Popular Misconceptions

The title for this post comes from the ‘list of facts’ email that I’ve been slowly dissecting. One of these supposed ‘facts’ is simply that:

Men can read smaller print than women can; women can hear better.

I’ve not been able to find any argument either way on this one, which might be down the vagueness of the statement. What does it mean that women can hear better? That they can make out sound at lower volumes than men? That they can better distinguish sounds? That they can recognise different types of noises more easily? This field of science, of cognitive perceptions of the senses, is pretty complicated, and I’d be surprise if either of these two claims could be easily answered, one way or the other.

Perhaps a more interesting question is how this claim arose, and why has it spread? Is it something to do with our ongoing fascination as to the differences between the sexes, and the mystery of what this differences might mean? Maybe that Men Are from Mars, Women Are from Venus book has a lot to answer for.

If you have any further ideas, or research, on this apparently popular misconception, post a comment below…