Women sometimes get a reputation for being scatter-brained, or worse, empty-headed. (All those blonde jokes…) But the truth is that women have very unique brains that are well-suited to the traditional roles that women have played through the millenia.
This is Her Brain…
The female brain is organized for multi-tracking. The average woman can juggle between two and four unrelated topics at the same time.
It is reported that a woman’s brain has a larger corpus callosum, which means women can transfer data between the right and left hemisphere faster than men. Men tend to be more left brained, while women have greater access to both sides.
Because of greater access to the right hemisphere (which is associated with nuance, reading social cues, and deception detection), women are much better at knowing when things are awry.
- Wives call marital therapists nine times out of ten when there is relational trouble.
- Mothers call child therapists nine times out of ten when children are struggling.
- Women can also spot a man lying to her much faster than a man catches his wife in a lie.
- Mothers are also better at catching kids in lies.
Women are able to use both sides of their brain for language, so they tend to be more fluent, which may be why they have more to say.
When husbands and wives get into arguments, their hemisphere activation styles (men = left brain, women = both right and left) often make problems worse. Because women use more words, men often become overwhelmed in disagreements and say insensitive things like “What’s the point?” or “Specifically what do you want?”.
These statements infuriate women and make communication even tougher. They know the point, they just have a harder time articulating it succinctly due to the extra input from the right side.
The limbic system, or emotional brain, tends to be larger in women. The limbic system is the emotional bonding center of the brain.
- It is no accident that women in overwhelming numbers are the primary caretakers for children.
- Women are primary caretakers for the elderly. Seventy percent of elderly people who need care get it from a woman.
- Women tend to have more friends in life, they go to church more often than men, and they pray (bonding with God) more than men.
Women have a larger nesting instinct than men. They have a greater biological need to have their houses in order. When a couple moves to a new house or apartment, it is generally the woman who feels unsettled until everything is put away. Women are usually primary caretakers for the home and take on the bulk of housework.
With the larger limbic size comes a greater incidence of depression. After puberty, females are three times more likely to develop depression than males.
Typically the woman’s brain is very active. Thinking, thinking, thinking, especially in the emotional part of the brain. A woman’s brain is always working.
Why do women always want to talk? Researchers have found that connecting with another through talking will trigger the pleasure centers in a woman’s brain, a high second only to an orgasm.
A 20-second hug will trigger the release of oxytocin in a woman’s brain. The effect of this chemical will often give the woman a feeling of trust in the person hugging her.
Women have between fourteen and sixteen areas of the brain to evaluate others’ behavior (versus a man’s four to six areas). This explains how a woman can attend a dinner party and rapidly work out the state of the relationships of other couples at the party-who’s had an argument, who likes who, and so on.
This is Her Brain At Work…
Women are more perceptive than men. Called women’s intuition, they have the innate ability to pick up and decipher nonverbal signals, and have an accurate eye for small details.
Women are more able to focus on specific stimuli, such as a baby crying in the night.
Women generally can recall lists of words or paragraphs of text better than men.
Women are better at:
- recognizing emotional overtones in other people and in language
- emotional and artistic expressiveness
- esthetic appreciation
- verbal language
- carrying out detailed and pre-planned tasks
- empathy
- social skills
- security-seeking
From all these facts, a woman’s head obviously isn’t empty. Instead there’s a lot going on in there. It’s easy to see why men and women sometimes have trouble getting along when you look at the differences in how our brains are made. If you’re creating a female character for a story, try using some of these facts to take advantage of her unique female qualities.
This is the end of the Gender Differences Workshop. I hope you’ve had as much fun exploring male and female diversity as I have. I’ll be gathering up all of these posts and putting them into a free ebook that you can download and use for reference when you’re writing. It’ll be available on Sunday.
Today’s Giveaway: a copy of The Right to Write by Julia Cameron
To enter the drawing, just leave a comment on today’s post. (If you don’t want to be entered for the drawing, just note that in your comment.) If you don’t have anything to say on female speech, leave a comment to throw your name in the hat.
All giveaways will have a 24-hour entry period. All workshops will be posted at 7:00 AM CST on the date scheduled (unless I have any unforeseen problems getting it posted. In which case, I’ll make up new rules for that day.)
The book giveaways are open to everyone (USA and elsewhere), even if you win a book on a different day of the workshop.
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Have a suggestion for a writing series you’d like to see? Leave me a note in the comments. I love a challenge!
