Traditionally it has been recognized that the differences between men and women can be so great that it seems as if they both speak their own language. Men and women perceive the same world in very different ways. Men are often concerned with obtaining results, achieving goals, status and power, while women are more often focused on communication, cooperation, love and mutual relationships. This overview makes these fundamental differences clear.
Unbridgeable?
Sometimes the differences seem irreconcilable. The well-known ‘complaining’ of a woman is interpreted by the man as whining, while for the woman it means that she trusts the man. Staring at replays of football highlights on the television is yet another thing that women cannot possibly understand. Women have the ability to listen between the lines, men do not. A man knows all the jokes his friend told him, but he doesn’t know that that same friend has gotten rid of his wife. If a woman wants to punish a man, she doesn’t say anything to him, but for the man this means a reward.
Characterizations
Much has been said about male behavior: Men hide their emotions, hate it when they make a mistake, offer good advice and solutions, hang around other men and don’t want to talk when they are stressed. They work hard, are aggressive, love boy toys, zap all evening, have elephant skin, like to use boasts, can separate love and sex, leave the toilet seat up, never ask anyone for directions, are addicted to sports , exhibit cocky behavior and cannot say ‘I love you’.
There is a similar list about women: Women think out loud, have a sixth sense, are sensitive to touch, have crying fits, always buy shoes and love to talk about problems . Women use indirect language, forget nothing, expose liars, believe in eternal romance, want constant attention, seem to be constantly emotionally unfulfilled and have eyes in their backs.
Understanding versus solutions
The brain of women is partly different from that of men. In women, emotions are processed in the same area as language and that is why it takes no effort for a woman to talk about feelings. In men, the parts of the brain involved in language and the parts that determine emotion are not connected. Ask a man how he feels and he won’t know what to do with that question. However, ask a man what he thinks and you will get an answer. Women can talk at length about emotional matters, something that men often do not understand. Men will not talk about a problem for a long time, but will immediately take action to do something about it. This is because they think solution-oriented while women talk to strengthen a bond. Men immediately see raising a problem as something that needs to be resolved as quickly as possible. Women usually do not even ask for solutions but for recognition, empathy, attention and understanding. A listening ear. Men have trouble understanding this.
About women who whine
Men can only do one thing at a time because their brains are specialized in performing only one task. If you ask a man something while he is doing something that is, for example, just routine, he will say that he is busy right now and can’t talk. Often a man does not actually hear what is being said because his brain forces him to concentrate on that one task. This then comes across to a woman as if he is not listening. Conversely, a woman will be seen as a nag if she continues to seek his attention while his brain is doing something else. A woman can usually do several things at the same time, especially talking and acting at the same time.
Map reading
It is a well-known phenomenon that women generally cannot read maps. Men are surprised that women have little or no sense of direction and cannot possibly ‘translate’ a road map into signposts and vice versa. The man sees a map as a reduced version of reality while a woman finds a map difficult because there are no landmarks to be found on it. Detours and road breaks are very disorienting for a woman, but a man only sees them as a nuisance. Women tend to read a map literally, men can even handle a map without legible text.
Parking
Women have great difficulty parking and men do not. A sense of space and distance is much less well developed in women than in men, and women are also less able to focus properly because their field of view is wider, but filled with details. This causes a woman to notice a blonde hair on her husband’s jacket but cause a car to crash into the back wall of the garage while driving. Spatial awareness is the ability to estimate distances, speeds and angles in a three-dimensional field. And this is exactly what parking is all about. Ask a woman to reverse park a car and she will either take a very long time or give up. A man effortlessly turns a car into a tight parking space, within a few seconds.
The feminine exaggeration
Men and women exaggerate, but the difference is that men exaggerate about facts and data and women exaggerate about emotions and feelings. Some men tend to exaggerate the importance of their work, their salary or the speed of a car. Even the number of women he has dated is not a reliable number for him. Women exaggerate in this way: ,I’ve told you a thousand times not to leave your socks on the floor,, ,When I suddenly met him I thought I was dying,, ,Don’t think I’ll ever be with you again., talk,, ,Why are you always so nasty to me,. Men rebel against this because they have difficulty understanding emotion and take such sentences literally. They come up with counter-reactions to defend themselves, but the reason for the ‘always’ and ‘never’ statements usually escapes them completely.
