Are Men or Women More Emotional?

[Matty]

I don't know which sex experiences more emotions, but women definitely give emotions more significance and attention. Frankly, it's downright mind-numbing, listening to women constantly talking about mundane occurrences, solely because of the emotional significance they attach to them.

 

[noisebloom]

Frankly, it's downright mind-numbing, listening to women constantly talking about mundane occurrences, solely because of the emotional significance they attach to them.

I don't think any of my female friends (or my girlfriend, for that matter) often talk about "mundane occurrences" they've ostensibly attached some sort of emotional significance to...

Maybe you should spend time with different women.

 

[April]

I don't know which sex experiences more emotions, but women definitely give emotions more significance and attention. Frankly, it's downright mind-numbing, listening to women constantly talking about mundane occurrences, solely because of the emotional significance they attach to them.

While your words are rather derogatory, my bf would say the same of me. He gets very impatient with me when I talk about things that he considers mundane.

 

[acd]

I think it's a result of socialization. Or maybe it's an individual thing, too. I'd mostly attribute it to socialization though. It's simply more acceptable for females to show their emotions. Whether good or bad.

I have a young son and it really pisses me off when my parents tease him by saying things like, "Quit crying like a girl!" Or "You scream like a girl!" "Boys don't cry!" I am not reinforcing that. He's 6 and we talk about feelings and label feelings so he knows how he's feeling and can verbalize it and express it in ways that are constructive. I'm infp and my husband is enfp so we normalize feelings in this house!

 

[QuirkyLemonFlower]

If I talk from experience - I'd say men are more emotional then women. The men in my life are extremely emotional but the women are much more thick skinned and don't show their emotions as much as the men do.

However, generally speaking I think both men and women are equal. Everyone just expresses it differently.

 

[Deleted member 16771]

There's a lot of 'balanced' views here that don't address the evidence.

I don't mind people saying that men and women are equally emotional, but if so, how do we account therefore for the experimental data?

 

[acd]

There's a lot of 'balanced' views here that don't address the evidence.

I don't mind people saying that men and women are equally emotional, but if so, how do we account therefore for the experimental data?

Sorry, where's the data? You mentioned a study anecdotally earlier.

 

[Deleted member 16771]

Sorry, where's the data? You mentioned a study anecdotally earlier.

Oh yeah, sorry I thought I posted it.

I'll have to find a link, or something, but I'm curious to know what people think of why the men in the study I read of were having much stronger reactions.

 

[QuirkyLemonFlower]

I think it's a result of socialization. Or maybe it's an individual thing, too. I'd mostly attribute it to socialization though. It's simply more acceptable for females to show their emotions. Whether good or bad.

I have a young son and it really pisses me off when my parents tease him by saying things like, "Quit crying like a girl!" Or "You scream like a girl!" "Boys don't cry!" I am not reinforcing that. He's 6 and we talk about feelings and label feelings so he knows how he's feeling and can verbalize it and express it in ways that are constructive. I'm infp and my husband is enfp so we normalize feelings in this house!

I think this is why the men in my family are far more emotional, due to hearing this or being told this whilst growing up. And now as adults they are unable to control any kind of feeling or emotion and just explode.

 

[acd]

Oh yeah, sorry I thought I posted it.

I'll have to find a link, or something, but I'm curious to know what people think of why the men in the study I read of were having much stronger reactions.

If you find it I'd check it out. Might take me a bit to respond though.

 

[Deleted member 16771]

I think this might be it:

https://journals.plos.org/plosone/a...ifferences in,with angry and positive stimuli.

 

[April]

I think it may be something to do with the fact that men are "supposed" to appear strong, and to repress what they feel as to appear "non-moving" and that in itself, making someone keep something inside like that, tends to make it appear or become stronger as it builds.

Women are expected to be emotional and to "release" those emotions and therefore get the added benefit of that release.

Just a thought to answer why it could be that a study shows men react more emotionally stronger than women. What do yall think? Its just one perspective.

 

[Anomalous]

I think women tend to burn through their emotions quicker as a result of their freedom to express them.

Men just tend to harbor shit until they're able to achieve some form of cathartic release or channel it all through an acceptable outlet. Or they crack and go full Jack Torrance.

I think any real variance would occur more in relation to what specific emotions are being expressed and the circumstances under which we experience them. Men being more likely to rely on anger for example.

 

[biwaly]

Females are more emotional because of their hormones and what kind of brain they have. So they are faster at processing emotions and they are done with them quickly but they feel emotions more intense than males while males don't have the brain for dealing with emotions as good as females therefore bad situations affects them way more than females if that situation makes them feel emotion which males doesn't necessarily feel the emotion as females are certain to feel an emotion for everything. So on the contrary to what some people think males doesn't hide, bottle up, etc. their feelings because they never feel in the first place while females are so emotion factory.

