WEBVTT 00:00:01.040 --> 00:00:09.540 Well, this evening, our our topic is on men and women, their differences, and, their complementarity. 00:00:10.880 --> 00:00:17.075 And of course, this is a very controversial hot topic in many ways in our society today. 00:00:18.655 --> 00:00:25.715 So with some trepidation, I, I approach it and will present it. 00:00:26.460 --> 00:00:35.280 There's an old saying, at least we knew it in our department at NYU, that where angels fear to tread, psychologists rush in. 00:00:37.820 --> 00:00:39.440 And so I'm doing that. 00:00:45.315 --> 00:00:52.695 And I want to make a few, preliminary remarks before we get to our actual topic. 00:00:53.640 --> 00:00:59.180 First, I want I want to say there are only three possible models of men and women and their differences. 00:01:00.920 --> 00:01:04.140 One model is that there are no important differences. 00:01:05.240 --> 00:01:12.295 There, you know, maybe men more likely have a beard and there are other trivial differences, let's say. 00:01:12.435 --> 00:01:16.055 But the no difference model is one model that's possible. 00:01:17.555 --> 00:01:21.735 The other model is that there are differences and one sex is superior. 00:01:23.720 --> 00:01:27.900 Historically, that might have been, and as it was more commonly, the macho model. 00:01:29.240 --> 00:01:34.540 Recently, there's something, sort of the opposite of it, which I call the FEMO model. 00:01:36.920 --> 00:01:43.715 But in either case, you can have differences with one, with one sex being superior. 00:01:44.815 --> 00:01:57.680 And the third model is that there are, differences, but they are, men and women are of equal, dignity and moral significance. 00:01:58.780 --> 00:02:07.200 And indeed, and here I want to emphasize, indeed not only are there differences, but the differences in so many cases are complementary. 00:02:08.355 --> 00:02:14.615 And by complementary, I mean that when they work best, they create a synergy. 00:02:17.555 --> 00:02:24.830 A synergy that makes for something more than either men or women by themselves could provide. 00:02:27.770 --> 00:02:39.525 An analogy might be if a man had 10 units of goodness and a woman had 10 units of goodness, by themselves, they each give you a total of 20 units of goodness. 00:02:40.225 --> 00:02:45.445 But if you put them together in a synergetic way, they produce they multiply. 00:02:45.585 --> 00:02:48.565 They give you a 100 units of goodness. 00:02:49.025 --> 00:02:52.690 And of course, they might literally multiply, right? 00:02:54.990 --> 00:03:07.205 The commonest expression of synergy being, the presence of children, which is a, and it's the result of a complimentary, relationship. 00:03:10.945 --> 00:03:19.205 The problem with the first model of there being no significant differences is it flies in the face of an enormous amount of reality. 00:03:20.130 --> 00:03:41.995 And, it's not only the tradition of, of differences, every culture that the, that, anthropologists have ever looked at had a binary distinction between men and women, and there were reliable differences that were found in all cultures between men and women in terms of what they were doing in the culture, their activities. 00:03:45.540 --> 00:03:51.220 So, it's not only that there's this historical notion of men and women as being different. 00:03:51.220 --> 00:03:56.360 It's not only that, of course, in our faith, we have a significant understanding of it from Genesis. 00:03:56.900 --> 00:03:59.560 God created us male and female. 00:04:01.105 --> 00:04:16.005 But in the last, twenty or thirty years, there's particularly the last fifteen or so years, there's been an enormous growth in the, research on men and women and their differences in psychology and in neuroscience. 00:04:17.210 --> 00:04:19.790 And there are now all kinds of books. 00:04:20.090 --> 00:04:34.065 I counted, at least 12 major books that have come out, in the last twenty years on the, scientific evidence for reliable differences between men and women. 00:04:34.845 --> 00:04:41.985 So the no difference model just it's running on empty in the presence of in our present culture. 00:04:43.020 --> 00:04:46.000 And the difference is, but one is superior. 00:04:46.620 --> 00:04:50.080 Well, we've had an awful lot of the war between the sexes. 00:04:50.780 --> 00:04:56.860 It probably began with Adam and Eve, but anyway, and it will never be completely gone. 00:04:56.860 --> 00:04:57.920 No, no doubt. 00:05:00.065 --> 00:05:04.245 But it, it's a model that means perpetual conflict. 00:05:04.705 --> 00:05:08.325 It's a model that means always a kind of war. 00:05:09.745 --> 00:05:12.645 So, one rejects the truth. 00:05:13.490 --> 00:05:17.990 The other one gives us ongoing warfare and conflict. 00:05:19.490 --> 00:05:20.690 So, hey, come on. 00:05:20.690 --> 00:05:22.070 Neither one is satisfactory. 00:05:23.250 --> 00:05:32.495 And we have available now a very satisfactory model and that's the model of complementarity. 00:05:32.875 --> 00:05:49.250 And, what's interesting to me is that this model is primarily developed within the context of, Christian scripture and primarily, I believe, to the best of my knowledge, mostly by Catholic theologians. 00:05:50.750 --> 00:05:59.365 And, it comes out of basically being based in the first, two, three chapters of Genesis. 00:06:00.385 --> 00:06:13.300 And the people who've made major contributions to it are, of course, John Paul the second with his theology of the body, but two women have also, Catholic women, have also made major contributions. 00:06:13.520 --> 00:06:33.035 One is Saint Edith Stein, whose writings about women, before she was eventually martyred, of course, she was a very fine philosopher, were influential, in terms of their impact on John Paul the second, who was quite interested in her writings. 00:06:33.415 --> 00:06:39.275 And another woman, I I think you should know about is Sister Mary Prudence Allen. 00:06:41.820 --> 00:06:53.345 Many of you may not know her, but she's now an elderly nun, with the from she's in the order of what we call the Alma Michigan sisters, if you know who they are. 00:06:53.345 --> 00:07:09.780 Anyway, she's a very, distinguished, philosopher, theologian, has written three books, published three books on the history of the concept of woman in, I think primarily in the West, but starting in the ancient world. 