COGNITIVE DIFFERENCES:Gender Differences in I.Q, Gender and Verbal Ability

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Gender Issues In Psychology (PSY - 512)

Lesson 21

COGNITIVE DIFFERENCES

It is stereotypically believed that men and women are intellectually very different. Men are thought to be more

intelligent, and capable of wise and quick decision making. Women, it is thought, are overwhelmed by their

emotion, rather than logic or intellect. Even when a man and a woman have the same I.Q level, the man is

considered to be more reliable for entrusting a job involving responsibility. Empirical research findings,

however, do not indicate the existence of any significant gender differences in terms of intelligence and

cognitive ability. Some gender differences have been noted in certain cognitive areas, but there seem to be no

true differences in the overall performance or ability (Hedges, and Nowell, 1995). In one analysis (Hedges, and

Nowell, 1995), the performance of male and female teenagers on tests of mental ability over the past 30 years

was investigated. The analysis yielded very minute `average difference'. But in case of some tests the member of

boys performing very high or very poor was disproportionately large. In case of science tests the number of

boys scoring in the top 5 percent was seven times more than that of the girls who scored that high. On math

tests twice as many boys than girls scored in the top 5 percent.

In tests of perceptual speed and reading comprehension, boys were much more likely than girls to score the

lower on the test of writing skills. A significantly little change was seen between the findings of 1960, 1992, the

years when testing session used in the study were held.

Gender Differences in I.Q

There is no strong evidence suggesting any real gender difference in I.Q scores. There are only very few studies

that showed gender differences in I.Q scores, the differences indicated by these researches are pretty small.

However these small differences have become even smaller in the recent past (Aiken, 1984; Halpern, 1986;

Hyde et. al., 1990; Maccoby and Jacklin, 1974). Females have generally been found to be out performing males

in verbal skills, whereas males have been noted to be performing better on tasks involving spatial ability, or

mathematical ability. In one of the earlier studies, Maccoby and Jacklin (1974) reported that boys possessed

superior quantitative and spatial abilities; however they were out performed by girls in verbal abilities. This

evidence strengthens the stereotypically held views about gender differences in cognitive abilities. However the

later and more recent research, that casts doubts on the research suggesting cognitive and gender differences.

In this regard the meta analysis done by Hyde and associates (1990) has yielded significant findings based upon

sophisticated analysis of 100 studies. This analysis covered the testing of a total of 3, 175, 188 participants in all

(Gerow, 1997). The meta analysis showed that `on average' males and females are not much different in terms

of their mathematical performance. In elementary, and middle school females were slightly better than males in

computational skills. At high school, or college level males did slightly better than females in mathematical

problem solving; this was seen particularly in case of the tests of advanced mathematics. When all age groups

were considered, the differences were almost insignificant (Hyde, Fennema, and Lamon, 1990). Research shows

that the stereotypically perceived gender differences in mathematical performance are pretty insignificant, and

in fact moving towards a decline (Stumpf, 1995; Bellas, and Gafni, 1996; Benbow, Lubinski, and Hyde, 1997).

However no matter how small the gender differences in mathematical ability may be, they are generally skewed

in favor of males. There are no or very little differences at elementary level, but in case of teenagers the average

achievement of boys is higher than that of girls. Some research has shown that more boys than girls are gifted

in mathematics. Majority of high schoolers are usually boys, the boys-to-girls ratio being 4-to-1, as yielded by

one North American study (Benbow, and Lubinski, 1996). There are various explanations for this edge on part

of boys. A positive relationship between spatial ability and math achievement is thought to be one of the

contributing variables. It has been seen that males' scores in various measures of visual-spatial ability, beginning

from grade school years, are higher than those of females (Voyer, Voyer, and Bryden, 1995). Boys at around

ten years of age begin to show better spatial ability than girls. Spatial ability contributes to a good grasp of

geometry; therefore a better spatial ability contributes a better understanding of geometry, which in turn leads

to a great part of gender difference in math achievement (Johnson, and Mead, 1987). One plausible explanation

of this difference is the social learning explanation; math in most societies is not considered to be a girls' thing.

It is taken to be something dry and hard, therefore an apt choice for males. Research also suggests that

educational experiences of students can also be a possible cause of gender differences in average math

performance and ability. Some studies have shown a correlation between mathematical skills test scores, and

Gender Issues In Psychology (PSY - 512)

the number and type of math classes taken in high school (Kimball, 1989; Welch et al., 1982). As compared to

females, males get enrolled in more advanced math courses, which in turn can be one of the major causal

factors in gender differences in math.

Gender and Verbal Ability

Similar trends are found in terms of verbal ability, but in favor of the females. Females, in all age groups exhibit

better verbal ability and skills than males on average. Female children start speaking a little earlier than boys do;

in their school years, girls have better reading scores and high vocabularies (Halpern, 1997). Literature review

done by a number of researchers indicates that females have an advantage, over males, in performance over

verbal tasks. In terms of acquisition of language girls exhibit an advantage in their rapidity and proficiency in

comparison to boys. This trend is maintained all the way through elementary school years (Halpern, 1994,

1997, 2000; Maccoby, and Jacklin, 1974).

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