Category: Gender Difference

NewsPsychology (Feb. 21, 2011) — Although their involvement is very different, childbirth is an important shared experience for the first-time father and his partner, yet men generally attend childbirth classes only for their partner’s sake, reveals research from the University of Gothenburg, Sweden.

The men from western Sweden who were interviewed in depth for the thesis thought it only natural for the focus to be on the woman, as it is she who carries, delivers and, perhaps, breastfeeds the baby. At the same time, men’s secondary role in childbirth classes can make the transition to fatherhood harder.

“Some of the dads said that they’d asked the midwife questions only for the midwife to direct her answers to the mum,” says midwife Åsa Premberg, author of the thesis. “It’s important that men too have an opportunity to talk about their fears and ask the midwife questions if they’re to feel it’s worth taking part.”

Childbirth classes are a form of preparation for childbirth and parenthood, but the men in the studies found that the classes were aimed mainly at the mums-to-be. For men, childbirth classes are mostly a ritual that they attend for their partner’s sake.

“Men seem to have other sources of information ahead of childbirth, such as their workmates or relatives,” says Premberg.

Fathers also play a secondary role during childbirth, of course, and the thesis shows that this involves supporting the woman and ensuring that she is not disturbed or worried unnecessarily, while at the same time attempting to conceal their own frustration and concern. The woman’s pain, fear of the unknown and gender-related notions of masculinity complicate the man’s involvement in the delivery room.

“A man who is close to tears might be advised to go and get a breath of fresh air,” says Premberg. “One man described how he was consoled by staff, but felt uncomfortable with this. Men react differently in this situation, and there are no easy answers.”

During the first year of fatherhood, the men prioritised building their own relationship with the baby. It was also important to master the overwhelming new task of fatherhood, not to lose their own sense of self, and to manage to look after the baby on their own. Fathers found that their contact with the baby made them more sensitive and responsive, which also affected them in other situations.

Åsa Premberg considers it important for the support provided during childbirth classes, childbirth itself and early parenthood to reflect an awareness of how the new situation and gender issues affect the man:

“There’s a need for support aimed specifically at men both before and after childbirth. This will benefit not only the man himself but also the whole family.”

To measure first-time fathers’ experiences of childbirth, a questionnaire was developed and validated on the basis of the interview studies in the thesis, which had the sensitivity to distinguish between groups known to have differing birth experiences.

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The above story is reprinted (with editorial adaptations by newsPsychology staff) from materials provided by University of Gothenburg.

Disclaimer: This article is not intended to provide medical advice, diagnosis or treatment. Views expressed here do not necessarily reflect those of NewsPsychology ( or its staff.

Among the many differences between girls and boys, add the effects from caffeine — physiological, behavioral and subjective — to the list.

Results of a double-blind, placebo-controlled, dose-response study of the response of youth to caffeine found that, in general, boys get a greater rush and more energy from caffeine than girls.

Boys also reported they felt that caffeine had a positive effect on their athletic performance. Girls didn't report on this issue.

The study, conducted by Jennifer L. Temple, PhD, a neurobiologist and assistant professor of exercise and nutrition sciences at the University at Buffalo, appears in the current (December 2010) issue of Experimental and Clinical Psychopharmacology.

It is the first study to demonstrate gender differences in physiological response to acute caffeine in adolescents. Temple's initial paper on this research was published in the December 2009 issue of Behavioural Pharmacology.

"Our findings from this study and from our previous study suggest that boys and girls respond differently to caffeine," Temple says. "We are hoping that our findings from our studies on caffeine will help us to determine why males and females differ in susceptibility to drug abuse and respond differently to treatment."

The study involved 26 boys and 26 girls between the ages of 12 and 17. To take part in the research, the teenagers were required to have previous experience with caffeine but no adverse reactions, and not using hormone-based contraceptives, not smoking, not on any medication that could have adverse interactions with caffeine (e.g., methylphenidate) and were willing to visit the laboratory four times for 90 minutes each.

Participants were instructed not to drink caffeine 24 hours before each visit and to eat nothing or drink nothing but water for two hours before each visit.

On the first visit, participants completed a 24-hour dietary and physical activity recall, including how many caffeinated drinks they consumed, while parents completed a demographic questionnaire. Teens provided a three-millimeter saliva sample analyzed to make sure they had abstained from caffeine as required and weren't taking steroid hormones.

