Gender Differences In Empathy

A gender empathy gap, sometimes referred to as an gender empathy bias, is a gendered breakdown or difference in empathy (the ability to recognize, understand, and share another's thoughts and feelings) where it might otherwise be expected to occur. Empathy gaps may occur due to a failure in the process of empathizing based on gender of either the person who should be empathizing or the person in need of empathy or as a consequence of stable personality characteristics, and may reflect either a lack of ability or motivation to empathize. Many studies show that females have an on-average advantage in empathic accuracy skills.

Empathy in different genders

Studies have consistently found that women have higher levels of empathy than men. According to some studies, females may be able to recognize facial expressions and emotions more accurately and faster than males, especially some neutral body language. Additionally, females may recognize males' angry emotions better than males, while males may recognize females' happy emotions better than females. Studies have found that a gender gap in empathy is also present in other animals, such as gorillas, rats or corvids; with females showing higher levels of empathy than males.

Another systematic review on gender differences in empathy among medical students found that female medical students exhibit higher empathy levels than males. This study stands out for its robust analysis, encompassing thirty studies with diverse sample sizes and geographic distributions. This extensive scope enhances the reliability of the findings . Researchers hypothesize that females' performance of recognizing emotion is driven by motivation. In other words, if females feel the work requires them to perform higher score empathy, they perform better; otherwise, they will perform no differently than males.

Studies have also found that females, on average, perform better on "theory of mind" tests. A study of over 300,000 people in 57 countries found that females scored higher than males on the widely used ‘Reading the Mind in the Eyes’ Test, which measures ‘theory of mind’ (also known as ‘cognitive empathy’).
From birth, male and female infants react to emotional stimulations differently. Experiments found that female infants are more likely to cry when they hear others crying. In addition, they make more eye contact with people than male infants. Scientists believe that those reactions of female neonates may give them more chances to feel others feeling, which may amount over the years to a sufficient difference that can explain some of the empathy scores gap of males and females.

Gender empathy gap and sexism

Sexism

Two studies examined responses to sexual assault research, particularly focusing on how hostile sexism predicts skepticism. In the first study, U.S. men were surveyed about their sexism levels and then asked about their skepticism towards different research summaries. Hostile sexism was found to strongly correlate with doubt towards sexual assault statistics, more so than towards other topics like breast cancer or alcohol abuse. The second study tested if self-affirmation could mitigate this skepticism but found it ineffective. This suggests that deeper educational strategies might be necessary to address biases that dismiss sexual assault research due to sexist views.

Other literature also shows that both males and females can sometimes exhibit benevolent sexism. When negative stereotypes are held on the basis of sex or gender this is known as hostile sexism.

Studies suggest that sexism and gender roles impact mental health outcomes as males are discouraged from appearing weak which impacts health seeking behaviour in males as they struggle to conform to gender roles where vulnerability is discouraged.

See also

* Gender and emotional expression
* Sex differences in emotional intelligence

References

{{Reflist

Empathy
Gender-related stereotypes
Gender equality
Gender roles
Sexism