For example, I don't think any male could endure the horror of giving birth if males was the one giving birth. It doesn't make them emotional or sensitive per se. It makes them just being weak about processing emotion. A female cannot understand how it feels like to feel like a pathetic being when you are a male while females are okay to be so emotional because they don't have the pride to don't feel so BS emotions. Females are okay to be a rainbow while males don't even want to emit one single colour LOL. Probably males tend to have way less EQ than females considering females are evolved for understanding emotions of their child so they can take care of their child properly while males only evolved for hunting and whatnot and for it you better don't feel anything.

Special edit for those who believe both genders are equally emotional:

Do you see a male care about putting makeup on their face, caring about if X cloth makes them look fat, caring about wearing different clothes every day to don't feel ridiculed, etc. BS?

Did you ever see candles burning and/or Christmas lights turned on 24/7 in a males room?

Did you ever saw your male friend cried for "when you were gone and were busy moving to another place I felt like you left me forever"?

Did you saw a male stop watching the news because it's so negative?

¯\_(ツ)_/¯¯\_(ツ)_/¯¯\_(ツ)_/¯¯\_(ツ)_/¯¯\_(ツ)_/¯

 

[Misty]

I think it's a result of socialization. Or maybe it's an individual thing, too. I'd mostly attribute it to socialization though. It's simply more acceptable for females to show their emotions. Whether good or bad.

I have a young son and it really pisses me off when my parents tease him by saying things like, "Quit crying like a girl!" Or "You scream like a girl!" "Boys don't cry!" I am not reinforcing that. He's 6 and we talk about feelings and label feelings so he knows how he's feeling and can verbalize it and express it in ways that are constructive. I'm infp and my husband is enfp so we normalize feelings in this house!

Totally. I also do this with my little boy, I encourage it, in fact. I tell him it's a very normal, human, mature thing to do to cry when you need to, just as much for men as for women. And I tell him it just shows what a big warm heart he has and how much he cares. I hate that "big boys don't cry" crap. Not gonna fly with me.

 

[Horatio]

It's scientifically shown that women are more prone to anxiety due to biological factors; but in terms of pure emotions, men and women are generally the same. Cultural factors influence how and how often emotions are expressed among genders (note: sex =/= gender).

Mood and mood disorders are also biologically influenced, and typically present in women–but again part of these findings could be culturally influenced as women are more likely to report on psychological disorder than men, at least in Western cultures.

Highly recommend this study here, as an example:

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4268901/#:~:text=Notably, mood disorders are approximately,prevention of these debilitating disorders.

When men and women that have been diagnosed with MDD are compared, women tend to have more symptoms and higher symptom severity, and women report more subjective distress [13-15]. Additionally, anxiety symptoms are almost always co-morbid with MDD in women, making the two difficult to separate. In fact, women are more likely than men to have a co-morbid anxiety disorder with MDD (e.g., [16]), and men more likely to have a co-morbid substance abuse disorder (reviewed in [17]), possibly suggesting different coping strategies in males and females. A frequent and important question is whether the sex difference in MDD incidence is an artifact of women being more likely to seek treatment.

However, this sex difference in MDD incidence is consistently found across cultures and in community-based epidemiological studies, in which the factor of seeking treatment is removed (e.g., [13,18]), suggesting that there are biological differences that place women at increased risk for MDD.

 

[David54]

I rather think it depends on which man and which woman we are talking about

 

[Sidis Coruscatis]

I think a lot of men would have to be convinced or locked into an agreement to save the kid over the spouse.

Seems reasonable. Finding even one partner compatible with my egregious state of being would be a thing too precious and sacred to willingly let go. I came close to experiencing this about 5 years ago by complete serendipity when I decided to talk to the only other customer at a bar while the streets were flooding during a hurricane. What happened in the next 24 hours was the most singularly profound instance of human connection to this day. I think the chances of a child beating that would be slim.

 

[ThomasJ79]

I think the word "emotional" is a loaded word in today's culture. It is often used pejoratively. We know through science that both men and women have inner experiences of emotion that are more similar than different. It is how those emotions are processed, suppress, repressed, or expressed that is different. Much of that has to do with cultural gender expectations.

I once got into an argument with another dude online. I said something and he reacted by calling me a sensitive snowflake, lol. The irony was lost on him until I pointed out how emotional his response was to mine. His self awareness grew a little larger that day.

 

[Wyote]

I came close to experiencing this about 5 years ago by complete serendipity when I decided to talk to the only other customer at a bar while the streets were flooding during a hurricane. What happened in the next 24 hours was the most singularly profound instance of human connection to this day.

You can't just drop this and not elaborate.