After researchers took baseline heart rate and blood pressure, participants drank a beverage containing 50 mg, 100 mg or 200 mg of caffeine, or one with no caffeine that served as a placebo. The order was randomized across the four visits for each participant.

Blood pressure and heart rate measurements were taken every 10 minutes during the first hour. The teens completed the behavioral checklist again and munched on snack food. After the fourth session, participants had their height and weight measured, and were debriefed about the study.

In addition to the general findings, the study revealed several differences in response to caffeine between girls and boys. Diastolic blood pressure increased and heart rate decreased as percentage of caffeine increased in males, but not in females. In addition, boys who were regular "high consumers" of caffeine showed greater increases in blood pressure than low-consuming boys.

"Caffeine is known to increase blood pressure, but the fact that it caused an exaggerated response in high-consuming males was a surprise, since at the time of measurement the amount of caffeine consumed by boys and girls was the same," says Temple.

"We would have predicted that high consumers would have developed some tolerance to the effects of caffeine and would have reduced responses."

When researchers examined eating behavior as a function of chronic and acute caffeine use, they found that high consumers of caffeine consumed more calories, protein and fat in their typical diet, and ate more high-sugar snack foods in the laboratory, compared with low-caffeine consumers.

The third and perhaps the most important question in this investigation focuses on the effect of caffeine consumption during adolescence on later use of legal or illegal drugs. That paper currently is in preparation.

The Department of Exercise and Nutrition Sciences is part of the UB School of Public Health and Health Professions. Addition authors on the paper are Amber M. Dewey and Laura Briatico, undergraduate research assistants from the UB Department of Psychology.

The research is supported by a grant from the National Institute of Drug Abuse.

Journal Reference:

1. Jennifer L. Temple, Amber M. Dewey, Laura N. Briatico. Effects of acute caffeine administration on adolescents.. Experimental and Clinical Psychopharmacology, 2010; 18 (6): 510 DOI: 10.1037/a0021651

NewsPsychology (Feb. 19, 2011) — A study by the University of the Basque Country (UPV/EHU) has carried out the first Spanish study into the emotional differences between the sexes and generations in terms of forgiveness. According to the study, parents forgive more than children, while women are better at forgiving than men.

“This study has great application for teaching values, because it shows us what reasons people have for forgiving men and women, and the popular conception of forgiveness,” says Maite Garaigordobil, co-author of the study and a senior professor at the Psychology Faculty of the UPV.

This study, which has been published in the Revista Latinoamericana de Psicología, is the first to have been carried out in Spain. It shows that parents find it easier to forgive than their children, and that women are better at forgiving than men.

“A decisive factor in the capacity to forgive is empathy, and women have a greater empathetic capacity than males,” says Carmen Maganto, co-author of the study and a tenured professor at the Psychology Faculty of the UPV.

The results, which were measured using a scale to assess the ability to forgive (CAPER), and a scale of forgiveness and facilitating factors (ESPER), show that there are differences in the reasons that encourage forgiveness according to people’s age and sex.

What drives forgiveness?

Children believe that “one forgives with time,” while parents point to reasons such as “remorsefulness and forgiving the other person” and “legal justice.”

The authors of this study say that parents who have forgiven most over the course of their lives have an increased capacity to forgive “in all areas.” Parents and children use similar definitions of forgiveness. Not bearing a grudge, reconciliation and understanding-empathy are the terms most used by both groups to define forgiveness.

However, there are greater differences between men and women. Both see “not bearing a grudge” as the best definition of forgiveness, but men place greater importance on this characteristic.

Lack of bitterness is the key

The study, which was carried out with the collaboration of 140 participants (parents and children aged between 45 and 60, and 17 and 25, respectively), highlights two key conditions for a person to be forgiven. One is for them to “show remorse” and the second is for the person who has been offended “not to bear a grudge.”

The experts say the family environment plays a key role in transmitting ethical values. “This result is especially interesting in situations where families are in crisis and no basic education can be expected of them in terms of values. This education is largely transferred to the school,” the researchers explain.

