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Do you think there has been any reliable study on why women seem to be generally better in languages and men better in maths/sciences? Do you think this is even the case?

Not sure about studies... But it ties into the people vs things argument. People speak languages, things speak math

There are studies suggesting that this is true

I believe it has something to do with how men and women think and view the world

Women approach something by looking at it as a whole. Parts only contribute to the whole, and only the whole is assessed

Men like to break bigger things into parts

Breaking big concepts into parts is crucial to fields like math/science, where the questions being answered don't have an easy solution you can just observe. You can't solve problems in these fields without first breaking them into stages, or steps, or testable metrics

For fields studying language and society, linguistics anthropology psychology etc., The whole is ultimately the only thing that matters. The whole language is how we communicate. The whole culture defines the society. The whole brain is how we think

Putting parts together into a whole is a big deal in those fields

That's why women have a tendency to take these kinds of jobs, while men take jobs that involve breaking big, complex questions into parts

Does that help, @Fred?

@Rai yea thats basically what i thought too but reading a paper on it would be very interesting

Language is more important in terms of evolution to women than men. Women are better at colour perception because of the traditional foraging role, they are better at communication as they are the news network and library of bronze-age society.

Men meanwhile, as the hunters and warriors, need to be better at split-second decision making based on precise analysis of the environmental data. it is also more vital for bronze-age man to make precise, calculated decisions as they are often life-or-death, whilst for women the imperative is on maintaining emotional and social cohesion of the group.

Of course it is worth noting that these are generalisations and you will get some women better suited to hunting, construction, fighting and so forth and some men better at recalling knowledge or social cohesion. But in general, these principles continue into the present day and result in the skew in vocations that men and women continue to exhibit, even when women have more-than-equal oppertunities to take up roles in traditional-male roles.

@Skellious While these traits may be true for the evolution of past ages, what advantage do these things mean to our current age? We have built a society around NOT using brute force or physical prowess. Communication is king, yet it is still men that dominate the scholarly and philosophical pursuits. Should it not be women that hold this mantle with their enhanced evolution of perception and communication?

@Silver_The_Bard Actually, studies show women do better in school than men. How much of this is due to biased teachers and department standards varies

But I'd say most of it can be chalked up to the teaching style used today. Students get lectured at and try their best to remember it and regurgitate it on an exam, which is not quite how it was even one generation ago. Women are better at school as it is today

It could also be because there are more services, scholarships etc. designed to help women, as well as more women being admitted into college in general equating to more chances for success

Another factor, like I mentioned, is department standards

Liberal arts departments like psychology give extra credit in their courses more often, while STEM, business, and other majors men would do better in hardly ever give extra credit

Studies also show teachers mark girls less harshly

Like I said, bias from instructors plays a role. The bias gets worse if the teacher is female

Therefore I don't find it accurate to say they do better in school, but that others skew the results so they appear to. They aren't gaining that by themselves

No, the actual style is more suited to women

Bias plays a role, but it's not the only factor

Men tend to enjoy learning through experience

The number of degrees that employ this type of learning is very low

I don't deny that the environment and method is more suited toward the way girls learn, but without the bias by itself I do think there'd be a marked improvement to at least bring boys up to the same level. I'll agree that the bias varies and it's not the only factor but it's not like it's a small factor

Yes, I agree, but I also think that many of the factors need to be addressed

Protocols need to be put in place to reduce bias

Other methods of learning need to be incorporated into the education system

More services need to help men, or just everyone neutrally

And more men need to be admitted. Though that might be fixed by fixing the above