The Sexual Paradox: Men, Women and the Real Gender GapSusan Pinker, psychologist and award-winning columnist, has written a groundbreaking and controversial book that reveals why learning and behavioral gaps between boys and girls in the classroom are reversed in the workplace. Pinker examines how fundamental sex differences play out over the life span. By comparing fragile boys who succeed later with high-achieving women who opt out or plateau in their careers, Pinker turns several assumptions upside down: that women and men are biologically equivalent, that intelligence is all it takes to succeed, and that women are just versions of men, with identical interests and goals. In lively prose, Pinker guides readers through the latest findings in neuroscience and economics while addressing these questions: Are males the more fragile sex? What do men with Asperger syndrome or dyslexia tell us about more average men? Which sex is the happiest at work? Why do some male college dropouts earn more than the bright girls who sat beside them in third grade? After three decades of women's educational coups, why do men outnumber women in corporate law, engineering, physical science, and politics? The answers to these questions are the opposite of what we expect. A provocative examination of how and why learning and behavioral gaps in the nursery are reversed in the boardroom, this illuminating book reveals how sex differences influence career choices and ambition. Through the stories of real men and women, science, and examples from popular culture, Susan Pinker takes a new look at the differences between women and men. |
What people are saying - Write a review
LibraryThing Review
User Review - urduha - LibraryThingIf you needed more proof that you really can't change your husband into a more considerate, warm and caring partner, this book provides it. I don't completely buy conclusions, but interesting read nonetheless. Read full review
THE SEXUAL PARADOX: Men, Women, and the Real Gender Gap
User Review - Jane Doe - KirkusCanadian psychologist and Globe and Mail columnist Pinker crafts a biologically based and sure-to-be-controversial examination of sex differences between "fragile men" and gifted women who opt out of ... Read full review
Contents
| 1 | |
| 19 | |
Chapter 2 | 38 |
Chapter 3 | 62 |
Chapter 4 | 92 |
Revenge of the Nerds | 126 |
Chapter 6 | 157 |
Chapter 7 | 183 |
Other editions - View all
The Sexual Paradox: Extreme Men, Gifted Women and the Real Gender Gap Susan Pinker Limited preview - 2010 |
The Sexual Paradox: Extreme Men, Gifted Women and the Real Gender Gap Susan Pinker Limited preview - 2008 |
Common terms and phrases
ability academic achievement ADHD adults aggression Alice Eagly American asked Asperger syndrome Attention Deficit autism autistic spectrum average babies behavior benefits biological boys careers child choices choose cognitive compete competitive Daniel Darwin Awards didn’t disabilities disorder dyslexia dyslexic earn effects Einstein emotions empathy ence engineering evolutionary expected extreme feel Female Brain fields figure find finding firm first fit five Gender Differences genes genetic gifted girls Globe and Mail graduate Harvard high school hormones human idea imposter influence interests journal language lawyers learning less levels look male math men’s mothers neural numbers office one’s oxytocin parents people’s percent physics problems professor profiled Psychology reading reflected risk Roy Baumeister Sandra Sandra Witelson scientific scientists sex differences Simon Baron-Cohen skills social someone Statistics success teachers testosterone there’s tion traits Uta Frith Witelson woman women York young
Popular passages
Page xii - ... made of chromosomal difference until it is manifested in development, and development cannot take place in a vacuum: from the outset our observation of the female is consciously and unconsciously biased by assumptions that we cannot help making and cannot always identify when they have been made. The new assumption behind the discussion of the body is that everything that we may observe could be otherwise.
Page 9 - Each of these is followed by a quote from one of her "magnificent extemporisations." Thus he says, "She can be breathtaking: "There is no female Mozart because there is no female Jack the Ripper.
Bibliographic information
| Title | The Sexual Paradox: Men, Women and the Real Gender Gap |
| Author | Susan Pinker |
| Publisher | Simon and Schuster, 2008 |
| ISBN | 1416554181, 9781416554189 |
| Length | 320 pages |
| Subjects | › Psychology / General Social Science / Gender Studies Social Science / General |
| Export Citation | BiBTeX EndNote RefMan |