00:07:10.800 --> 00:07:26.515 Very scholarly woman, and she's part of the, Vatican's Theological, committee or I I forget all those technical names, but, that's where she is at present and is more or less retired otherwise. 00:07:28.095 --> 00:07:59.255 The reason I bring her up is that, well, first, we we will be talking about this complementary model, and it's not just that we have important differences and we have equal dignity, that men and women, but if you look at the front page at the bottom, you should put complementarity also right after equal dignity, which is another way of saying we are synergistic at our best, men and women, when we're working together. 00:08:00.515 --> 00:08:06.640 And this model, does require something from people. 00:08:06.640 --> 00:08:17.780 It does require thought and reflection that you begin to see this and understand it in your own life and in the, in the cultures that you're dealing with. 00:08:20.215 --> 00:08:35.280 But the result of it is that men and women can each be, if you will, happy and joyful for the qualities that the other sex has, which is, you know, that's what we would want. 00:08:35.280 --> 00:08:35.780 Right? 00:08:36.480 --> 00:08:51.555 And, I can't imagine that in our faith that, that our lady and Joseph didn't see this in a positive way, that certainly the relationship between Mary and Jesus would have been, a complimentary one. 00:08:51.555 --> 00:09:00.935 There are many great saints, male and female saints in the church, some of whom were actually sort of paired in a complimentary way. 00:09:02.200 --> 00:09:03.820 Like, what was it? 00:09:04.200 --> 00:09:08.280 Francis of Assisi and, who is it? 00:09:08.280 --> 00:09:08.780 Clare. 00:09:08.920 --> 00:09:12.760 Clare, Saint Clare, and the look, the, and her order. 00:09:12.760 --> 00:09:13.260 Alright? 00:09:15.315 --> 00:09:15.635 Alright. 00:09:15.635 --> 00:09:21.735 So that's one thing, I want to preface my remarks about to begin with. 00:09:23.395 --> 00:09:27.655 Second, when I'm talking about differences here, please remember it's always averages. 00:09:30.670 --> 00:09:37.890 Just like height and weight, men are taller and heavier than women, but there's, there's a lot of overlap. 00:09:38.510 --> 00:09:41.490 There might be a whole standard deviation of overlap. 00:09:42.785 --> 00:09:50.325 So that means that always we're talking about a population difference, not that there aren't many, exceptions. 00:09:54.385 --> 00:09:57.125 There are there are tall women and short men. 00:09:57.970 --> 00:10:01.910 Although, even that tends to be based somewhat on ethnic groups. 00:10:03.250 --> 00:10:05.670 The Swede Swedish women are pretty tall. 00:10:06.290 --> 00:10:07.910 The Swedish men are taller. 00:10:07.970 --> 00:10:16.005 And, Filipino men are not too tall compared to Swedish women, but they're usually taller than Filipino women. 00:10:16.465 --> 00:10:19.205 But in in any case, we know about the overlap. 00:10:19.345 --> 00:10:19.845 Okay? 00:10:20.465 --> 00:10:41.820 And I think it's time that we begin in our culture to we've been overly concerned with small minorities and not enough concerned with the support for the majority and the typical, and the result has been that because of our emphasis always on the exceptions, many of the ordinary people are feeling confused about things. 00:10:42.825 --> 00:10:55.085 So it's time to recover sort of the, the average, if you will, characteristics of people and in this case of, of, the men and women. 00:10:58.580 --> 00:11:06.200 One other thing, besides the literature, I've had some practical experience. 00:11:09.300 --> 00:11:18.535 My wife has often, shall we say, shown certain corrective tendencies to me. 00:11:19.315 --> 00:11:24.055 She's a professor also, by the way, a professor of French literature, but anyway. 00:11:24.230 --> 00:11:31.290 And she's now up at NYU still and and so she goes up there commutes and she's up there today, so she's not here tonight. 00:11:32.950 --> 00:11:33.930 Just as well. 00:11:37.595 --> 00:11:48.735 And I have six children and three of those are daughters, three are sons, and I have a lot of grandchildren and, actually, more than half of those are granddaughters. 00:11:48.955 --> 00:11:56.290 So, it isn't as though I've lived in some sort of, male man cave by myself. 00:11:58.910 --> 00:12:01.250 That doesn't mean I might not have missed something. 00:12:02.270 --> 00:12:06.450 So, I'm fair game. 00:12:11.025 --> 00:12:13.445 So, we're talking about differences on average. 00:12:14.705 --> 00:12:35.900 And the way to begin the differences, I believe, is to look at infants and young children, because there you can see if there are differences, things that are really pretty removed from, culture or whatever learning experiences you might say, could have affected things. 00:12:36.355 --> 00:12:44.135 And they know, from the beginning that little boys are different from little girls in significant ways. 00:12:46.515 --> 00:12:53.050 For example, little girls respond to the face, particularly the mother's face, sooner. 00:12:53.750 --> 00:12:57.930 They smile sooner and attend to the the mother's face more. 00:12:59.270 --> 00:13:24.930 Little boys respond later, don't smile quite as much or attend as much, and they they've already seen with little boys, that if they if you show them videos of cars and trucks and show them moving objects that make noise, they attend more to them than, than little girls when they're paired with looking at a face. 00:13:29.330 --> 00:13:46.650 So already, there's a difference between, the, the greater interpersonal interest and involvement of girls, as compared to the involvement in sort of external world of objects, with boys. 00:13:47.510 --> 00:14:00.810 There have been many studies that have shown starting, I think about age one or two and going up through five, six or seven, that girls are more empathic than boys. 00:14:02.765 --> 00:14:14.545 One study that showed this was, they, they had a tape recording of the crying of a baby. 00:14:17.810 --> 00:14:23.510 And the baby was different from either of the two, from the boy, the baby boy and the baby girl in the experiment. 00:14:24.770 --> 00:14:39.975 And how long did they, both of them would show a disturbance at hearing the the strange baby crying, but the boy, stopped being disturbed sooner, significantly sooner than the girl. 00:14:39.975 --> 00:14:48.290 The girl was more empathic and was continued to remain concerned with the cry of, of this, diff strange baby. 00:14:49.790 --> 00:14:52.850 So, the empathy shows up very early. 00:14:53.390 --> 00:15:10.815 Boys also will look at, physical moving objects more I've mentioned, but things like, not just trucks and movies of cars, but, rotating physical objects they'll appear to look at longer, than girls. 00:15:13.170 --> 00:15:46.330 But here are some of the other, and a lot of this is related to the, effects of testosterone on boys, testosterone on boys, and estrogen on girls, and they even find that with, girls who have higher testosterone than ordinary girls, they show, more risk taking behavior than the average girl, and, they show better spatial relations than the average girl. 00:15:47.270 --> 00:16:12.270 And, so these effects seem to be capable of, you know, being artificially or accidentally, precipitated to some degree by, character by environment in which these two basic hormones are are to some extent exchanged in terms of where they're normally found. 00:16:15.770 --> 00:16:31.445 Girl, twin girl a girl who's a twin with a boy will tend to show because of the biochemical environment male hormones, will show higher on a number of typically male activities, and vice versa. 00:16:31.465 --> 00:16:46.400 There's a particular kind of of of of, genetic anomaly more common in that is a female genetic account, issue, anomaly. 00:16:46.400 --> 00:16:58.235 But when it happens with a male child, they tend to show, more female characteristics in their, you know, they show less spatial issue and more involvement and more empathy. 00:17:01.175 --> 00:17:02.635 Here are some of the other things. 00:17:05.735 --> 00:17:11.115 I have that a table out there on differences that it summarizes some of it. 00:17:13.080 --> 00:17:20.300 The male brain is more lateralized even in as a a boy, and the female brain is less lateralized. 00:17:21.160 --> 00:17:43.800 Well, as you know, we have two hemispheres, a left and right hemisphere, and what it means is that the male brain is more found is more active in one hemisphere or the other, and the female brain is, less lateralized, which means it moves back and forth across both hemispheres, more easily. 00:17:44.020 --> 00:17:46.740 And that's where a lot of the and we'll look at this later. 00:17:46.740 --> 00:17:51.160 That's a very interesting finding because it shows up clearly in adults. 00:17:52.485 --> 00:17:59.705 The boy's brain mass is about 10% larger than the girl's, that's true all throughout life for men and women. 00:18:01.765 --> 00:18:14.320 The the two hemispheres are connected by a cable, if you will, called the corpus callosum, And that allows moving back and forth between the two, hemispheres. 00:18:15.500 --> 00:18:22.895 The corpus callosum for girls and women is larger than for boys and for men. 00:18:23.195 --> 00:18:30.495 So that also means that moving back and forth between the two hemispheres is easier, for, females. 00:18:40.040 --> 00:18:43.740 The boy gazes at the mother half as long as the girl does. 00:18:44.360 --> 00:18:49.260 The boy's motor activity and their physical activity even in the womb is more active. 00:18:51.145 --> 00:18:59.325 At four months of age, the boy cannot distinguish faces of known people in a photo, but at four months of age, a girl can. 00:19:02.105 --> 00:19:09.030 Speaks words later than girls, Girls develop their vocabulary earlier. 00:19:11.410 --> 00:19:35.260 Boys seem to be less able to multitask, and girls, better able to multitask, and that seems to be related also in women Boys are better at general math and three d reasoning, girls read earlier, Boys are more able to separate emotion from reason. 00:19:36.360 --> 00:19:37.980 Girls have better verbal ability. 00:19:38.760 --> 00:19:42.860 Boys are more likely to ignore voices, even their parents. 00:19:45.655 --> 00:19:51.515 Girls are less likely to ignore someone's voice, parents or somebody that they knew. 00:19:55.895 --> 00:20:15.430 And these differences go on up into later life for boys and girls, and that's we're now talking about them not as young, but, let's talk about high school. 00:20:17.945 --> 00:20:22.685 Boys are more likely in high school to be involved in criminal behavior than girls. 00:20:23.305 --> 00:20:30.445 Very much more commonly involved in an active criminal, you know, juvenile delinquents type of thing. 00:20:31.260 --> 00:20:33.600 Girls, however, are more likely to be depressed. 00:20:33.820 --> 00:20:35.920 We're talking about in high school and adolescence. 00:20:36.140 --> 00:20:40.000 Girls are more depressed, boys are more criminally based. 00:20:40.700 --> 00:21:11.750 There's a certain general tendency, I don't know how strong it is or how widespread, but it's as though, men's pathologies are more expressed in the external world, often in antisocial behavior, and girls' boys' pathologies more expressed internally in, in sense of depression, and, maybe a certain kinds of obsession, etcetera. 00:21:14.515 --> 00:21:18.855 It's as though boys wanna punish other people, and girls wanna punish themselves. 00:21:19.795 --> 00:21:37.380 I don't say it's that's overstating it, I'm sure, but, and by the way, one of the ways in which differences, we've just got to cope with differences for forgetting all of this research, one of the ways you're gonna run into it on a daily basis is in the DSM. 00:21:38.880 --> 00:21:49.835 The DSM is filled with, you know, categories of mental pathology, and almost half of them are more common with men or more common with women. 00:21:50.375 --> 00:22:03.470 And they even argue in many of them that, for example, schizophrenia is about equal in men and women, that nevertheless, the way in which the mental pathology expresses itself is different. 