Do males and females have different abilities when making and remembering observations?
Abstract
The topic for this research is whether males and females have different abilities when making and remembering observations, and the result shows that my hypothesis was correct, and females do better at remembering observations than males. This research includes recent studies, the experiment I designed and did by myself, the data and result for the experiment, the reason for the result and how can I improve my further experiments.
1.0 Introduction
Whether males and females have different abilities when making and remembering observations or not has been highly discussed. Current research has shown that women are better than men when remembering observations. According to Martin Asperholm, a doctoral student at the Department of Clinical Neuroscience at the university, there is a slight female advantage in episodic memory (Terra Marquette, 2019). Additionally, the research finds that middle-aged women outperformed men on all measures of memory (Ashley Welch, 2016). Therefore, I hypothesize that females are better at remembering observations than males. Thus, the aim of this research is to find out whether my hypothesis is right.
2.0 Research Methodology
My experiment consists of 12 pictures, and the testers have two minutes to remember all the pictures in the correct order and the colours in the correct order of the jellies and ice cream. Each picture is worth 1 point, and the colours are worth 8 points in all. After that, the testers will speak out the order of the pictures, and after that, I will ask 3 extra questions, which weren’t told to the testers before they finished speaking. Those questions are “What does the cat have in its hands” “What is the colour of the second layer of the chocolate” and “How many sunflowers are there”. Each question is worth 1 point, so the total score will be 12+8+3=23. Twenty testers are invited to do this test, and they are all approximately the same age, about 16 years old.
3.0 Research Results
According to the result of my experiment, females do better in the memory test. According to the table above, the lowest value for males is 15, and the lowest value for females is 20. The highest value for males and females is the same, which is 23. The medium number for males is 20, and the medium number for females is 22. The mean for males is 19.5, and the mean for females is 21.7. Additionally, there are 4 numbers under 20 for males, and all the numbers for females are above 20, and there are many 22s, which are very close to the full-mark. Obviously, except for the highest value, all the other numbers for females are bigger than those for the males, which points to the conclusion that females are better at remembering observations than males.
4.0 Discussion
The result of the experiment proves that my hypothesis has been proven correct. Similar research by Goldstein shows that middle-aged women outperformed men on all measures of memory. For the study, researchers looked at 212 men and women aged 45 to 55 (Ashley Welch, 2016). They assessed participants’ memory using cognitive testing that focused on memorization, semantic processing, and associative memory (Ashley Welch, 2016). Semantic processing tests challenged participants to name as many related words as they could think of in various categories, and associative memory tests involved matching names to faces and occupations (Ashley Welch, 2016). Another similar study of college undergrads published in the journal Memory revealed women remembered events more accurately after a week than men (Unknown, 2015). These two studies inspired me and made me think of the effectiveness of my experiment. Since the result of my experiment is right and the controls, including the time and the age of the testers are almost perfectly controlled, I think my experiment is relatively effective. However, there is still a lot that can be improved. The first study looked at 212 men and women, which is a really large size, ten times larger than mine. In addition, it uses two ways, including semantic processing tests and associative memory tests. And in the second study, the experiment is about long-term memory, which lasts for a week. Maybe trying to design more than one test can make my experiment more effective, since I will be looking at the problem from different perspectives, for example, short-term and long-term memory, memorizing pictures, words, sounds, etc.
5.0 Conclusions and Recommendations
According to a study published in the journal Child Development, the strength of our memory is built on a learned process of how we’re taught to tell stories during our formative years. From a young age, girls are trained to share emotion and descriptive details when recalling an event, which is the reason why females are better at memorizing things (Unknown, 2015). For further experiments, I am willing to larger sample size to approximately one hundred people, test people in different age groups, and design various kinds of experiments, which are able to make my experiment more effective and convincing.
Reference List
Ashley Welch. (2016), “Who has better memory, men or women?” [online]. Available from: https://www.cbsnews.com/news/who-has-better-memory-men-or-women/
Terra Marquette. (2019), “Told you so! Women remember events better than men, study finds”[online]. Available from: https://studyfinds.org/told-you-so-women-remember-events-better-than-men-study-finds/
Unknown. (2015), “Why women have better memory than men” [online]. Available from: