Sex/Gender Differences: Cognition

Cognitive & Biological Psychology

Rippon, 2019

suggests people may misuse findings to support inherently sexist ideas (neurosexism— if women aren’t as good at a task of men > actively exclude women)

Hirnstein et al, 2019

meta-analysis comparing performance on different visuospatial cognition tasks

most studies focus on mental rotation

different tasks yield different effect sizes

spatial perception tasks such as water level/line orientation tasks yield medium effect sizes

paper folding task yielded small effect sizes

Kheloui et al, 2023

mental rotation tasks yield the largest and most consistent sex/gender difference with men outperforming women

Collins & Kimura, 1997

large effect sizes, particularly in 2D tasks

suggests sex/gender differences isn’t related to 3D processing skills BUT difficulty has an effect

Linn & Peterson, 1985

meta-analysis of 172 studies covering range of visuospatial tasks

medium to large effect sizes favoring men

no difference in other tasks

Voyer, 1995

meta analysis of 246 studies, large effect size favouring men for mental rotation

Voyer et al, 2007

meta-analysis of 36 studies

women outperform men in tests of spatial location memory

significant sex/gender difference in favour of women found across age, scoring methods, type of measure

interaction with object type — men better at “masculine” objects

Hyde & Lynn, 1988

meta-analysis finding very small “trivial” effect sizes favouring women on a range of verbal tasks

Petersen, 2018

meta-analysis covering approximately 10 million students

small effect size favouring women for “English language arts”

Hirnstein et al, 2023

meta-analysis containing data from 355,000 participants

Small but consistent effect sizes favouring women in phonemic fluency

Bleecker et al, 1988; Herlitz et al, 2013; Kramer et al, 1997; Lowe et al, 2003

Several meta-analyses report medium effect sizes favouring women for verbal fluency

Wallentin et al, 2009; Mathuranath et al, 2003

Individual studies suggest an inconsistency, showing no evidence for sex/gender difference in verbal fluency

Kheloui et al, 2023

argued magnitude of sex/gender differences depends on task used

also varies depending on whether age/education have been controlled for

Mathuranath et al, 2003

examined effect of age, education, and gender on verbal fluency

found no significant sex difference in animal/letter verbal fluency tasks after controlling for age and education

level of education, but not age or gender, influenced letter fluency

age, but not education, had a differential effect on verbal fluency tasks

but no effect of sex/gender

Merritt et al, 2007; Stoet, 2010

some studies have shown that women are more susceptible to distraction by invalid cues

Bayliss et al, 2005

suggests the women’s use of cues depends on type of cue used — better able to use valid cues than men

Pletzer et al, 2017

fewer studies looking at sustained and divided attention

men better in both types of these attention tasks than women

findings not consistently replicated

Voyer et al, 2007

reported women outperform men on tests of episodic memory and object location memory, with small-medium effect sizes

Asperholm et al, 2020

large meta-analysis of 545 studies

men showed greater variance in both verbal and spatial episodic memory

women showed greater variance in route memory

Hirnstein et al, 2023

meta-analysis shoed females outperformed males in recall and recognition for verbal episodic memory

small effect sizes

Benbow & Stnaley, 1980, 1983

sex/gender differences in mathematical ability

40,000 grade school children

suggested “large sex difference” in mathematical ability in favor of males

particularly pronounced at the upper end of the distribution, with boys outnumbering girls 13:1

presented as a fact independent of environmental consideration

Ceci et al, 2009

detailed review of sex/gender differences in mathematical ability

Voyer & Voyer, 2014

women / girls in school seem to achieve better marks in maths tests than men / boys

small effect size

varying depending on contextual factors

Else-Quest et al, 2010; Hedges & Nowell, 1995; Hyde et al, 1990

meta analyses reporting small effect sizes for a minor male advantage in mathematics

Hjelmervik et al, 2012; Hodgetts et al, 2015

studies suggesting sex hormones might influence selective attention and top-down control of attention

Uttal et al, 2013

engaging in male-typical activites can reduce the presence of some sex/gender differences