The research “opens up many new questions” for the two investigators, who believe it is “necessary to study the role that forgiveness plays in psychological treatment, especially among victims of sexual abuse, physical and psychological maltreatment and marital infidelity, as well as other situations.”

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The above story is reprinted (with editorial adaptations by newsPsychology staff) from materials provided by FECYT – Spanish Foundation for Science and Technology, via EurekAlert!, a service of AAAS.

Disclaimer: This article is not intended to provide medical advice, diagnosis or treatment. Views expressed here do not necessarily reflect those of NewsPsychology ( or its staff.

NewsPsychology (Feb. 17, 2011) — Girls are more interested in studying science if topics are presented in a female friendly way. This is one of the findings of Dr Sylvie Kerger the University of Luxembourg whose research is published online the British Journal of Educational Psychology by BPS Journals in partnership with Wiley-Blackwell.

There has been concern over the decreasing number of students studying scientific fields such as statistics, physics and information technology. These disciplines contribute strongly to national growth and well-being. As girls have less interest in these disciplines but perform just as well as boys this study attempted to find out if making it more relevant to girls would encourage more to study them. For the study 134 boys and 160 girls (14 years old) completed questionnaires relating to their interest in 80 topics. Before completing this they were told:

‘Imagine that you will visit a new school next year, where you can select your subjects. Now we will present different subjects to you which you can select. Each subject has different topics. You can say how much you are interested in it.’ For example to gauge interest in physics students were asked about the functioning of a laser. The feminine context was ‘how is a laser used in cosmetic surgery’ and the masculine context was ‘how does a laser read a CD’. Students rated their interest from 1-5 and were not aware which scientific discipline the question related to. The results showed that girls had a significantly higher interest in IT, statistics and physics when concepts were presented in a female friendly way. Unfortunately this led to a significant decrease in boys’ interest. Dr Kerger said “There was clear evidence that applying female friendly topics increased girls’ interest in these scientific disciplines. However, boys showed a decreased level of interest when topics were presented in this way. Girls were more interested in social and real contexts such as decline of forests whereas boys clearly found mechanics and technology more compelling.

“One solution might be to establish gender-specific science classes. However, this solution might not work for every student. Imagine a girl whose interest does not match that of other girls and a boy who is more interested in female topics than in male topics. So the solution might not be the division of students into gender-specific groups, but something that takes into account the individual differences among students. “Perhaps teachers and or schools could offer science modules or groups dealing with the same concepts but presenting them in the context of different topics. Each student could then choose the science modules or groups using the topics that seem the most interesting to themselves.”

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The above story is reprinted (with editorial adaptations by newsPsychology staff) from materials provided by British Psychological Society (BPS), via AlphaGalileo.

Journal Reference:

1. Sylvie Kerger, Romain Martin, Martin Brunner. How can we enhance girls’ interest in scientific topics?British Journal of Educational Psychology, 2011; DOI: 10.1111/j.2044-8279.2011.02019.x

Disclaimer: This article is not intended to provide medical advice, diagnosis or treatment. Views expressed here do not necessarily reflect those of NewsPsychology ( or its staff.

The "glass ceiling" for women administrators in college athletics may be cracked, but is not completely broken, according to a new study co-authored by a North Carolina State University researcher.

Results of the study, which surveyed athletic administrators at universities across the country to determine how, and if, gender roles made a difference in hiring practices, may disappoint those who think double standards for women have been relegated to the past.

Dr. Heidi Grappendorf, assistant professor of parks, recreation and tourism management at NC State, and colleagues surveyed 276 athletic administrators at Division I universities to have them evaluate fictitious vignettes of male or female candidates for intercollegiate athletics positions such as athletic director, compliance director or life-skills director. They then ranked the candidates' attributes and the likelihood of hiring them for the respective positions.

The research found that female candidates for the athletic director position, despite having the same background as their male counterparts, were viewed as less feminine. However, if the same female candidates applied for life skills positions — positions which are predominately held by women in real-life athletic administration — they were viewed as more feminine.

Meanwhile, males were more likely to be chosen for athletic director positions, even with the exact same background and attributes as female candidates.

Researchers believe the study lends support to the notion that men tend to be hired in management roles not just for their skills and experience, but because of the perceived view that management roles require masculinity.

