Men who have been accused of never listening to the women in their lives now have an official, scientific excuse for not being the greatest listeners in the world. Women's voices are, and it kills me to write this, more difficult for men to listen to than other men's.
Researchers at England's Sheffield University have discovered key differences in the way that the brain responds to male and female voices. Recently published research in NeuroImage Magazine confirms that female voices tend to create a wider range of sound and frequencies than the average guy's. Researchers suggests that when men decode women's voices, they engage a complex part of the brain that also responds to music, whereas men process other men's voices through much simpler-dare I say, less sophisticated-cognitive means.
So let us assume for the sake of argument that these results are accurate, reproducible and not at all resultant from the contrived empirical suppositions of husbands, boyfriends, lovers or other men with a hidden agenda (HBLOOMWAHA). And let us also assume that, because of the sheer complexity of female speech sounds, the HBLOOMWAHA inadvertently filter out a lot of the "noise." What, then, do these results actually mean for male-female dynamics the world over?
Numero Uno: First of all, this study reaffirms that basic physiology might have a whole lot to do with the way that men and women interact-vocationally, in friendship and in really friendly friendship situations. Assuming that there is in fact some statistical significance behind this study, it would legitimately mean that the proverbial glass ceiling is actually yet another sound barrier that mankind (pardon the pun) will be forced to break in order to gain dominance over human limitations.
Numero Dos: For all the gals out there who are at their wits end because "he just doesn't listen," you're going to have to face the possibility that his miscommunication with Ms. Communication might actually be your fault.
Numero Tres: Besides the potential impact on women's workforce mobility and our ability to communicate effectively with men, what, pray tell, does this mean for the acoustically disadvantaged male students who fill the seats in classes taught by female Duke professors? In order to find out for sure, I propose another experiment: I'd like to see a Duke guy blame his less-than-ridiculously-over-inflated grade on the fact that listening to the sound of female voices in class "exhausts his brain." I promise that this proposal is all the name of science and in no way am I trying to have fun at anyone's expense. Okay- maybe just a little bit of fun.
Now, like most liberal arts majors, I'm not one to argue with science. But after much mulling over the veracity of this study and its implications, I was still skeptical that men are subconsciously tuning me out and turning me off. So, I decided to do a little preliminary investigative research of my own by conducting a not-so-scientific survey of my male friends.
Time and again the guys agreed that it was easier for them to listen and identify with other guys and the topics that generally came up with their buddies. One guy used the following analogy: "If I'm an economist, it's more fun to talk to other economists than to struggle through a conversation with a physicist."
Another survey respondent conceded, however, that "if the topic is interesting, I'm all ears"-regardless of whether or not a woman was speaking. Halfway through yet another interview, I was interrupted with a scoff: "Ha!" he excitedly exclaimed, "I just accidentally tuned you out. I wasn't relating."
Okay, so what we have here is evidence that, yes, women are indeed tuned out now and again. But cognitively wrestling to decode my female voice probably isn't why. In no significant way is frequency filtering disabling to the average guy. Rather, the foundations of co-ed miscommunication are more probably linked to Hollywood stereotypes, social stigmas and general laziness than tiny ol' physiological limitations.
In the end, all the Sheffield study does is reemphasize Swingers-esque attitudes about communication between men and women: "Do you even think I know what the hell they're saying to me half the time? I don't know if they're talking about how hard it is to be adopted, or how their dad can't show them affection. All I do, man, is stare at their mouth and wrinkle my eyebrows and somehow I turn out to be a big sweetie."
Ladies, you're so money, and you don't even know it. And if your devastatingly intelligent, attractive and interesting selves can't hold the attention of a particular bloke-in the office, in the classroom or in a Vegas casino with Vince Vaughn-it isn't entirely because your super complex voice keeps grinding the gears in his head. It's not science, it's situational; and if he's not a case study, he's probably just another space case.
Boston Cote is a Trinity senior. Her column appears every other Friday.
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