Brief Assignment 1
Aidan Kelleher
Professor Perisse
ENG 170-10
Research Journal
31 March 2022
Archives:
Courtesy of Hathi Trust Digital Library
Reprinted from Journal of Health and Social Behavior, Vol. 24, No. 2, June 1983
Permalink: https://hdl.handle.net/2027/umn.31951002920615l
This archive is important to show an opposing view to mine and give further context on a more specific category of going through emotional distress, something that leads to the use of psychotropic drugs. The archive displays in a factual manner the sex differences between men and women in terms of likelihood of depression, societal pressures, and stressors leading to drug use based on their environment and treatment. I find it important to see a perspective of why women are more emotional than men that does not come from a stereotypical and misogynistic perspective. In fact, this archive makes a point for why it makes sense for women to be more emotional than men and uses data to back it up. Of course, this archive is from the 1980’s and the data could be very dated and untrustworthy as evidence towards the way men and women are in the modern day.
Courtesy of Internet Archive
Boston University Libraries, 1949
Link: https://archive.org/details/sexdifferencesin00demi/page/n23/mode/2up
This archive is important to my research because it discusses the differences between men and women in their adolescence, as boys and girls. While the majority of the thesis focuses on the difference in intelligence between boys and girls, some of it focuses on the emotional and intellectual maturity of the girls over the boys. The writer discovers evidence that boys develop physically, emotionally, and mentally slower than girls their age do. The archive also discusses how this difference at a young age can leave a lasting impact, and how the world at the time was recently getting rid of the notion that women were inferior. This helps with my research because it offers further analysis as to what makes men and women emotionally different on a more biological level as opposed to what many of the other archives will do, which will show how society makes us different, offering both nature and nurture as evidence to support my claim.
Courtesy of Digital Public Library of America
Atlanta University and Clark Atlanta University Theses and Dissertations
Sex differences in active tolerance, 1948
Permalink: http://hdl.handle.net/20.500.12322/cau.td:1948_pierce_frances_o
This study is valuable to my research because it discusses the sex differences between men and women in different age groupings, but most importantly it is very specific to their differences emotionally. It also discusses a wide variety and range of emotions that are being studied and compared, including emotions that are generally considered “negative” emotions (rage, fear, sadness, depression) and some of the more positive emotions (love, empathy) as well.
Courtesy of Internet Archive
Sex Differences in Cognitive Abilities, 1986
Link: https://archive.org/details/sexdifferencesin0000unse_d0k1/page/n3/mode/2up
This archive discusses the sex differences between men and women on more of an intellectual level rather than an emotional level. But I find this useful to my topic of interest because it analyzes the human brain and the two sexes in a way that could be useful to fully understanding the way that society’s treatment of them and expectations for them have impacted them and the way they express emotions.
Courtesy of Internet Archive
Sex Differences in Social Behavior: A social-role interpretation, 1987
This archive will be very helpful to my research because it is an in-depth analysis of the SOCIAL behavior of men and women and how they compare. Rather than a direct source about their emotional thoughts and reactions or their intellectual differences, how they differ on a social level can tell us a lot about the way men and women are expected to act or even how they act naturally because of their gender.
Survey/Poll:
I created a poll on Google Forms that asked the respondent the central question: Are men and women equally emotional? I sent the form out to friends and family of mine who are in long-term man and woman relationships. The form received 30 responses to the central question and short answer responses to explain their reasoning. The form offered 3 possible multiple-choice answers to the question, “Yes, men and women are equally emotional”, “No, WOMEN are more emotional than men”, and “No, MEN are more emotional than women”. The smallest percentage was 3.3%, or one respondent, who answered that men are more emotional than women. 12 of the respondents (40%) said that women are more emotional than men. Out of the 30 respondents, the majority of them (17 people or 56.7%) agreed that men and women are equally emotional. But this is where it gets interesting. Most of the respondents who answered “women are more emotional than men” admitted in their short answer explanations to believing that men and women feel the same amount of emotion, just that women express their emotions more.