"It seems like there is, unfortunately, a 'catch-22' for women in management roles — particularly in sports," Grappendorf explains. "The assumption has been that masculine attributes like aggressiveness and competitiveness are needed for management-level positions, yet women who display those attributes are still not given the same opportunities as men. Even worse, if they do happen to be hired, women are often looked down upon by colleagues for having those masculine qualities."

Similar research has been conducted in business settings, but this research is the first of its kind conducted in the sports industry, which continues to be male-dominated. The research, which is published in the Journal for Sport Management, was conducted along with lead author Dr. Laura Burton from the University of Connecticut and co-author Dr. Angela Henderson from the University of Northern Colorado.

NC State's Department of Parks, Recreation and Tourism Management is part of the university's College of Natural Resources.

Journal Reference:

1. Laura J. Burton, Heidi Grappendorf, Angela Henderson. Perceptions of Gender in Athletic Administration: Utilizing Role Congruity to Examine (Potential) Prejudice Against Women. Journal for Sport Management, 2011; 25 (1): 36-45 

A joint research project between the University of Alberta's Faculty of Education and the Department of Computing Science has found that, for high-school girls, the fun is in making video games, not just playing them.

Computing science professor Duane Szafron and fellow U of A researchers Mike Carbonaro, Jonathan Schaeffer and Maria Cutumisu say that women in computing science are rare, but their study shows that if you want to get more females interested in computing science, you have to rewrite the program, so to speak.

"There's been a huge push throughout North America to try and get girls to go into computing science, but [educators are] having a lot of challenges convincing them," said the Faculty of Education's Carbonaro. "The findings are important, as they demonstrate a way to motivate girls' interest in computing science"

In their study, the researchers wanted to see whether girls would gain as much interest in game development as they boys in the class control group. To facilitate the experiment, they introduced a group of local Grade 10 students to a program called ScriptEase, a tool that allowed them to develop and design their own games. A key factor in the study was having male participants who had more experience than the females in gaming.

Szafron says that there is an inherent creative component to computing science, and that having a student design and construct something using the tool is one way to allow them to investigate that aspect of computing science. "We thought we should have female students create games and see if they are just as excited about making games as male students and see whether it's an attractor to computing science that is independent of gender," he said.

Their findings indicated that female students enjoyed creating games as much as their male counterparts; further, they preferred game construction to activities such as story writing. Further, he noted the female students gained and used practical skills that are crucial to understanding computing science.

"The female students built games that were every bit as good as the male students made, even though the male students had more experience with playing games," said Szafron. "In terms of the quality of the games developed and the abstraction skills that the students learned, which could translate to knowledge of competing science — and in terms of the amount of fun that they had — there was no difference between the two groups."

According to Carbonaro, computing science teachers need to look at redesigning the types of projects and content they use in class to make them more "female-user friendly."

"If you want more females in computing science, you need to radically change the curriculum. You need to provide activities that are more gender neutral so that they'll be attracted to the discipline."

The research study was recently published in Computers and Education.

Adolescents who misuse alcohol and drugs are at increased risk of continued misuse well into middle age. They are also at increased risk of experiencing mental health problems, accidents, physical health problems, premature death, financial problems, and suicide attempts.

These are the results of a doctoral thesis presented by Yasmina Molero Samuelson at the Center for Psychiatric Research (CPF), Karolinska Institutet in Sweden.

In the present thesis, Yasmina Molero Samuelson has followed two large cohorts of adolescents for several decades. These cohorts received treatment for substance misuse at a clinic in Stockholm, Sweden during two time periods; the end of the 1960s, and the beginning of the 1980s. The cohorts were followed until 2002, and were compared to two matched samples from the general population. Approximately 7,000 individuals were included in the studies.

The results demonstrate that adolescents treated for substance misuse, as compared to the individuals in the matched sample, to a significantly greater degree experienced psychosocial problems long after the end of the treatment, even up to age 50. They also demonstrated a greater risk of experiencing several concurrent problems as adults.

The thesis also shows that there were more similarities than differences among males and females who received treatment for their substance misuse as adolescents. For example, females with delinquency and substance misuse problems exhibited an equal risk of developing psychosocial problems in adulthood as their male counterparts. Furthermore, a considerable number of the females who were treated at the clinic committed crimes, both in adolescence and in adulthood. Across gender, the crimes included non-violent crimes, violent crimes, and substance-related crimes.