00:22:03.930 --> 00:22:29.360 And so they have the the APA, American Psychological Association, has developed a, a special program for female psychology, particularly as it deals with, mental pathology because it looked like male models were sort of the initial first models of mental, disturbance, and they wanted to make clear that they were there were differences. 00:22:29.360 --> 00:22:37.700 And I think most of us know that autism is more common in boys and, anorexia more common in girls. 00:22:38.765 --> 00:22:51.760 And so the mental pathology world is also split on, which is more common for one's maybe more common for women and one more common for men. 00:22:51.900 --> 00:22:55.440 Even when when it's the same illness, they may express it differently. 00:22:55.500 --> 00:23:09.015 So, the notion of differences between men and women is embedded in the APA DSM and has been pioneered in many respects by, female psychologists and psychiatrists. 00:23:13.155 --> 00:23:13.655 Okay. 00:23:18.995 --> 00:23:34.970 One of the, interesting authors summarizing differences between men and women is a, she's a, an, an, an MD, sort of psychiatrist, sort of, neurologically oriented. 00:23:35.030 --> 00:23:36.410 Her name is Lou Anne Brizantine. 00:23:37.415 --> 00:23:41.595 She's published a book called The Female Brain and another one called The Male Brain. 00:23:42.535 --> 00:23:47.755 And here's her description of the teenage, female brain. 00:23:51.210 --> 00:24:04.510 So, some of you can only remember it, others of you may be with children experiencing it in your household, but here's her description of the, alright. 00:24:08.305 --> 00:24:20.720 The girl at puberty, her pituitary gland has sprung into life as the chemical breaks are taken off her pulsating hypothalamic thalamic cells. 00:24:21.180 --> 00:24:27.840 This cellular release sparks the hypothalamic pituitary ovarian system into action. 00:24:28.380 --> 00:24:35.325 It is the first time since infantile puberty that the girl's brain cell will be marinated in high levels of estrogen. 00:24:36.105 --> 00:24:47.725 In fact, it is the first time that her brain will experience estrogen progesterone surges that come repeatedly in monthly waves from her ovaries. 00:24:48.450 --> 00:24:57.890 The rising tide of estrogen, starts to fuel many circuits in the teen girl's brain that were laid down in fetal life. 00:24:57.890 --> 00:25:10.765 These new hormonal surges assure that all of her female specific brain circuits will become more sensitive to emotional nuance, such as approval and disapproval, acceptance and rejection. 00:25:13.650 --> 00:25:21.590 Girls begin at this age to react more to relationship stresses than boys who react to challenges to their authority. 00:25:22.610 --> 00:25:28.870 The girls' brain circuits are arranged and fueled by estrogen to respond to stress and to nurture activities. 00:25:30.065 --> 00:25:35.765 Connecting through talking activates the pleasure centers in a girl's brain. 00:25:36.225 --> 00:25:42.725 Sharing secrets that have romantic and erotic implications activates those centers even more. 00:25:45.810 --> 00:25:47.510 Brissendine comments further. 00:25:47.570 --> 00:25:55.590 At mid cycle, during peak estrogen production, the girl's dopamine and oxytocin level is likely at its highest also. 00:25:55.970 --> 00:26:02.005 Not only her verbal output is at its maximum, but her urge for intimacy is also peaking. 00:26:02.705 --> 00:26:11.445 Intimacy releases more oxytocin, which reinforces the desire to connect, and the connecting then brings a sense of pleasure and well-being. 00:26:15.830 --> 00:26:25.850 Now, of course, this difference is even more highlighted when a baby arrives because that's when a lot of oxytocin, the bonding chemical, gets released. 00:26:26.310 --> 00:26:36.795 And this, I was always amazed as a father at how much time my wife would spend with our children when they were young. 00:26:37.815 --> 00:26:39.675 Babies are really time consuming. 00:26:41.160 --> 00:26:42.460 Nothing new about that. 00:26:42.760 --> 00:26:45.500 They're time consuming, and what was the reward? 00:26:49.320 --> 00:27:00.795 The baby didn't give you money, the baby didn't feed you, The baby didn't even normally say things like, oh, you're just wonderful mother. 00:27:02.375 --> 00:27:03.595 What was the reward? 00:27:04.695 --> 00:27:07.595 Well, they're so cute and so cuddly and they smile. 00:27:08.870 --> 00:27:09.770 That's a reward? 00:27:10.870 --> 00:27:11.370 Yes. 00:27:11.510 --> 00:27:19.050 Because it triggers a lot of this oxytocin and other, other chemicals. 00:27:19.750 --> 00:27:28.975 And it has to do with, women's very much greater involvement in relationship and in intimacy as important. 00:27:40.010 --> 00:27:42.830 Now, let's get to some, some of the others. 00:27:47.505 --> 00:27:56.645 To summarize it, for women, I would say women seek companionship and intimacy, their lovers, their children, their friends are central to their sense of well-being. 00:27:57.745 --> 00:28:03.990 It is then not surprising that women find social exclusion more painful than men. 00:28:04.610 --> 00:28:05.830 Studies have shown that. 00:28:05.970 --> 00:28:26.695 Men find, not social exclusion not so painful, but they find anything, buddy, anything that disses them as having any significance, any power or meaning or anything that, that's one of the greatest, insults that a man can get. 00:28:27.795 --> 00:28:35.680 A woman's greatest insult is to be rejected and excluded from people or a person she really wants to be connected to. 00:28:39.660 --> 00:28:46.665 Men in prisons are almost always there because somebody dissed them and they they struck back. 00:28:46.665 --> 00:28:56.265 And it was clear that what starting with boys, if the if compared to girls, if girls have disputes, they try to talk them out and work them out. 00:28:56.265 --> 00:29:03.620 Boys will engage in physical violence to settle it, in quotes, much more often, so not surprising. 00:29:09.280 --> 00:29:09.680 Okay. 00:29:09.680 --> 00:29:25.065 You can now turn to, in the outline to the fact that men's and women's, these are adult brains, are different in terms of how the typical internal pattern takes place. 