Nearly every short answer response came to the same conclusion, that men and women are equally capable of being moved and impacted internally by something, but what they express externally can vary. One response stated that “women are taught to be emotional in terms of sadness or happiness. Emotions that are considered soft. Men, on the other hand, are encouraged to be either stoic, cocky, or angry, all emotions that are considered masculine. However, for some reason media does not consider the masculine traits as emotional despite them being just as influenced by emotions as happiness or sadness”. The reason this question originally interested me so much was because of the idea: what do we consider emotional? The first thing that came to mind for me was what are considered “negative emotions” like sadness and the stereotypical “woman being emotional” and overdramatic. What I thought made the question so thought-provoking and endlessly debatable was that there are other emotions that are often more associated with men, such as rage and even depression, which is rage turned inward.
A response that surprised me and brought up an idea that I had not thought of was that emotional can also be referring to positive things. “I think women care about more things than men, and feel more empathy and sympathy for others”, one respondent said. I thought this was an interesting opinion to have because while the answers to the central question varied, many of the respondents seemed to feel the same way, while this person does not believe that men feel the same emotions internally at all. Another respondent wrote that “the only reason that people believe women are more emotional is because of the stereotype that has been very long-lasting.” The word “stereotype” here implies negativity, and that being called emotional has always been a slight against women and a way to keep them silenced. But the respondent who said that women have more empathy is taking the word “emotional” and flipping it on its head and wearing it with pride.
This study was very helpful in learning more about what the people around me think and feel about this discussion, and it gave me insight into the culture, that is people who have had to deal with their partners emotions and their own for years. It seems to me that nearly everyone in this group did not just try to focus on themselves or the emotions that their partner may show to the world, but really think about the emotional intelligence and capability of both of them. Not only did this help the study but it gave me insight into the importance of listening and understanding the other person past the point of what they express to the world. But I also feel that it’s clear this group can also get caught up in the binary of gender and the stereotypes and roles they have with their partner. One person jokingly wrote “the man I’m thinking of is much less emotional than I am” at the end of their response. More than half of this group was an older generation that may have their fair share of new ideas about gender, but they still mostly leaned into the roles they have and took pride in them.
Poll Link: https://forms.gle/GyAHgptXqckJMq5t9
Annotated Bibliography:
Google Forms Poll. “Are men and women equally emotional?”
https://forms.gle/GyAHgptXqckJMq5t9
Summary of Source: In this poll I asked family and friends that are in long term relationships to answer the central question “Are men and women equally emotional?” and to explain their answer. The results showed that most of them believed that men and women are equally emotional, with another large percentage believing that women are only more emotional outwardly. Only one person out of 30 thought that men were more emotional than women.
Evaluation of Source: The relatively large number of people polled adds to the specificity and accuracy of the way that people in long-term relationships may feel about the topic question compared to a much smaller sample.
Usefulness of Source: What makes this source useful is that it means I am not getting all my information and opinions from data and research, but from people. This source helped me understand the necessity of emotionally understanding your partner to be in a long-term relationship and that understanding gave me a different insight into the emotions of the average man and woman.
Reevy, Gretchen M. “Sex Differences.” Cultural Sociology of Mental Illness: An A-to-Z Guide, edited by Andrew Scull, vol. 2, SAGE Reference, 2014, pp. 795-799. Gale eBooks, link.gale.com/apps/doc/CX6500100306/GVRL?u=newpaltz&sid=bookmark-GVRL&xid=29046a3b. Accessed 2 Apr. 2023.
https://link.gale.com/apps/doc/CX6500100306/GVRL?u=newpaltz&sid=bookmark-GVRL&xid=29046a3b
Summary of Source: This source discusses the likelihood of depression in men vs women. In it they state that women are 2 to 3 times as likely to experience a depressive episode than men. It also states that sometimes due to sexism and stereotypes, it is more likely for a man’s depression to go unnoticed or undiagnosed compared to a woman.
