Do you think gender differences are partially innate?

I mean differences in

mannerisms (how femenine or masculine),

interests (people vs objects), communication styles (directness),

emotional sensitivity (empathy, likeliness to take offense),

approach to relationships (value of building long term relationship),

self-confidence,

Neuroticism (propensity to feel anxiety),

etc?

I don't mean "innate" like a boolean value, but more in a probabilistic manner. Like, if being born of a given sex would make you more likely to act or think in an specific manner regardless of your cultural background.

My point of view is that to a degree most of those differences are innate, though they may be attenuated or enhanced by culture.

I think that way because, after living in several continents with radically different cultures, gender differences in these aspects tend to be mostly the same.

Of course, a lot of people definitely disagree and consider that human behavior is fully decided by culture and environment. To an extent, that lately it has even become controversial to say that some behaviors are innate.

What do you think about it?

I have yet to meet a man or woman who didn't think there were clear differences between sexes. All of my female friends also admit that men are stronger than woman genetically. It has nothing to do with being sexist so much as it just appears to be a fact. Just like woman have better qualities that men do not posses, though I couldn't tell you what as this topic doesn't affect my day to day life, nor do I think upon it much. Of course that could change should something transpire in my lifetime to where I need to dwell upon it more.

I've seen transvestites, which our society calls transgender, who are clearly still very much male despite changing their appearances. I have been curious about how they behave in their day to day lives. I would love to study them more. But men don't know what it feels like to be a woman, nor do woman know what it feels like to be a man. A good case study is Dylan... something. A mockery to woman. But that's my thoughts.

@nirgal: I think there are some things that are innate (like determined by our biochemistry, hormones, etc depended on our sex), but everything you listed is in my opinion environmental/learned. It might be to such a historic and tradtional degree that it can seem innate, but I don't think it really is. Most of the time it is quite arbitrary, i.e. men have short hair and women have long hair.

With that said, there are roles to play in society, and those roles are different for men and women in many situations. However, these things change over time; it used to be that women would always stay at home, men would work; but these days it's become more and more common for women to be not just working professionals with serious careers, but the main breadwinner of the home.

Personally, I think it is great the more things change. Last thing I want is to find a partner and for her to think she can just sit at home and take care of things domestically. Sorry, woman, get out there and get your ass a job, I'm not paying for our plane tickets and vacations by myself!

Yeah, cynics tend to focus on the negative aspects of the differences between sexes and criticize them instead of focusing on the positive aspects of the differences and saying how we complement each other so well.

For example people will be like "Oh women are physically weaker than men, that's why they can't be combat soldiers" but there are other things they have that men don't like a higher pain tolerance, capacity to manage stress better, and (iirc) a "caretaker" mentality that helps unit cohesion.

I think saying we are all the same is just as bad as dwelling on the negatives of our differences; we should celebrate and embrace the differences.

Absolutely a true point right there. My friend is a tattoo artist and there was a poll asking tattoo artists (redundant) who had a higher pain tolerance, and the artists said without a doubt that it was woman, which makes sense as woman have the capacity to bear children. Is that the sole reason? Probably not, but a damn good one. XD

Your last paragraph was very well put. :) 100%

@mycatismilk: well I didn't mean physical difference, but differences in behavior, mentality and personality.

Regarding transexual people, I think that's a different topic. Though you seem to have a negative idea about them that I do not share.

In fact for me, transexuals impulses to change gender no matter what is proof that gender has a biological bases. since many transexuals have been seen to have brains similar to the opposite gender in some regards.

https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/is-there-something-unique-about-the-transgender-brain/#:~:text=Male%2Dto%2Dfemale%20subjects%20tended,of%20brain%2C%E2%80%9D%20Guillamon%20says.

@mrbojangles25: interesting. Which aspects do you think are innate?

Only physical differences?

Do you consider that no psychological or behavioral aspects are biology driven?

I don't know I have worked in east Asia, latin America and Europe, I have frequently travelled to Africa as well. In all territories I have been women and man seem to share the same differences regardless of cultural background.

I haven't seen a culture in which most men are feminine and most women are masculine.( I mean in mannerisms)

Where a noticeable amount of women are fascinated by machines or tools.

I haven't seen a society in which men are less promiscuos than women.

I haven't seen a society in which men value the height of their partner more than women or that women value the youth of their partner more than men.

