Sex Differences in Brain Functioning

I just came across some info that is hugely important in understanding differences between men and women. HUGE! Stanford neuroscientist Robert Sapolsky has found that women's autonomic nervous system ramps down more slowly than men's (like during/after an argument). Here, we're mostly focused on sympathetic system arousal--the fight/flight/keep-on-arguing response. This is as important, maybe even moreso, concerning miscommunication between genders than the awareness of women getting a shot of oxytocin just from talking to other people. I'm going to also pair this bit of data with John Gottman's finding that two out of three arguments between couples are about topics that simply cannot be solved.

From men's side, in an argument that cannot or simply will not end in agreement, we want the stress to end. We may try to get some distance and allow ourselves to calm down, and this will generally happen if we aren't keeping the argument going in our heads and trying to still win. BUT, if we try what Gottman calls a repair attempt too early, our much-loved partner will still be amped. Or, we may not try anything, but if we show a relative degree of relaxation, that can signal that we don't care about the topic or the relationship as much as our partner. She might even be frustrated and jealous of the relatively quick turnaround (calming down) in us.

Over the long haul, we end up learning certain indelible "truths" about the other sex as well as our own. One is that hell hath no fury like a woman scorned...or ignored...or simply not adequately mirrored in her emotions. ("Yes, I am VERY excited about that new hand-bag you found; it is WUNDERBAR! for so many reasons" [that I don't know].) Another is that it is a woman's prerogative to always change her mind--always. Another is that guys are expected to "be the bigger man" or take "it" like a man even though we supposedly have fragile egos. Clearly some of these truths are contradictory, feeding the battle of the sexes.

We all know that women nag. Ladies, you know it's true. And men blow up when they lose their temper. Or shut down (sometimes due to "nagging"). But what is nagging? Sometimes, the guy is calming down, which is being interpreted as a lack of caring. His gal is still focused on getting somewhere on this topic because she is still amped about it. So she sticks to the point just when he is calming down enough to begin to feel close--or at least nonantagonistic--with/towards her. For women, they are simply trying to further the relationship by gaining closure or progress of some kind. And this attempt, this one more comment, is like a cattle prod applied to the base of the skull just when the guy thought it was safe to let his guard down. Because there is a literal extra unpleasant jolt, which feels treacherously timed, from a behavioral point of view the guy learns not to let his guard down or trust. Or he can blow up or shut down. Or he just has to "take it" because that's how women are.

Alternately, your girl may be looking for emotional reassurance (because she's still amped, but it's leaning towards anxious rather than angry/aggressive this time) while you're still trying to simply relax out of an argument or let it go (since you know things won't go well while you're still pissed). This is compounded by the fact that it takes guys more effort to verbalize. So in general, the demand or even expectation that we verbalize what we're feeling and thinking before we're "re-set" makes a little jolt feel like a cattle prod. (Besides, before we've calmed down, we're thinking and feeling about how we're right, she's wrong, etc. But you can't say that's what you're feeling, oh no.) That exaggeration on our part ("She just jammed me with a cattle prod, and she waited just until I started to calm down in order to catch me by surprise") suggests for an exaggerated reaction from us. BOOM!

From this unenlightened perspective, then, women simultaneously want men to be strong (not pushovers), they want reassurance, they want to be right, and they want the right to be vindictive while being treated as if they have really helped us open into our full potential emotionally. Wow, then there is no right response. And guys are big, petulant children prone to tantrums, uncontrolled aggression, sulking inexpressiveness, and emotional withdrawal.

It impresses me how often and how greatly timing matters.