Evaluation of Source: This source is from Cultural Sociology of Mental Illness and is written by Gretchen M. Reevy, a professional with a PhD in Psychology and the source is peer-reviewed. It uses evidence and scientific research to back up all of its claims and information.
Usefulness of Source: This source is useful because it analyzes emotions such as depression and anxiety in men and women and more importantly, the treatment of the people that need help with them in the medical and therapy world. It explores the discomfort men have with expressing their emotions that can be deemed as weaknesses.
Lane, Lara Lynn. “Sex Differences.” The Gale Encyclopedia of Psychology, edited by Bonnie Strickland, 2nd ed., Gale, 2001, pp. 577-578. Gale eBooks, link.gale.com/apps/doc/CX3406000581/GVRL?u=newpaltz&sid=bookmark-GVRL&xid=8d7ac363. Accessed 2 Apr. 2023.
Summary of Source: This source discusses the differences between men and women that originate from older gender roles and positions that men and women held. For example, men are more likely to display aggression than women possibly because women used to be at home taking care of the home and the children as men would fight or act as hunter-gatherers. The source also expresses that if men are aggressive and violent towards their sons, those sons are more likely to act that way to their children, creating a cycle known today as traditionally masculine and feminine tendencies.
Evaluation of Source: This source is peer-reviewed and written by Bonnie Strickland, a revered psychologist in the community. It is from the Gale Encyclopedia of Psychology and uses scientific evidence to support all its claims and it is all factual.
Usefulness of Source: This source is useful because it not only picks up on the differences between men and women biologically and socially, it also uses evolutionary evidence to further understand and explain why men and women are as different as they are today.
Campbell, Anne. Men, Women, and Aggression / Anne Campbell. BasicBooks, 1993.
https://suny-new.primo.exlibrisgroup.com/permalink/01SUNY_NEW/5celm9/alma990002413190204844
Summary of Source: This source analyzes the differences between how men and women perceive of their own anger and aggression. Women consider their own anger as them experiencing a loss of control over their own emotions. Men on the other hand consider their anger as a tool to gain control over the people around them.
Evaluation of Source: This source is written by psychologist and criminologist Anne Campbell whose research largely concerned the sex differences between men and women relating to aggression. She was a professor of psychology at Durham University and she conducted her research for this book by talking to male and female gang members.
Usefulness of Source: This source is useful because it goes in-depth into the ways we as people feel about our own emotions and the difference between how the world perceives an “emotional woman” versus how they perceive an “angry man”. This really helps my research because it emphasizes that being emotional does not have to mean a loss of control, that is only a stereotype put on women and not men for when they get upset or angry and it makes people uncomfortable. It also offers another side of the same coin if you will against the point that emotional men are considered weak, when referring to sadness. In this example we are referring to anger, in which men feel comfortable expressing this because society is comfortable with it and used to it.
Moskvina V, Farmer A, Jones IR, et al. Sex differences in symptom patterns of recurrent major depression in siblings. Depression & Anxiety (1091-4269). 2008;25(6):527-534. doi:10.1002/da.20372
Summary of Source: This source compares the likelihood of depressive symptoms in same-sex siblings versus opposite-sex siblings. This is interesting research because it focuses on people on the opposite sex from the same household with the same childhood traumas, especially when you see that there were more correlations between the same-sex siblings than the opposite-sex siblings, showing that the difference is the way that the female and male brains deal with the same emotions.
Evaluation of Source: This source is written by several academic researchers from the Department of Psychological Medicine and the Department of Psychiatry at various institutions such as the University of Wales College of Medicine, University of Geneva, and University of Birmingham.
Usefulness of Source: This source is useful for my paper because it discusses that being raised in the same household can lead to very different ways of thinking and expressing emotion based on your gender.