阅读理解
When men and women take personality tests,
some of the old
Mars-Venus stereotypes(定式)keep reappearing. On average, women are more cooperative,
kind,
cautious and
emotionally enthusiastic. Men tend to be more competitive,
confident,
rude and
emotionally flat. Clear differences appear in early childhood and never
disappear.
What's not clear is the origin of these differences.
Evolutionary psychologists think that these are natural features from ancient
hunters and gatherers. Another school of psychologists argues that both sexes'
personalities have been shaped by traditional social roles,
and that
personality differences will shrink as women spend less time taking care of
children and more time in jobs outside the home.
To test these hypotheses(假设), a series of research teams have
repeatedly analyzed personality tests taken by men and women in more than 60
countries around the world. For evolutionary psychologists,
the bad news is
that the size of the gender gap in personality varies among cultures. For
social-role psychologists, the bad news is that the change is
going in the wrong direction. It looks as if personality differences between
men and women are smaller in traditional cultures like India's or Zimbabwe's
than in the Netherlands or the United States. A husband and a stay-at-home wife
in a patriarchal(男权的)Botswanan clan(部族)seem to be more alike than a working
couple in Denmark or France. The more Venus and Mars have equal rights and
similar jobs, the more their personalities seem to separate.
These findings are so unbelievable that some researchers
have argued they must be due to cross-cultural problems with the personality
tests. But according to new data from 40.000 men and women on six continents,
David P. Schmitt
and his colleagues conclude that the trends are real. Dr. Schmitt,
a psychologist at
Bradley University in Illinois and the director of the International Sexuality
Description Project, suggests that as wealthy modern
societies level(使平等)the barriers between women and men, some ancient internal differences are
being developed.
The biggest changes recorded by the researchers involve the
personalities of men, not women.
Men in traditional agricultural societies and poorer countries
seem more cautious and anxious, less confident and less competitive than men in
the most progressive and rich countries of Europe and North America.
To explain these differences, Dr. Schmitt and his partners from
Austria and Estonia point to the hardships of life in poorer countries. They note
that in some other species, environmental stress tends to extremely affect the larger
sex. And, they say, there are examples of stress decreasing biological sex differences
in humans.