As a woman I was disheartened to learn that a scientific study has shown that men are...?

Question

on average more intellegent. If women are less intellegent should they abandon aspiring to equality in all things?

Jack Jack, please don't just say no, you sort of confirm the study

Ok, sorry for my spelling but I am dislexic. Study was scientifically carried out and published in reputable journals

The study was by Paul Irwing and Professor Richard Lynn and publisher The British Journal of Physcology. They found no diference up to the age of 14 but after that a diferance between the sexes. There were twice as many men with IQs of 125 and 5 times with IQ over 155

Well no ones impressed me with their IQ and some of the answers are down right stupid so over to a vote

Answer 1

I would question the study if I were you. Intelligence has no sex.

Answer 2

I’ve read of several studies but the ‘average’ IQ test score for men & women is basically the same. The difference is the distribution. There are more males with very top & very low scores while females tend to be less likely to test at either extreme -- but obviously some do. (Twice as many men with IQs of 125 and 5 times with IQ over 155 sound a little extreme so I’d quest this particular study.) Note that these are only test results. Assuming that the tests are accurate what does this mean for an individual -- not much in my opinion. Also note that women may not test at the extremely high level (I’m referring to the top 1 or 2%) due to culturally differences. Hence, after our culture changes even more in regards to women: the day may come when women test averages will be higher than men. Already there are more women graduating from college than men. I hope this makes you feel better.

Answer 3

Sex differences in average IQ are insignificant. However, male performance displays higher variances; consequently, there are more men than women with both very high and very low IQ's.
Women excel in tests of memory and verbal proficiency while men are better in mathematical and spatial ability. Aristotles, the great philosopher advocated the notion that male is the ruler and female, the subject. So because of seclusion, women are not allowed to develop their inherent intelligence. There are social aspects to be considered here.

Most if not all of the recorded genuises are men, like Einstein,Newton,Franklin, Mozart, Beethoven, Goethe and Leonardo Da Vinci. Hypatia, a Greek Godess is considered to be a genius. Marilyn Von Savant's is recorded in the Guiness World Book as having the highest living IQ. She's a columnist for Parade magazine. She was recorded at 228 as a child and at 186 as an adult.

A lot of intelligent women do not get as much notariety as men , either in the field of science, arts, or music which require great inventions, discoveries or musical pieces.or artistic paintings. These men exhibit eccentric and quirky behavior and border on psychosis.

Even though there are more intelligent men than women, you have to remember that if it wasn't for the women, those men wouldn't be around. There's a saying to remember, a man would forgive a woman for anything, except the wit to outwit him. There are a lot of things in life that do not hinge on intelligence; therefore whatever the scientific study shows, a woman should strive for equality. Some jobs require more than intelligence. They require loyalty, common sense,practicality, and ingenuity which some men do not possess. They make good assets for the companies except when the rigors of motherhood and career hang in the balance. Many a men would find this feat hard to juggle. Men and women complement each other. More and more male dominated fields are open to women now.

Answer 4

There are many, many different studies on this subject, and none of them can really be said to have been conclusive. The problem is, for one, the definition of intelligence and the ability to measure it. It's long been speculated that many tests are oriented toward a male way of thinking and problem solving. Where a man may easily come up with the "expected" answer, a woman may consider a question differently and come up with two possibilities, for example. If IQ testing was the only method of comparison in this study, there are obvious flaws.
You will find other studies saying that both sexes are equal, and yet others saying that women have higher intelligence.
This is a question that really can't be conclusively answered, at least not yet, mostly because of the subjectivity of the quality being studied.

Answer 5

First off, the study was done by two men. Not to sound mean, viscious, or nasty, but how reputible could this test have been.
Second, do they mention the socio or education backgrounds of the people in the study?
Third, how many people were interviewed? Just because a study says 4 out of 5 doesn't mean that the entire peopulation was tested. There have been reports of scientific research being thrown out the window because the researchers had biased pools. (Meaning they weeded out those whose results would have disproved their theories.)
Fourth, even if the tests are 100% unbiased, should we abandon the aspiration to equality. NO!!!
I was horrified when I heard this, but public school systems are still short changing girls in the math and science fields. That's right, the boys get more attention from teachers in these subjects.
So, if by some bizarre possibility these tests are totally unbiased, maybe that's the reason why. We aren't getting the education the men are

Answer 6

I'd be interested in seeing references to that study.

All of the studies I have seen tend to break "intelligence" down into
different categories - math, verbal, spatial, social, etc. Generally, men
score higher on average in some and lower in others.