00:29:26.885 --> 00:29:28.185 It's in your handout. 00:29:29.640 --> 00:29:35.020 And these studies of brain activity were done on large numbers of normal men and normal women. 00:29:36.200 --> 00:29:47.875 And they found that for men, the brain activity was commonly more in one hemisphere than the other and that it was front to back. 00:29:50.975 --> 00:29:59.920 And, and for women, it was commonly across in both hemispheres going back and forth across the corpus callosum. 00:30:03.660 --> 00:30:05.680 And that means they're being connected. 00:30:06.380 --> 00:30:10.000 One of the things about the corpus callosum is it connects to the amygdala and other areas and amount it means that women are more connected to emotions. 00:30:11.195 --> 00:30:14.495 Areas and amount and means that women are more connected to emotions. 00:30:15.275 --> 00:30:35.450 That means they're more emotional, and so most of us would on on average, of course, and men, because of their distancing in the other parts of the cortex and the smaller corpus callosum to connect, are more able to separate reason from emotion. 00:30:36.895 --> 00:30:40.515 But women are very much more emotional and they're much more empathic. 00:30:40.895 --> 00:30:46.995 But, of course, sometimes their emotion makes them cry when they they're really angry that they do that. 00:30:47.615 --> 00:30:55.160 You know, you're in talking to the chairman of the department and all of a sudden you start to cry. 00:30:55.620 --> 00:31:00.600 You know, you you don't want that to happen, but it does because they're more emotional. 00:31:00.820 --> 00:31:01.320 Period. 00:31:01.805 --> 00:31:16.830 And men can, it's easier for men to avoid emotionality, probably even because of the brain structures, because one of the things about moving from, across laterally is, now this this is a Vitzian hypothesis now. 00:31:18.970 --> 00:31:38.035 I think that's related, other people have suggested this too, women can multitask and what more easily than men, and that's because men seem to get involved that not only do they spend their time maybe in one half of the brain, one cortex, but they their men's brains seem to be more modular. 00:31:38.175 --> 00:32:19.750 They have areas of local focus that a whole task is oriented to, and to get out of that, to they get really deeply involved in something very, specifically, and they don't multitask and they find that I'm convinced that that crabby old men, I know one, that one of the reason they're that way is it's a longer neurological distance to travel when you're interrupted, particularly when you're interrupted by something that has nothing to do with what you're focused on, which means it's a child. 00:32:22.815 --> 00:32:39.890 You know, you're focused on solving this problem that you're working on in the shop, or you're focused on how to putt, you know, or you're focused on a problem, you're reading something, you know, and then there comes this interruption. 00:32:40.830 --> 00:33:05.820 But so that if you can move back and forth across the corpus callosum, which I think many women can do, I'm always amazed that when I ask, she's not here, so she won't be embarrassed, but there's a wonderful secretary we have on the 5th Floor, and I have all kinds of things where I I I I'm not high-tech enough to know what to do with this thing on the email or what have you. 00:33:05.960 --> 00:33:25.835 And I go over and ask her for help, and she always knows what the almost every time she knows how to fix it, but she's, yes, I'll be right, you know, she's right away, I've inter she's sitting there listening to something on earphones and typing away, but my interruption doesn't bother her, which is amazing. 00:33:28.775 --> 00:33:43.250 But, so you could test this hypothesis by seeing whether the neural distance to go to the place where the child is asking you about something from where you were is longer, but the average woman can go across the corpus callosum faster. 00:33:43.525 --> 00:34:07.520 And look how functional this is, if you're a mother or if you're just dealing with people a lot, not just children, but you know, if you're in a clinic and dealing with people there and dealing with, people coming in and so on, You have to be ready to get interrupted and address what, you know, people, they don't, they don't pay attention to what you're focused on. 00:34:07.520 --> 00:34:10.800 They interrupt when something's on their mind, they go right at you. 00:34:10.800 --> 00:34:13.860 Children, two or three at the same time will do it. 00:34:15.515 --> 00:34:31.450 And that is, and so if you got as crabby as an old man, every time you got interrupted, that mother would be functionally, creating anxiety and bad attachment and stuff like that in the children. 00:34:34.950 --> 00:34:50.315 On the other hand, the man can get so deeply involved in something that he's not, he can't handle interruption, but boy, serious long term problem solving about this finally can come up maybe with something really interesting. 00:34:52.215 --> 00:35:01.560 So this shows the tendency for women to brains to be moving back and forth and men's brains to be normally on one side back and front. 00:35:01.560 --> 00:35:32.180 Now, one of the things about physical activity for men is it involves coordination between, the occipital lobe, particularly occipital lobe, which is visual in the back lobe of the brain, and frontal areas for coordination, for, you know, quick action, for all sorts of sports involved, a lot of movement back and forth, I'm sure, probably in the right hemisphere. 00:35:33.360 --> 00:35:45.355 It may be that if you're an intellectual and you're trying to solve a problem in math, you go back and forth between images in the the occipital lobe and, prefrontal frontal cortex. 00:35:48.535 --> 00:35:48.935 Okay. 00:35:48.935 --> 00:35:53.435 Now, but you can see how they're complementary. 00:35:53.810 --> 00:36:05.030 And here what I want to mention is that one of the ways in which this complementarity has been researched, there are two ways outside of regular ordinary psychological research. 00:36:05.410 --> 00:36:06.470 One is the neuroscience. 