Brain differences are nowhere near the entire story. There are so many different chemicals that can be floating around in your brain at any given time. Oxytocin might give you some insight here. They’ve done studies that showed that this hormone increases things like trust, trustworthiness, generosity, empathy and morality.
This same video explains that testosterone increases selfishness and punishing behaviors. Different sources say different things about how oxytocin affects each gender, but there’s a theme where they’re saying the women either have higher oxytocin or stronger reactions to it or that testosterone interferes with it, etc. Essentially the message in the theories is “Women more frequently act on the influence of oxytocin”.
Here is what this is like for me:
Imagine, for a moment, feeling ten times less selfish (the video says men have 10x the testosterone, not sure if our subjective experiences correspond exactly, but that’s my guess for the following hypothetical scenarios). Now imagine being high every time you do something nice. For me, this means the world feels beautiful, I feel secure and peaceful, and I feel satisfied in a way that nothing else can match.
Imagine someone doing something bad to you. Imagine you’re not even selfish enough to be angry. I don’t always stay calm, but the things that don’t make me angry might surprise you. Now imagine feeling sorry for the person instead of worrying about yourself. This is what it feels like to be me. People like me have to work hard on developing rational self-interest. You’ve probably wondered about the phenomenon where a lot of women get attached to an abusive man and keep trying to love him into being a better person even though he’s abusing her. I haven’t had problems saying no since my early twenties, but it took work to learn to be strong enough to say no and be firm. These hormonal differences may explain that.
If you’re motivated by helping, and you even feel sorry for people who hurt you, how much motivation do you have to go out and learn more about how to make money? If your brain rewards you with a high whenever you’re nice to someone, how much more time would you want to spend doing that? If what gratifies you is expressing empathy, this changes your priorities by, at the very least, competing with your other interests. In my case, I prefer playing helping roles so much that it trumps just about everything else for me. Here is a chart that shows the results of some studies done to compare the interests of highly intelligent adult men and women (I figure if the LW surveys are right about member’s IQs being in the 140s on average, this chart is more applicable here than a random one).
Notice things like the women are much more interested in community service, social contacts and teaching children (all of which require caring) and men are more interested in law (which demands an aggressive personality because you’re fighting over who wins). Sure, you can help people with money, but that way, you give them the most benefit while spending the least amount of time actually interacting with them. Most people have empathy and like helping but not everyone can do it full-time. I, on the other hand, like helping so much I can’t be bothered to spend a large amount of time on money. After I clock out at the end of the day, it’s time for me to help someone.
If oxytocin tends to affect the genders differently (or if testosterone contradicts it), this explains a lot of gender differences—why men tend to be more aggressive, why women tend to be more socially accommodating and it may explain why they aren’t as interested in economics—they may just prefer roles that require caring instead.
Brain differences are nowhere near the entire story. There are so many different chemicals that can be floating around in your brain at any given time. Oxytocin might give you some insight here. They’ve done studies that showed that this hormone increases things like trust, trustworthiness, generosity, empathy and morality.
http://www.ted.com/talks/lang/en/paul_zak_trust_morality_and_oxytocin.html
This same video explains that testosterone increases selfishness and punishing behaviors. Different sources say different things about how oxytocin affects each gender, but there’s a theme where they’re saying the women either have higher oxytocin or stronger reactions to it or that testosterone interferes with it, etc. Essentially the message in the theories is “Women more frequently act on the influence of oxytocin”.
Here is what this is like for me:
Imagine, for a moment, feeling ten times less selfish (the video says men have 10x the testosterone, not sure if our subjective experiences correspond exactly, but that’s my guess for the following hypothetical scenarios). Now imagine being high every time you do something nice. For me, this means the world feels beautiful, I feel secure and peaceful, and I feel satisfied in a way that nothing else can match.
Imagine someone doing something bad to you. Imagine you’re not even selfish enough to be angry. I don’t always stay calm, but the things that don’t make me angry might surprise you. Now imagine feeling sorry for the person instead of worrying about yourself. This is what it feels like to be me. People like me have to work hard on developing rational self-interest. You’ve probably wondered about the phenomenon where a lot of women get attached to an abusive man and keep trying to love him into being a better person even though he’s abusing her. I haven’t had problems saying no since my early twenties, but it took work to learn to be strong enough to say no and be firm. These hormonal differences may explain that.
If you’re motivated by helping, and you even feel sorry for people who hurt you, how much motivation do you have to go out and learn more about how to make money? If your brain rewards you with a high whenever you’re nice to someone, how much more time would you want to spend doing that? If what gratifies you is expressing empathy, this changes your priorities by, at the very least, competing with your other interests. In my case, I prefer playing helping roles so much that it trumps just about everything else for me. Here is a chart that shows the results of some studies done to compare the interests of highly intelligent adult men and women (I figure if the LW surveys are right about member’s IQs being in the 140s on average, this chart is more applicable here than a random one).
http://www.davidsongifted.org/db/Articles_id_10176.aspx
Notice things like the women are much more interested in community service, social contacts and teaching children (all of which require caring) and men are more interested in law (which demands an aggressive personality because you’re fighting over who wins). Sure, you can help people with money, but that way, you give them the most benefit while spending the least amount of time actually interacting with them. Most people have empathy and like helping but not everyone can do it full-time. I, on the other hand, like helping so much I can’t be bothered to spend a large amount of time on money. After I clock out at the end of the day, it’s time for me to help someone.
If oxytocin tends to affect the genders differently (or if testosterone contradicts it), this explains a lot of gender differences—why men tend to be more aggressive, why women tend to be more socially accommodating and it may explain why they aren’t as interested in economics—they may just prefer roles that require caring instead.