"What we can see is that adolescent antisocial behaviour, manifested through substance misuse and delinquency significantly increases the risk of various types of psychosocial problems in adulthood, even into middle age," says Yasmina Molero Samuelson. "This emphasises the importance of early and effective interventions in order to prevent a negative development that risks being maintained for the most part of a person's life."

The breadth of problems experienced in adulthood suggests that interventions for adolescents in treatment settings should not focus solely on the substance misuse or delinquency; it is equally important to assess and treat problems in other areas as well.

"The results also clearly show the importance of not overlooking young girls in this these types of contexts, since they too demonstrate severe antisocial behaviour, and are equally at risk of developing problems throughout their lives as their male counterparts," says Yasmina Molero Samuelson.

It's an incendiary topic in academia — the pervasive belief that women are underrepresented in science, math and engineering fields because they face sex discrimination in the interviewing, hiring, and grant and manuscript review processes.

In their study, published Feb. 7 in the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, Cornell University social scientists say it's just not true.

It's not discrimination in these areas, but rather differences in resources attributable to career and family-related choices that set women back in science, technology, engineering and math (STEM) fields, say Stephen J. Ceci, professor of developmental psychology, and Wendy M. Williams, professor of human development and director of the Cornell Institute for Women in Science, both in Cornell's College of Human Ecology.

The "substantial resources" universities expend to sponsor gender-sensitivity training and interviewing workshops would be better spent on addressing the real causes of women's underrepresentation, Ceci and Williams say, through creative problem-solving and policy changes that respond to differing "biological and social realities" of the sexes.

The researchers analyzed the scientific literature in which women and men competed for publications, grants or jobs in these fields. They found no systematic evidence of sex discrimination in interviewing, hiring, reviewing or funding when men and women with similar resources — such as teaching loads and research support — were compared.

"We hear often that men have a better chance of getting their work accepted or funded, or of getting jobs, because they're men," Williams said. "Universities expend money and time trying to combat this rampant alleged discrimination against women in the hope that by doing so universities will see the numbers of women STEM scientists increase dramatically over coming years."

The data show that women scientists are confronted with choices, beginning at or before adolescence, that influence their career trajectories and success. Women who prioritize families and have children sometimes make "lifestyle choices" that lead to them to take positions, such as adjunct or part-time appointments or jobs at two-year colleges, offering fewer resources and chances to move up in the ranks. These women, however, are not held back by sex discrimination in hiring or in how their scholarly work is evaluated. Men with comparably low levels of research resources fare equivalently to their female peers. Although women disproportionately hold such low-resource positions, this is not because they had their grants and manuscripts rejected or were denied positions at research-intensive universities due to their gender.

Also, females beginning before adolescence often prefer careers focusing on people, rather than things, aspiring to be physicians, biologists and veterinarians rather than physicists, engineers and computer scientists. Efforts to interest young girls in these math-heavy fields are intended to ensure girls do not opt out of inorganic fields because of misinformation or stereotypes.

Also, fertility decisions are key because the tenure system has strong disincentives for women to have children — a factor in why more women in academia are childless than men. Implementation of "flexible options" to enhance work-family balance may help to increase the numbers of women in STEM fields, the researchers say.

As long as women make the choice and "are satisfied with the outcomes, then we have no problem," they write in the paper. "However, to the extent that these choices are constrained by biology and/or society, and women are dissatisfied with the outcomes, or women's talent is not actualized, then we most emphatically have a problem."

The solution will only be possible if society focuses on changing the women's non-optimal choices and addressing unique challenges faced by female STEM scientists with children, the researchers say.

Ceci and Williams, a married couple with three daughters, co-authored "The Mathematics of Sex: How Biology and Society Conspire to Limit Talented Women and Girls" in 2010.

The research was funded by the National Institutes of Health.

Journal Reference:

1. S. J. Ceci, W. M. Williams. Understanding current causes of women's underrepresentation in science. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, 2011; DOI: 10.1073/pnas.1014871108

Are you still looking for a date for Valentine's Day? Here's some dating advice straight from the laboratory: It turns out there may be something to "playing hard to get." A study published in Psychological Science, a journal of the Association for Psychological Science, finds that a woman is more attracted to a man when she is uncertain about how much he likes her.

