Female intuition

The term female intuition expresses that the human talent referred to as intuition is subject to a special gender-specific differentiation. The difference may be that women use this talent more often or rely on it successfully more often.

Scientific research

In 2005 a scientific study by the psychology professor Matthew D. Lieberman from the year 2000, which among other things examined a possible biological basis for the phenomenon “female intuition”, received public attention. As part of the Edinburgh Science Festival , Richard Wiseman carried out a survey with 15,000 participants. He showed his test subjects a series of two photographs each showing the same person: one with a real smile , the second with a "false" smile . Based on other research results, he expected women to recognize the wrong smile more easily and the self-assessment was accordingly: 77% of women rated themselves as “very intuitive”, compared with 58% of men. The actual results contradict this hypothesis: the men recognized the wrong smile in the opposite sex in 76% of the cases, whereas the women only recognized it in 67%. Overall, the success rate for men was 72%, that of women only 71%. The interpretations range from the statement that “female intuition is nothing but a myth” to Wiseman's words, “Perhaps men have now learned to listen to their gut instinct”.

Expressions

The female intuition in the sense of insight into contexts and gaining knowledge without rational conclusions is often contrasted with male logic or male reason as a way of gaining knowledge.

When making a decision using intuition, a distinction can be made between two forms, on the one hand intuition based on understanding, in which facts are processed unconsciously, and on the other hand a pure emotional decision. The latter would be what is meant by “female intuition”.

Understood in this sense, feminine intuition is seen as an escape from enlightened and sensible terminology, and therefore, among other things. a. criticized by feminist groups.

On the other hand, feminine intuition is praised for overcoming the enlightened terminology and bringing out other human, especially feminine, skills. In this direction there are courses under the title “Female Intuition”, which offer “to find your way back to our instinctive knowledge”. In a similar sense, feminine intuition is represented as the manifestation of the maternal instinct .

origin

The ethnologist Margaret Mead wrote in her autobiography:

"Because of their age-long training in human relations - for that is what feminine intuition really is - women have a special contribution to make to any group enterprise."

"With thousands of years of training in human relationships - because that's what feminine intuition means - women have a special contribution to make in all community ventures."

- Margaret Mead : Blackberry Winter: My Earlier Years , 1972.

A group of Romanist researchers from Bochum traces the discourse on female intuition back to the French Enlightenment, where women were emphasized because of their higher sensitivity .

Aphorisms

The male reactions to the alleged female intuition range from gallant confirmation to aphorisms and ridicule about behaviors and justifications that are based on female intuition.

• "The much-vaunted female intuition is nothing other than the great transparency of men." ( George J. Nathan )
• "Intuition is the strange instinct that tells a woman that she is right, regardless of whether that is true or not." ( Oscar Wilde )

literature

• Tiffany Graham and William Ickes: When women's intuition isn't greater than men's. In: W. Ickes (Ed.): Empathic accuracy. Guilford Press, New York 1997, pp. 117-143, ISBN 1-572-30161-9 .
• Matthew D. Lieberman: Intuition: A Social Cognitive Neuroscience Approach. In: Psychological Bulletin. 1/126/2000. American Psychological Association, pp. 109-137, ISSN  0033-2909 , online (PDF; 3.7 MB) , review .
• Allan and Barbara Pease: Why men don't listen and women don't park properly: very natural explanations for weaknesses that are actually inexplicable. Ullstein, Munich 2001, ISBN 3-550-07181-7 .
• Jörn Steigerwald, Daniela Watzke (Ed.): Stimulus - Imagination - Attention. On the excitement and control of the imagination in the classical age (1680-1830) . Königshausen & Neumann, Würzburg 2003, ISBN 3-8260-2313-7 .

Web links

• Results of the Wiseman experiment at the Edinburgh Science Festival 2005 scienceticker.info, April 12, 2005
• Female intuition male, isn't it? (Report on the Wiseman study with sample image pairs) science.ORF.at, April 13, 2005
• Typically man, typically woman - male logic and female intuition egonet.de, published in October 2000
• Barbara Drescher: Women's Intuition and Other Facts of Life. James Randi Educational Foundation, accessed February 19, 2014 . 
• Ronald E. Riggio: Women's Intuition: Myth or Reality? Do women have some special ability? Psychology Today , July 14, 2011, accessed February 19, 2014 . 

Individual evidence

1. ^ Matthew D. Lieberman: Intuition: A Social Cognitive Neuroscience Approach. (PDF 3.49 MB) SCN Lab of Matthew D. Lieberman, 2000, accessed on February 22, 2014 (English). 
2. ↑ Steve Connor: The myth of female intuition exploded by fake smile test. The Independent, February 12, 2005; archived from the original on February 19, 2014 ; accessed on September 28, 2018 (English). 
3. ↑ Course program of the VHS Konstanz, 2005/06
4. ↑ Quoted from q: en: Margaret Mead # Blackberry Winter, 1972
5. ↑ Jörn Steigerwald: Male enlightenment and the female imagination. In: RUBIN 1/2002. Press office, Ruhr-Universitaet Bochum, June 5, 2002, accessed on February 19, 2014 .