I haven't seen a society in which men value long term relationship and children as much as women. Or that women value one night stands as much men do.

I haven't seen a society in which women are more likely to assume risks to earn money as much as men do .

I haven't seen a society in which women commit remotely as many crimes as men do .

I haven't seen a society in which male prostitution is more prevalent than females prostitution.

I think culture is highly exportable. Feminine values in Canadian culture can easily make their way to Egypt, and so on and so forth.

Women have generally been treated as an inferior sex everywhere, with some exceptions.

When your history is so often dictated not by who rules the fairest, but by who can conquer and kill the most, then men tend to write the rules, and this applies everywhere. There have been some mighty queens and female leaders in history, but as I said, not as many as men simply because of that capacity for violence that men have due to innate abilities.

With that said, if in a cultural vacuum, I think you'd find young girls as entertained by video games as young boys. I think if women were raised and told it was OK to be good at math, to compete with boys, we'd see a lot more women in tech.

As time goes on, we've seen sexual liberation of women. In pornography, they are celebrated and earn far more money and renown than men. Women are super freaky these days compared to how things used to be; I told my 80-year old dad some stories from college and he was disgusted and to me that was just normal horny young person shenanigans. I believe his words were "You'd think the women were as horny as the men!" and my response was "They are, dad. They're probably hornier".

Same with professional careers; they were raised to be homemakers traditionally, universally...now they are being told it's OK to pursue careers.

People are living longer, there is no need to have kids in your 20's any more, you can focus on a career. You can adopt. You can use in vitro or surrogates or any other manner to have children.

Women also commit a shitload of crimes, it's more how we as a society discipline women. Again we think they are weak and frail so we are less likely to send them to prison.

All anecdotal by the way, just having a fun debate for insight and perspective😀

To answer your question, yes, I think mostly the physical aspects are the only innate ones. Physical and chemical. With that said, those differences can make a huge difference with everyone, male or female. Smaller men might be more risk adverse than larger men in physical activities, for example.

@mrbojangles25: I think you are mostly referring to differences in status, while I am referring to differences in values, mindset and priorities.

And I don't agree with the idea of western influence being responsible for similarities in gendered behavior across cultures, otherwise people historically would have acted differently, but we still see much of the same behavior in history books.

The more the world opens, the more westernized it becomes.

No I am referring the values, mindset, and priorities.

As for Western influence, that was just an example; my point is these things are universal and people are placed into gender roles because of innate differences between sexes.

With that said...

This is how it goes.

Kpop and Jpop model themselves after American boy bands. Musicians lose their accents when singing in bands because they grew up listening to foreign musicians. Food and cuisine tends to become more "fusion" with Western technique fusing with non-Western ingredients. Women get out of the house and into work, just like "Rosie the Riveter" of the American 1940's.

It's cross-pollination, and it's beautiful. It's not a negative; in fact I think it's really great to see. Some of my favorite music is Nigerian/African blues rock, a wonderful melding of good ol' American blues and rock with the awesome stylings and tradition of African tribespeople.

Now, why is this important? In this part of the world, music hasn't always received a warm welcome, with various regimes and religious factions barring it entirely.

Coming back around to gender/sex, this was doubly true for women, who were forbidden from doing even more things (sports, music, education, etc). Now we are seeing a lot of women coming out and doing music, something only men could do.

Anyone of any status can do these things, they were just prevented from doing it because of values, mindset, and priorities.

I would ask how you came to that conclusion? I most certainly don't think they should "change sex," but I can't control them. I can also have compassion as I was also considering becoming "trans" growing up, but that wasn't until I was in my 17s and above. I chose not to go through with it because I found a greater love in Jesus. It doesn't mean I don't have that "desire" every now and again, but again, I choose not to because of the greater love I found. But I digress.

In regards to that article, though gender dysphoria is most certainly a thing, it lost credibility when it started off by saying that, "Some children insist, from the moment they can speak, that they are not the gender indicated by their biological sex." I don't know if you've been around children who can speak at a very young age, they will say many things they don't understand. Case in point, I tested my little nephew asking if he was a dinosaur and he said, as you'd expect from a child, yeah. "Are you the smartest kid known to man?" "Yeah." And when I see videos of LGBT families, which again I was apart of the LGBT group earlier in my life though I still have that "desire," it's horrendous to see them posting videos online and putting their own ideologies into the minds of their kids. I am most certainly with the group of "Gays against groomers." Let children be children, and when they're older and they still feel that way, allow them to make the choice on their own when they're legally able to.