On the one hand, a lot of psychological research has found that person A usually likes person B about as much as they think person B likes them. "If we want to know how much Sarah likes Bob, a good predictor is how much she thinks Bob likes her," write the authors of the paper, Erin R. Whitchurch and Timothy D. Wilson of the University of Virginia and Daniel T. Gilbert of Harvard University. "But what if Sarah is not sure how much Bob likes her?" This might lead Sarah to spend a lot of time thinking about Bob, wondering how he feels, and she might find him more attractive the more she dwells on him.

Forty-seven female undergraduates at the University of Virginia participated in the study. Each student, who believed that the experiment was designed to study whether Facebook could work as an online dating site, was told that male students from two other universities had viewed her profile and those of 15 to 20 other females. Then the women were shown four men's Facebook profiles that they thought were real, but were actually fictitious. Some of the women were told they'd seen the four men who liked them the most; others were told these were four men who rated them about average. A third group were told the men could be either the ones who liked them most or the ones who liked them about average — so those women didn't know about the level of the men's interest in them.

As other research has found, women who believed the men liked them a lot were more attracted to the men than women who thought the men liked them only an average amount. However, the women who found the men most attractive were the ones who weren't sure whether those men were into them or not.

"Numerous popular books advise people not to display their affections too openly to a potential romantic partner and to instead appear choosy and selective," the authors write. Women in this study made their decisions based on very little information on the men — but in a situation not unlike meeting someone on an internet dating site, which is common these days. "When people first meet, it may be that popular dating advice is correct: Keeping people in the dark about how much we like them will increase how much they think about us and will pique their interest."

Journal Reference:

1. E. R. Whitchurch, T. D. Wilson, D. T. Gilbert. "He Loves Me, He Loves Me Not . . . ": Uncertainty Can Increase Romantic Attraction. Psychological Science, 2010; 22 (2): 172 DOI: 10.1177/0956797610393745

Dads who still haven't given up video games now have some justification to keep on playing — if they have a daughter.

Researchers from Brigham Young University's School of Family Life conducted a study on video games and children between 11 and 16 years old. They found that girls who played video games with a parent enjoyed a number of advantages. Those girls behaved better, felt more connected to their families and had stronger mental health. Professor Sarah Coyne is the lead author of the study, which appears Feb. 1 in the Journal of Adolescent Health.

"The surprising part about this for me is that girls don't play video games as much as boys," Coyne said. "But they did spend about the same amount of time co-playing with a parent as boys did."

The findings come with one important caveat: The games had to be age-appropriate. If the game was rated M for mature, it weakened the statistical relationship between co-playing and family connectedness.

The study involved 287 families with an adolescent child. Mario Kart, Mario Brothers, Wii Sports, Rock Band and Guitar Hero topped the list of games played most often by girls. Call of Duty, Wii Sports and Halo ranked 1, 2 and 3 among boys.

For boys, playing with a parent was not a statistically significant factor for any of the outcomes the researchers measured (positive behavior, aggression, family connection, mental health). Yet for girls, playing with a parent accounted for as much as 20 percent of the variation on those measured outcomes.

Coyne and her co-author Laura Padilla-Walker offer two possible explanations for what's behind the gender differences.

"We're guessing it's a daddy-daughter thing, because not a lot of moms said yes when we asked them if they played video games," Padilla-Walker said. "Co-playing is probably an indicator of larger levels of involvement."

It's also possible that the time boys play with parents doesn't stand out as much because they spend far more time playing with friends. The researchers plan to explore the basis of these gender differences in more detail as they continue working on this project.

Padilla-Walker remembers the outcry from gamers two years ago when this study linked frequent video game playing to poor relationships with friends and family. Though she has a Ph.D. and expertise in analyzing statistical pathways, her most effective response to those critics is rooted in common sense.

"If you spend huge amounts of time absorbed in any activity, it's going to affect your relationships," Padilla-Walker said.

And that brings us to some practical parenting advice illustrated by the new study on playing video games with kids.

"Any face-to-face time you have with your child can be a positive thing, especially if the activity is something the child is interested in," Padilla-Walker said.