Tuesday, November 13, 2018

Do Men and Women Truly Experience Different Emotions?

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"Stop crying, you're acting like a little girl." is a phrase I've heard my parents say numerous times to my younger brothers and their grandson (my son). It's probably the one phrase (among many others) that frustrates me the most. Why? Because it perpetuates societal gender stereotypes. At a young age, most males are taught to suppress their feelings so that they seem "stronger" and more dependable, while females are often taught they need to always be "soft" and dainty. And if a female is emotional, well society says that's acceptable because females of course are naturally more emotional than males--or so we were wrongly taught. But, if a man were to display any sort of emotion other than those that promote "true" masculinity, society labels him as weak or even "gay". The result of this is an unfortunate toxic cycle of gender norms.
Stereotypes are very powerful. Many members of society, including my parents believe that women are more sensitive and experience emotions such as happiness, fear, and sadness more than men. Yet, there are countless research studies that disprove this common belief. Psychologist Denis Cummins attests that men and women experience the same emotions, but express and process them differently. In her article Cummins states, "A number of studies have reported that the sexes recruit different neurocircuitry  when processing and "down- regulating" emotions." In other words, even though men and women use different areas of their brains to process emotions, the emotion felt (whether it be joy, disgust, anger, or sadness) is the same. Another difference between men and women is the way they express emotions, but this shouldn't be much of a shock given societal expectations we are all forced to embody and live up to. Since men are taught to suppress emotions starting at a young age, what do adult men do? That's right, you guessed it! Adult men express their emotions either by not expressing them at all (thereby through down-regulation), or through true "tough-guy" ways such as violence and anger. See the toxic pattern here?

(Source: https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/good-thinking/201406/are-males-and-females-equally-emotional)

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