Which Gender Is Really The Better Multitasker?
2013.10.25
A recent study published in the journal BMC Psychology has found that women tend to be better at certain forms of multitasking than men. The men were found to perform significantly slower than women on a computerized test that requires users to juggle tasks involving counting and shape-recognition.
The female participants also performed well in a followup test involving more real-world scenarios like locate restaurants on a map, perform simple maths equations, answer a phone call, and planning to find a set of lost keys in a field in less than eight minutes. Based on these findings, it would appear that women are more organized under pressure while men have a tendency to act impulsively.
But before you go thinking that males are best suited for "hunter-gatherer" roles while females should stick with multi-tasking skills, the researchers also note that "a near lack of empirical studies on gender differences in multitasking should caution against making strong generalisations." In short, there's simply not enough scientific evidence to actually prove which of the genders is the better at it, especially since multi-tasking is "a relatively broad concept in psychology" and there are so many ways to assess multi-tasking performance.
The female participants also performed well in a followup test involving more real-world scenarios like locate restaurants on a map, perform simple maths equations, answer a phone call, and planning to find a set of lost keys in a field in less than eight minutes. Based on these findings, it would appear that women are more organized under pressure while men have a tendency to act impulsively.
But before you go thinking that males are best suited for "hunter-gatherer" roles while females should stick with multi-tasking skills, the researchers also note that "a near lack of empirical studies on gender differences in multitasking should caution against making strong generalisations." In short, there's simply not enough scientific evidence to actually prove which of the genders is the better at it, especially since multi-tasking is "a relatively broad concept in psychology" and there are so many ways to assess multi-tasking performance.
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