Visual stimuli
Men are aroused by visual stimuli while a woman is more likely to be aroused by what a man says to her. The many men who show explicit images in webcam chat rooms further prove this attention to the visual. However, many men do not understand that in most cases these expressions do not affect a woman. The great interest of men in porn says it all: The vast majority of these sites are aimed at men. It is common knowledge that men are moved by the sight of a naked woman, but conversely, women all too often burst out laughing at the sight of a naked man. Sometimes you see a woman in a cam room who challenges the cheering crowd of men with racy images and makes them think that she is very ‘in the mood’. This is an example of men’s imaginations being run wild by the visual. The man forgets on the spot what such a woman’s personality is like. Women generally do not understand this extraordinary interest in stimulating images.
Fear of permanent relationships
Many men have a fear of commitment, something that women hardly experience. Men are usually very reluctant to enter into permanent relationships because they do not want to get the idea that they will miss the boat by giving up a wild or otherwise bachelor life. Furthermore, for many men it is not ‘cool’ to get married. However, some women still believe in the prince on a white horse and are therefore more likely to want to get married than a man. The idea of getting married often comes from the woman, the man beats around the bush until he feels he has to change his mind. Many men walk away when a relationship seems to be getting too serious, followed by repeated relationships that never lead to marriage. The infamous ‘bachelor’ is much more likely to be a man than a woman.
Body position
In terms of posture, men take up more space in the presence of others than women. They almost always sit with their legs apart or with their legs extended. Women always keep their knees together, regardless of whether they are wearing a skirt or pants. Women also have the habit of crossing one leg over the other or crossing one foot behind their calf. Men, on the other hand, often put one foot on their knee. Sitting back with your hands behind your neck is also typically masculine.
Help is weakness
Men rarely ask for help. A man sees that as a defeat and as a weakness and he will not even ask his best friends to help him. Men often have the idea that they have to perform, that they have to prove themselves and that they have to be able to handle everything. Women see asking for help as something social and have no problem with it. If a man really can’t figure it out, he will never admit it. Instead, he withdraws for a long time until he finds the ‘solution’ himself. Women often do not understand this and this behavior is seen as exclusion. A man goes to great lengths to find his way out of a problem. A man rarely appreciates receiving unsolicited good advice and asking for help himself proves to him that he has failed.
To cry
Everyone knows that men cry much less than women. From his earliest childhood, a man has learned that crying is synonymous with weakness. This can also be explained from the point of view of evolution. A weak man would encourage other men to attack him. So he runs a risk with it and will certainly not do it in public. Women not only cry when they are sad, they can also use it as emotional blackmail: ,Look what you did to me ., Men don’t know what to do with this and usually walk away when a woman cries. Women are comforted by other women who see crying as a sign of trust.
Why men hate shopping
Women love unstructured shopping. Trying on clothes extensively without buying anything is something a man simply cannot understand. His brain structure is based on the fact that he can only shop with a specific goal and even a specific timetable. Give a man clear guidelines when shopping and he will become enthusiastic. Just going in and out of the store doesn’t work for men. While women relax from shopping, men become frustrated. A man is traditionally a hunter and wants to take his prey home. If the hunt takes far too long, the hunter becomes very stressed. Many men let their wives do the dressing so they can skip the whole shopping ritual.
Even more differences
- Men think globally and see a situation as a whole, women rely on nuances and details.
- Men build and tear down, women do neither.
- Women sometimes touch each other in conversations, in this case a man rarely touches another man.
- Men are independent in their thoughts and actions, women are more likely to follow other people’s ideas.
- Men find satisfaction in career and possessions, women find it more in relationships, family and children.
- Women often tolerate pain better than men and are better able to do truly monotonous work.
- Men are more likely to take risks and experiment, women have much less of that need.
- Women mature faster than men and this explains why college romances rarely work out.
- Men look in the mirror about once a day, but women look in anything that has a shiny surface.
- Women fantasize about romance and love, men about fast cars, even better computers, boats and motorcycles.
- Women work with lists when shopping, a man buys everything he likes the way it looks.
“A man falls in love through his eyes, a woman through her ears.” ~ Woodrow Wyatt
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