00:36:07.535 --> 00:36:09.375 I've talked about some of that. 00:36:09.375 --> 00:36:44.985 But the other big way they're looking at differences and complementarity, although they don't talk about complementarity and they need to be, shaped up on that issue, is in evolutionary psychology, where they talk about, male and female roles for the family and how the specialization for men in certain kinds of roles and women for others increased the efficiency of, of child rearing and rearing so that we survived. 00:36:48.480 --> 00:36:50.180 So that there was a kind of specialization. 00:36:51.120 --> 00:37:00.180 Women with nursing and supporting and children knowing interpersonal relationships, being able to address when someone was unhappy and to deal with it. 00:37:00.535 --> 00:37:02.695 The man was more more often outside. 00:37:02.695 --> 00:37:03.815 He would be hunting. 00:37:03.815 --> 00:37:04.695 He was protecting. 00:37:04.695 --> 00:37:09.415 He was bringing back resources, if he was a decent father. 00:37:09.415 --> 00:37:13.515 He was bringing back resources to the, family. 00:37:14.960 --> 00:37:21.700 And it looks like this is one of the things that's involved in typical mating behavior. 00:37:22.720 --> 00:37:28.855 One of the things, the, the major psychologist here is, is David Buss, b u s s, he's an evolutionary theorist. 00:37:28.855 --> 00:37:31.115 There's several others, Geary, so on. 00:37:32.935 --> 00:37:57.350 In which, women in particularly when they're looking for a husband are looking they meant the normal woman on average, we're talking about an average, marries a man who is taller, older, and will have good resources to bring to support the children, often richer. 00:37:58.005 --> 00:37:58.505 Okay? 00:37:59.365 --> 00:38:05.305 But not necessarily richer, but he's got the potential to bring the stuff in because he's too young to be rich. 00:38:07.285 --> 00:38:09.545 Although, I was hoping to find one who wasn't. 00:38:09.845 --> 00:38:24.670 But anyway, and men, there it's, a lot of the cues to physical beauty are also simultaneously cues to, fertility in women. 00:38:25.815 --> 00:38:29.195 So beauty and fertility are are related. 00:38:31.015 --> 00:38:44.167 You know, you're more fertile when you're young, and the curves make a difference in terms of, you know, I I you know you know the the drill. 00:38:46.493 --> 00:38:46.993 Okay? 00:38:49.320 --> 00:39:06.480 And you know, even though some women are really quite different in terms of they they'd have made, I wanna read you a little bit about I hope I don't I don't date myself too much, but, I assume you all know who Margaret Thatcher was. 00:39:07.420 --> 00:39:08.960 If you don't, find out. 00:39:12.780 --> 00:39:16.560 Margaret Thatcher was the first woman prime minister of England. 00:39:17.355 --> 00:39:17.855 Alright? 00:39:17.915 --> 00:39:21.355 She was back there in the eighties, roughly, seventies, eighties. 00:39:21.355 --> 00:39:21.855 Alright? 00:39:22.075 --> 00:39:24.495 And her nickname was the Iron Lady. 00:39:25.595 --> 00:39:26.095 Okay? 00:39:29.115 --> 00:39:30.975 But she was a a lady. 00:39:32.130 --> 00:39:39.270 This didn't mean she was mad, you know, that they she was tough, but she was always a woman, always a lady. 00:39:43.330 --> 00:39:51.005 She was high in certain typical male attributes such as assertiveness, political leadership, and scientific ability. 00:39:52.345 --> 00:40:00.040 She was trained as a chemist and later as a lawyer, but she was nevertheless always and visibly a woman. 00:40:00.740 --> 00:40:07.800 She was a wife, a mother, she had a female figure, she dressed rather well, she had a womb and breasts. 00:40:08.595 --> 00:40:20.135 Margaret and her husband, Dennis, he was older, taller and quite wealthy, were supportive of each other very much and biographers say their marriage was strong. 00:40:21.510 --> 00:40:30.490 Lady Thatcher herself acknowledged the debt she owed her husband, I could never have been Prime Minister for more than eleven years without Denis by my side. 00:40:31.430 --> 00:40:42.635 He was a fund, a fund of shrewd advice and penetrating comment, and he very sensibly saved these comments for me rather than the outside world. 00:40:44.135 --> 00:40:49.350 But, she had, two children, So, you know, she was a woman. 00:40:49.730 --> 00:40:57.010 Granted, she had many masculine characteristics, but there was nothing about her that, you know, everybody knew she. 00:40:57.010 --> 00:40:58.950 She was the Iron Lady. 00:41:00.725 --> 00:41:08.105 And so that's the case when we have overlap between some of the male characteristics or the female characteristics on men. 00:41:08.965 --> 00:41:10.665 It's a man or it's a woman. 00:41:10.965 --> 00:41:15.545 Every cell in your body is sexed by is male or female. 00:41:17.270 --> 00:41:28.890 Every single cell, and every cell in your body is at at, there are a few tiny exceptions, is that sometime in your life, sometimes rather frequently, it's replaced. 00:41:30.265 --> 00:41:37.885 You have a new cell, you know, the old one is considered, you know, goes away or they sloughs out or whatever, and you have to have a new cell. 00:41:38.665 --> 00:41:42.185 And that new cell has it's actually an amazing process. 00:41:42.185 --> 00:41:45.320 That cell is extraordinarily complex. 00:41:45.860 --> 00:41:58.040 A single cell is very complex because not only does it have what we would normally think of as the cellular complexities, it has DNA in it and DNA is a very complex molecule. 00:41:59.805 --> 00:42:00.625 Very complex. 00:42:01.645 --> 00:42:07.425 And that's, you know, replaced, reproduced each time the cell is replaced. 00:42:10.365 --> 00:42:19.120 So, anyway, and it's and one of the things that's reproduced when it's replaced is the maleness or femaleness of the person. 00:42:23.660 --> 00:42:36.475 Sister Mary Prudence Allen says that one way of understanding this is to say that her approach, which is Christian, is based on gender reality. 00:42:38.150 --> 00:42:50.490 And the other approach, which is the radical feminist approach, she calls gender ideology and traces its ideological roots. 