However, the difference between the average scores is pretty small
and there are many men who do better in (say) verbal skills than the
average woman, and many women who do better in (say) spatial
skills than the average man. That is, there is more commonality than
difference.

"scientific study" is pretty meaningless - where did it come from, how
reputable was it, and how did it come to that conclusion? How
repeatable is the data? Has it been confirmed?

Men and women will never be equal in everything - men are
generally larger than women, women will continue to develop
social skills earlier than men - so? What counts is what you do with
it - and the variation across that exceeds anything predicted by
gender, race, creed or even measured intelligence.

Anyone who has been around awhile will tell you that measured
intelligence and "horse sense" are two different animals. That is,
very intelligent people can do some pretty stupid things because
they might lack common sense. To date, there has been no attempt
at measuring "common sense".

Why aspire for equality? Why not aspire to excel? Why not aspire to
get the most out of life?

Answer 7

I hate to break this bit of news to you since you are bent on believing that women are inferior but... the person with the highest IQ was a woman who married the doctor who performed the very first heart transplant (he is also recognized as having a genius IQ) but this woman's IQ was so high that it could not be measured.

On average, those IQ tests are very flawed. They do not take into account social differences or different forms of intelligence. For example, what IS intelligence? The ability to memorize something? There are savants that do that, too, and they need help to cross the street and cannot live independently. Is it the ability to pass exams? The ability to learn and process information? What is a genius? Is a mathematical genius better than a musical genius or a scientific genius or a physics genius or a history genius... ?

Yes, there seems to be more "intelligent" men out in public view but that's simple to understand... men (fathers and husbands) shelter their women, daughters and do not let them learn as they let their male children learn or achieve... women are held back by societal norms established by men; and women have been kept out of male-dominated fields for ages... like women not being allowed to become doctors until the beginning of last century (and they were segregated), or to vote (until the 1930s) or own property or inherit... or run for public office or be pilots or police personnel or take part in the Armed Services... but women are proving this "popular" notions wrong every single day!

Achieving greatness doesn't always go to the most intelligence but to the most ingenious and the most passionate about succeeding! Women, given an equal opportunity and measured fairly, can contribute and succeed on equal par to men. If women were NOT as intelligent as men, WHY are there more female teachers than male teachers?

I hope you are not teaching your daughters to be inferior to men!

Answer 8

You need to be careful with statistics. This study confirms what is already kown from previos studies, ad it has nothing to do with averages. The average IQ's are quite similar. But the VARIANCE is very different. That means there are many more men at the top of the IQ levels, and also many more men at the bottom of the IQ levels, but women are more likely to be in the middle levels. You are rading the study incorrectly whe you refer to average men and women.

What does it mean for an individual like yourself? Nothing. What does it mean for the society in general? Well, it means we are likely to find more men winning Nobel prizes, and more men in jail. There will be less women at either end of the spectrum. Should you be disheartened by this? I don't see why, as long as the society manages to treat all equally, and provide oportunities to all? Opportunity and equality are competely different issues from IQ and talent.

Answer 9

I see many answers have corrected you on the distribution variance; showing you that on average men and woman are of a similar intelligence. Though at either end of the distribution you find more men. that is more intelligent, proportionally, and less intelligent, proportionally. This was the study/studies. What I am concerned with is how you could make such a gross error? Perhaps next time you will have someone or someones help you with text interpretation, as from your well written question one can see you have a bit of intelligence.

Answer 10

I would say that any study on intelligence would only be as strong as the participants. I firmly do not believe that sex has any bearing on intelligence. I have known some extremely intelligent women, and some extraordinarily dumb men. However, let's assume for a moment that the study is true. Does that mean that women should not be equal to men in most areas, and vice verse? Given that criteria, then some men do not measure up to other men either. Equality is not about intelligence, it is about equal treatment of the sexes. I am all for this concept. As a man, I do not consider myself superior to the women around me. We all have strong and weak points. Those who tell you equality can be quantified or measured by some scale such as intelligence are elitists who are wholly unworthy of any consideration in a reasonable discussion.

Answer 11

Well there have been a great many scientific studies on intelligence and as far as i know they have not all shown men to be more intelligent than women.
Also it is quite easy to prove that most iq tests are biased to certain cultures and certain types of intelligience.
There are many cultural issues associated with intelligence not least that many women feel that men feel threatened when a woman is more intelligent than them.
Anacdotally i think that is true. Many mens' reactions are very different if i say that i am a secretary compared to when i am doing a phd. Sad but true.