And I apologize that I went off topic with this one, but I definitely wanted to address your post to me at the very least. :)

No.

Everything you listened is learned behavior and social conditioning. And it's killing men at an early age and continuing to limit the opportunities of women.

Aside from our entire body's being different and our brains, yeah there's more differences to male and female after that.

Yes, I believe there are innate differences in the genders, and reject this entire narrative being promulgated that men and women are exactly the same, everything is a social construct and nurtured, and, aside their primary and secondary characteristics, are completely interchangeable.

Rubbish.

While there are always exceptions to the rule and it operates in a massive grey area, the rule still tends. For one example, I find females to be generally more attuned, sensitive and intelligent emotionally than their male counterparts, and I believe this is due to their biological role as being the bearer and caretaker of offspring that many years of evolution has ingrained tendency into concordant to the biological role they inhabit. And unlike so many today, I also don’t view the differences, both physical, psychological or emotional between the sexes as some perverted form of denigration or belittlement to one or the other. Men and woman are different….on various levels…. and there is nothing offensive or intrinsically demeaning about that whatsoever.These are distinctions that are wonderful and should be valued, protected and treasured, not fought against.

But no, all must be absolutely equal, so let’s commence in making every attempt to obfuscate, muddle and destroy what makes us unique, while then attacking and proclaiming anyone who refuses to do so bigots and monsters, walking away, reveling in the stench of our own supposed moral superiority.

@nirgal: Absolutely. Of course there are outliers, but the average strength of men is higher. The average compassion of women is higher. The average women will get emotional when arguing faster than a man will. The average male will be more likely to resort to violence, etc.

@mrbojangles25

And I'm not sure where you get the idea that women have a higher pain tolerance than men. It's the exact opposite.

https://riversidepainphysicians.com/do-women-feel-more-pain-more-intensely-than-men/#:~:text=Studies%20have%20found%20that%20the,pain%20more%20intensely%20than%20men.

https://www.nccih.nih.gov/research/research-results/acute-pain-tolerance-is-more-consistent-over-time-in-women-than-men-according-to-new-research

https://www.psu.edu/news/research/story/probing-question-do-women-have-higher-pain-threshold-men/

That's nonsense.

Many people believe that women have a higher threshold for pain because they can endure childbirth. To some degree this may be true, because the female body is designed to release certain hormones that act as pain-blockers of sorts during the birthing process, so the mother’s perception of the pain may be diminished.

But overall, studies are finding overwhelming evidence that women do, in fact, experience more pain than men… even if only perceived.

https://riversidepainphysicians.com/do-women-feel-more-pain-more-intensely-than-men/

You're one of those who believe the human species popped into existence a couple of millennia ago?

Aside from the perpetual ideological back and forth from all sides, it's pretty obvious that there's differences on a biological level but it's also obvious that the social constructs do in fact play a role, and probably have played for millennia, into shaping both men and women. If you understand how artificial selection works you can see how maneable life is.

If you offer dolls and house keeping toys to child you will undoubtedly shape her differently than if you encourage her in other directions. Gender roles are as much of a construct as they are a reflection of the environmental needs of a species and won't stay frozen in time, they're maneable.

Yeah my sister has a very strict "no dolls, no pink stuff" in her house when it comes to her daughter (my brother in law is also fine with this as he is pretty traditional and doesn't want that stuff near his son haha). It's nice to see. They're not grooming her to be anything, but they're not anti-grooming her, either.

However at the risk of arguing against myself, it is funny to see how my niece gravitates towards more feminine stuff like dressing up as a princess and stuff like that. But I think that is more from seeing her friends at school do more traditionally "girlie" stuff than anything.

As you said, this stuff has occurred over millenia. I'm not one for believing in "inherited memories" but at the same time there's a lot of belief out there that some things are so ingrained in our culture and psyche and when our physical/biological differences sort of play towards these beliefs, it is hard to shake them.

I'm slowly introducing her to D&D and Star Wars. Next I might find some good metal albums for her to listen to. Gotta do my part as an uncle haha.

I will read those articles later (thank you for providing), but I'm curious if there is a difference between feeling pain and tolerating pain. It seems like the articles' wording was pretty well chosen in making that difference noticeable just from the title.