00:42:50.710 --> 00:42:55.265 Some of it, a good deal of the feminist gender ideology goes back to Marxism. 00:42:56.285 --> 00:43:08.305 It's the it's the it's the extension of the class warfare to, you know, where it was between the the capitalists and the and the workers. 00:43:08.845 --> 00:43:12.520 That logic has been extended to men and women. 00:43:13.860 --> 00:43:38.930 And their and the whole idea of making a new Soviet man, which was very big in the Russian world, most of you don't didn't live through that period, but, you know, the whole idea of making a new Soviet man and creating one completely, unrelated to the family in the usual sense of the term and who would be created out of the communist culture. 00:43:39.550 --> 00:43:51.090 Of course, it was a it ended up becoming a total flop, but it was the idea there, and so that was the new feminist woman, and who would be, I suppose, not much like a woman. 00:43:51.615 --> 00:44:06.755 But, reality is different, and the complementarity model allows us to accept that reality and to, see it as something that Look, at its best, it creates synergy, it creates something. 00:44:06.780 --> 00:44:10.220 It's like a dance. 00:44:10.220 --> 00:44:12.240 A man and woman can dance together. 00:44:13.500 --> 00:44:19.600 If they each dance separately, it's 10 units for each of them and not the 100 that comes from dancing together. 00:44:20.345 --> 00:44:46.810 A family comes from a man and a woman living together, dancing together, etcetera, and that creates not only children, but it also creates generations, And that's the fourth thing that, is sister Agnes, sister mother Mary Prudence Allen. 00:44:47.350 --> 00:44:48.890 I was thinking of her friend. 00:44:48.950 --> 00:44:59.915 Anyway, Mary Prudence, Allen's sister, she talks about that as the fourth aspect, not just synergy or complementarity, but the generations. 00:45:01.655 --> 00:45:07.540 And, you know, generations and the notion of generations is core to the understanding of the faith. 00:45:09.600 --> 00:45:26.165 The scriptures are filled with the generational descriptions of of the origin of of of, of Our Lady and the generations behind her, the generations behind Saint Joseph, and of course, elsewhere in the scriptures as well. 00:45:27.025 --> 00:45:44.300 So, now I whoops, I'm gonna get well, anyway, I think there are certain kinds of extreme forms of masculinity and extreme forms of femininity. 00:45:45.800 --> 00:46:01.235 The most documented extreme form of masculinity has been done by, Baron Cohen, and he thinks the most extreme form of masculine, intellectual life is autistic. 00:46:03.340 --> 00:46:08.560 The the autistic Look, four out of five autistic children are male. 00:46:09.420 --> 00:46:21.095 And autism is a description of a man who doesn't He he he sort he sort of mind blind and relationship blind. 00:46:22.595 --> 00:46:24.535 They're very low in empathy. 00:46:24.995 --> 00:46:25.975 Very low. 00:46:26.755 --> 00:46:36.180 He even talks about zero empathy at times with autistics, and he thinks that's the extreme form of masculine intellectual life. 00:46:36.960 --> 00:46:42.420 Only objects and things, and often these autistic kids are very bright. 00:46:45.545 --> 00:46:48.045 Now, I think there's another kind of male extreme. 00:46:48.585 --> 00:46:53.645 No one's done anything on this, and I call this the hyper physical male. 00:46:54.105 --> 00:46:59.840 This is the man who plays golf all the time or goes fishing all the time. 00:47:01.020 --> 00:47:03.440 You've heard of a golf widow, haven't you? 00:47:04.220 --> 00:47:04.540 Okay. 00:47:04.540 --> 00:47:07.040 That's that's the wife of this guy. 00:47:07.420 --> 00:47:18.865 This is the guy who plays basketball all the time, who's always involved camping and always involved, he's a farmer, he's doing, he's he's messing around with machines all the time. 00:47:19.805 --> 00:47:20.625 That extreme. 00:47:21.405 --> 00:47:34.100 One is left hemisphere extreme, one is right hemisphere extreme, but there's not much documentation on the Right hemisphere, athlete, physical involvement man as a form of extreme, but it'll come. 00:47:34.720 --> 00:47:46.125 Now, I'm gonna propose two female extremes, two kinds of women who are out on a out on an extreme. 00:47:48.185 --> 00:47:55.680 One, women, as I said, are more emotional than men, and you can have some women who are terribly emotional. 00:47:55.900 --> 00:47:59.680 In fact, we have an expression from They're called drama queens. 00:48:00.860 --> 00:48:06.960 And, they are so emotional, and not only are they very emotional, they want you to be involved in their emotions. 00:48:07.565 --> 00:48:14.305 They want you to respond to them, to understand of them, and and take care of their emotional, needs. 00:48:14.685 --> 00:48:15.905 So that's one kind. 00:48:16.605 --> 00:48:25.970 The other kind is the as I said, women are so much better at interpersonal and detecting relationships, but they can take that to an extreme. 00:48:27.070 --> 00:48:32.530 And this is the woman who has 50 cats and a relationship with everyone. 00:48:34.935 --> 00:48:40.875 And, or, or the woman who has, who sees relationships everywhere. 00:48:43.975 --> 00:48:58.940 Oh, I, you know, I was, I went back and there was Cleopatra, my, who I was before, and now I'm channeling, my spirit in heaven, and I, I'm do, I'm real, I'm finding relationships everywhere. 00:49:02.840 --> 00:49:04.780 Seeing relationships where they aren't. 00:49:06.265 --> 00:49:12.925 So, all those are four kinds of two and two male and female, shall we say extremes. 00:49:15.305 --> 00:49:18.525 And now I wanna end with one last thing. 00:49:19.160 --> 00:49:21.500 All of these things, I'm sure, are somewhat controversial. 00:49:21.720 --> 00:49:28.300 I haven't spared you for when there isn't a lot of evidence, I just don't mention it because there isn't. 00:49:29.480 --> 00:49:36.685 But I don't know about these extreme you know, I think the extreme I mean but why are women so good at relationships? 00:49:36.825 --> 00:49:46.365 Well, they are, but that means that if they're gonna be that means, for example, being a psychotherapist ought to be a good job for a woman. 