Moe et al, 2021

sex/gender differences in mental rotation can be reduced through training to improve performance

Khelou et al, 2023

performance on some cognitive tasks can vary in line with hormonal fluctuations, including those which have shown a sex/gender difference

Hausmann et al, 2000

tested women on mental rotation across the menstrual cycle

performance on 3D tasks was significantly worse during luteal phase (high estrogen low progesterone) compared to the menstrual phase (low estrogen and low progesterone)

Gordon & Lee, 1986; Aleman, 2004; Yang et al, 2007

testosterone consistently shown to improve visuospatial abilities

Maki et al, 2002

estradiol and progesterone can improve verbal fluency

Van Goozen et al, 1995; Wolf et al, 2000

testosterone can impair verbal fluency abilities

Scheuringer & Pletzer, 2017

tested men and women on a computerized 2D-matrix navigation task

sex/gender differences were found favoring men, and were not affected by cycle phase

cycle phase did interact with strategy use — during luteal phase, accuracy for the euclidian strategy decreased, while accuracy for landmark strategy increased

Hjelmervik et al, 2012

dichotic listening task to investigate impact of hormone fluctuations on cognitive control and lateralisation

• top-down cognitive control improved during follicular phase — directly related to estradiol levels (higher estradiol —> improved cognitive control)

Colzato et al, 2012

estradiol levels influence other aspects of cognitive control — inhibitory control

Hamspon & Morley, 2013; Rosenberg et al, 2002

estradiol levels influence other aspects of cognitive control — working memory

Hodgetts et al, 2015; Colzato et al, 2010’ Mihalj et al, 2014'

inconsistent findings on effects of estradiol on cognitive control — no effect

Gasbarri et al, 2008; Hatta & Nagaya, 2009

inconsistent estradiol can impair performance on cognitive control tasks

Colzato & Hommel, 2014; Jacobs & D’Esposito, 2011

effect of estradiol on cognitive control may be dependent on individual differences in baseline dopaminergic function

Jacobs & D’Esposito, 2011

compared working memory performance across the mesntrual cycle between groups of women with differing baseline levels of dopamine

• women with low baseline dopamine exhibited poor working memory during menstrual phase, but improved during follicular phase when estradiol increased

• participants with high baseline dopamine demonstrated the opposite pattern

results demonstrate estradiol status impacts working memory function, with direction of effect relying on baseline dopamine

Levine et al, 2016

engaging in “male-typical” play is associated with better spatial ability

Uttal et al, 2013

meta-analysis suggesting some “male-typical” activities, such as playing with construction toys or action video games, can substantially improve spatial skills

Miller and Halpern, 2014

“male typical” activities can be adapted into training programs which lead to improvement in spatial skills regardless of sex/gender

Haier et al, 2009

used MRI to investigate the effects of practice/training in spatial tasks on performance, and cortical structure/functional activity

• tetris practice group showed thicker cortex and decreased activity in frontal areas during task

Hoffman, Gneezy & List , 2011

conducted a large sample cross-cultural study of sex/gender differences in spatial abilities

compared two tribes, the Karbi (patrilineal) and Khasi (matrilineal)

• 33% of the variance in spatial ability was explained by differences in education level

suggests environment and education can have a significant impact on the presence and maintenance of sex/gender differences in cognition

Wraga et al, 2006

series of three experiments investigating impact of gender stereotypes on mental rotation performance

• experiment 1 established effect favoring men

• experiment 2 positive stereotype towards women on women’s performance reduced gap

• experiment 3 positive stereotype towards women on men’s performance eliminated gap

sex/gender difference can change in response to environmental cues

Hausmann, 2014

conducted studies to investigate whether gender stereotypes/academic background affected performance on sex/gender sensitive tasks

effect of male-dominated environments (degree type)

• experiment 1: sex/gender difference in mental rotation mainly driven by stereotype threat effect in female art students, with female science students showing stereotype reactance

• experiment 2: academic priming activated stereotypes of discipline and gender — stereotype threat effect in women in STEM