3 Similarities and Differences

IF YOU VISIT ALMOST ANY BOOKSTORE, you’ll probably find books about sex/gender differences. Many of these are for couples seeking relationship advice, and they typically describe women and men as totally different from each other. A famous book of this type was John Gray’s Men Are from Mars, Women Are from Venus, an international best seller published in 1992. Gray (1992) imagines that “men are from Mars and women are from Venus” (p. 1) and then tells how they fell in love and moved to Earth, after which they forgot they were supposed to be different. When women and men in relationships think they’re supposed to be similar, Gray says, the result is unmet expectations and relationship conflict. He believes the fundamental difference is that men experience fulfillment through success and accomplishment, and women experience it through sharing, relating, and feeling.

Another book, Men Are Like Waffles, Women Are Like Spaghetti (Farrel & Farrel, 2007), explains that men separate life into compartments like waffles and focus on one thing at a time (career, family, leisure). Women, in contrast, see all aspects of life as interrelated like pieces of spaghetti. They want to connect issues and talk things through. In His Needs, Her Needs (Harley, 2011), the author presents the contrasting needs of women and men. For example, she needs affection; he needs sexual fulfillment. She needs financial support; he needs peace, quiet, and domestic support. She needs intimate conversation; he needs recreational companionship. The book aims to teach heterosexual couples how to meet the needs of their partner—needs that are completely different from their own.

A photo shows a stack of books written by John Gray. — The prolific Mars and Venus series provides many examples of books that take an essentialist approach to gender differences.

In Act Like a Lady, Think Like a Man (2011), comedian Steve Harvey instructs women about what to expect from and how to attract men. He notes that women and men have different goals and needs: Men need to protect and provide for their women, and in exchange they want support, loyalty, and sex. Harvey warns women who are self-sufficient that “if you’ve got your own money, your own car, your own house, a Brinks alarm system, a pistol, and a guard dog, and you’re practically shouting from the rooftops that you don’t need a man to provide for you or protect you, then we will see no need to keep coming around” (Harvey, 2011, p. 182). So he advises women, even those with plenty of money, to let men pick up the check—and if they need their sink fixed, to “act like you haven’t a clue what to do” and then tell him, “Baby, thank you so much for doing this for me—I don’t know what I’d do without you” (p. 188).

All these books make assumptions about women and men being fundamentally different. But does this view reflect reality? In this chapter, we’ll explore why the assumption of difference is so popular and how it has historically served to justify sexism. Then we’ll consider how psychologists study the topic and explore the data on gender similarities and differences. Finally, using STEM fields (science, technology, engineering, and mathematics) as an example, we’ll explore how sex/gender differences that start small can become magnified to lead to large differences in certain fields.