Women might feel more pain than men, but if they have an equal or near-equal capacity for tolerance, doesn't that mean they might actually tolerate pain better?

Just a thought. In either case, definitely something to think about. And again I wonder if their is really that much of a difference between male nerves and female nerves.

@mrbojangles25: My girlfriend was raised like that too, her parents tried not to push stuff on her and she ended up gravitating towards reading and sciences. She's now graduated both in computer sciences and astronomy and managed to build a career doing what she loves. She's very thankful for her parents role while growing up, and so am I.

It's not collective memories. If you look to other more conservative and orthodox cultures, if you're a woman you either adapt to the role or you might not even get to live to pass your genes. Or you might not even be allowed to pass your genes unless you accept the set rules. That's artificial selection, shaping future generations by limiting the genetic traits.

@mrbojangles25: regardless of it being innate or learnt, I don't see why there is a vision that having a mannerisms and behavior that correspond with society's expectations of your gender is bad.

It's like a girl liking pink will make her less competent as an adult? But femeninity is not incompetence and masculinity is not agression.

In fact, most women I know that are in positions of power are not any less femenine than average.

Yes, that's a myth. Women can play with dolls as children, that actually encourages creativity, and still be interested in what was once a perceived masculine field. It's also going off the deep end in the other direction to have a prohibition on traditionally feminine toys around a child. Toys don't make you choose your career. As long as you aren't shutting doors down, the interest can be grown. By restricting toys, you're shutting those doors. I don't agree with mrgojangles' sister at all.

To be clear, it's not so much that she shuts doors as just says other things are open. I made her sound a bit more close-minded than she is.

To rephrase it, she encourages her daughter to seek out other things instead of just saying "Oh she is a girl, therefore she will play with dolls" as many parents do sort of passivlely.

I agree going too hard in either direction is a bad move. That's how we end up with blue-haired 50-year olds that talk about their fur babies.

I think the misunderstanding we are having is that I don't disagree with you, I just think you have to walk a fine line between being your genuine self but also realizing that cultural expectations/stereotypes/etc play a role as well.

For example, if you're pretty and dress in pink and are female, people can think less of you professionally. Is this fair? No, of course not. But it's the way things are; people will think you are dumb, or got to where you are in your career because of your looks, or any other number of things.

I mean, we all saw Legally Blonde, right?

Using myself as an example, I generally don't like watching sports, but as a man I do feel pressured to do so. This gives me not a lot to talk about at work in my male-dominated field. People will be like "Hey did you watch the game last night?" and I'll be like "No but I rolled four natural 20's during D&D!" and, well....yeah.

The argument goes both ways; like I said, need to balance it out.

I don't think being feminine is a negative if that is your genuine self, I just think passively encouraging kids to fall into archetypes based solely on their sex is kind of lame. It's like if you went to get a toy for a little girl's birthday, I would understand not getting them a toy gun...but I also don't think you should get them a Barbie. Maybe get them a board game or LEGOs or something.

@mrbojangles25: I don't know. I don't mean you when I say this, but I think some people understand that gender income and political representation equality can only be achieved if gendered behavior is abandoned in all aspects.

This leads people to presume that traditionally male hobbies and interests are superior (like that they lead to greater economical success), but I don't think that's the case. Other than greater interest in tools/machines/technology, I don't think any of the other traditionally male interest lead to any advantage. Some can be quite self destructive (like interest in contact sports)

I also think that focus in income inequality is misplaced. Because it's simply a result of the time/energy cost of rising children (even in a perfectly equal society you still need to be woman to get pregnant and breast feed) and it doesn't affect Childless women at all, and doesn't impact the total Wealth of married/partnered women (because that's is shared wealth)

So instead of seeing it as social problem, it could be simply be seen as an economical problem and focus on helping me the real victims of it: single mothers.

@mrbojangles25:

Using myself as an example, I generally don't like watching sports, but as a man I do feel pressured to do so. This gives me not a lot to talk about at work in my male-dominated field. People will be like "Hey did you watch the game last night?" and I'll be like "No but I rolled four natural 20's during D&D!" and, well....yeah.

See I've never understood the glorification of someone who can kick/hit/throw a ball better than the average person either. Half the time when I meet up with very stereotypically "masculine" men, I'm like "so gents, did you see the major sporting event that happened last night?" 🤣