24 8:50:15 PM |
| #2 "...in later life women can speak 20,000 to 25,000 words a day compared to a man's 7000 to 10,000." Gosh... I never knew that! |
| Posted by: Dave D. 2005-01-24 8:49:52 PM |
| #1 Did they say why men can't ask for directions on those occasions when they can't read the maps? |
| Posted by: Angie Schultz 2005-01-24 8:37:43 PM |