00:49:48.170 --> 00:49:55.070 Dealing with young children in school setting should be a good job because they'll be able to I mean, you're supposed to be able to detect. 00:49:55.290 --> 00:49:56.030 You're empathic. 00:49:56.330 --> 00:49:56.830 Right? 00:49:57.050 --> 00:49:59.550 You've had courses in empathy, I expect. 00:50:00.490 --> 00:50:02.190 And have you yet? 00:50:03.475 --> 00:50:04.915 I don't know the first year students. 00:50:04.915 --> 00:50:06.375 I don't know what they've had yet. 00:50:06.875 --> 00:50:09.155 Not much, but trouble. 00:50:09.155 --> 00:50:20.120 Anyway, so they, you know, but empathy and being able to understand that other person, which is the opposite of the autistic, male. 00:50:22.180 --> 00:50:32.645 But it should be a good job, women should be very good at that, and there's a lot of evidence just anecdotal, I guess, that they are, because there are a lot of good female therapists. 00:50:33.585 --> 00:50:55.290 But I'm gonna propose on the last page of your handout something else, and here I'm talking about complementarity, and I'm talking about averages again, so I'm saying there are certain masculine traits and feminine traits. 00:50:56.470 --> 00:51:01.275 When they're well, when the trait is well is good, they complement each other. 00:51:01.575 --> 00:51:11.035 But both male virtues or traits and female virtues and traits can have a downside when they're too extreme. 00:51:13.950 --> 00:51:19.490 So, so men, men, males are seen as assertive. 00:51:20.270 --> 00:51:21.970 Okay, that can be very helpful. 00:51:22.110 --> 00:51:22.830 Very good. 00:51:22.830 --> 00:51:23.330 Good. 00:51:23.710 --> 00:51:28.595 But it can also lead to anger and dominating anger. 00:51:29.615 --> 00:51:30.915 Whoops, that's the downside. 00:51:32.415 --> 00:51:34.755 There are a fair number of husbands like that. 00:51:35.375 --> 00:51:35.875 Alright? 00:51:36.095 --> 00:51:36.835 Or fathers. 00:51:39.135 --> 00:51:47.420 Feminine, nurturing, terrific, but sometimes nurturing moves, goes into controlling and smothering. 00:51:52.040 --> 00:51:58.495 Risk taking for men, but sometimes risk taking is impetuous and rash. 00:52:00.715 --> 00:52:07.295 For women, they're careful and cautious, but sometimes they're, too much so, they're timid or retiring. 00:52:09.500 --> 00:52:13.600 Men can be very logical, but then they're sometimes rigid. 00:52:16.220 --> 00:52:21.840 Women can be very intuitive, but sometimes they can be just irrationally kooky. 00:52:26.735 --> 00:52:30.355 That's not a psychological term, kooky, irrationalism. 00:52:30.895 --> 00:52:34.195 Men can be very calm, but they can be machine like. 00:52:34.780 --> 00:52:38.160 Women can be emotional, but they can be overly emotional. 00:52:40.380 --> 00:52:44.480 Men can be abstract, but, you know, they can be impractical. 00:52:45.740 --> 00:52:48.640 This is the abstract philosopher who falls in the ditch. 00:52:50.825 --> 00:52:51.325 Boom. 00:52:52.425 --> 00:52:57.325 A woman can be concrete and very practical, but sometimes too restrictedly literal. 00:52:59.065 --> 00:53:04.570 Man can be objective and problem solving, but he can be cold and heartless. 00:53:06.310 --> 00:53:13.690 A woman can be subjective and empathic, but sometimes she's overly identified or even merged. 00:53:18.155 --> 00:53:23.775 A man can be systematic in his thinking, but he also can be closed minded. 00:53:25.035 --> 00:53:29.535 A woman can be open minded, but sometimes chaotic. 00:53:31.020 --> 00:53:33.360 You know, open minded to almost anything. 00:53:36.380 --> 00:53:42.320 Men can focus on external things, which can lead, however, and it's negative, to indifference to persons. 00:53:43.275 --> 00:53:48.415 Women's focus on persons, but sometimes it means relationships are everything. 00:53:51.995 --> 00:53:59.320 Finally, mental toughness, men can have be mental tough, mentally tough, but they can be insensitive and clueless. 00:54:02.580 --> 00:54:07.880 Women can be sensitive to others, but they can be easily hurt and cry. 00:54:10.235 --> 00:54:14.795 Men can be skeptical and they can be too doubting because of that. 00:54:14.795 --> 00:54:15.775 They doubt everything. 00:54:16.875 --> 00:54:19.375 There's a joke about two farmers in Vermont. 00:54:19.835 --> 00:54:26.010 They were driving down the road together, in a truck, no doubt a pickup truck. 00:54:27.750 --> 00:54:34.730 And one of them looked up on the hillside and there was a a bunch of sheep up on the hillside, sort of distributed in various ways. 00:54:35.885 --> 00:54:38.545 And and that farmer who saw him, he said, look. 00:54:38.605 --> 00:54:39.485 Look at those sheep. 00:54:39.485 --> 00:54:40.625 They've been sheared. 00:54:42.365 --> 00:54:47.425 And the other farmer who's going down with him says, well, on this side anyway. 00:54:49.485 --> 00:54:50.865 Now, that's too skeptical. 00:54:51.860 --> 00:54:57.400 There are men who don't believe in things that are important to believe in and they, they suffer from that. 00:55:00.980 --> 00:55:05.080 And then there can be women who are trusting, but they can be too trusting. 00:55:05.300 --> 00:55:09.915 They can be seduced or become credulous too easily. 00:55:11.735 --> 00:55:19.435 So I'm saying that each, but taken by themselves in the positive sense, each of these characteristics complements each other. 00:55:20.260 --> 00:55:26.660 Now in a couple, no man will have necessarily all the male characteristics and no women, all the female. 00:55:26.660 --> 00:55:34.920 They may, you know, they may have about two thirds of them and the other third, they'll be on the distribution which is more like the opposite sex perhaps. 00:55:36.015 --> 00:55:58.050 But I'm suggesting that these together, give us a way of thinking of how men and women complement and help each other on average when they do it, you know, when And this is the synergy of how they bring different ways of looking at the world that complement each other, that help the other from, you know, help the other one. 00:55:59.565 --> 00:56:14.065 And, so that's sort of the summary of my hypothetical model of complementarity in terms of personality dimensions, and that sort of brings it to a conclusion, and