Art appreciation 'a gender issue'

[Aitch]

Came across a story on the Beeb News site concerning gender differences in the appreciation of art (http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/health/7905251.stm).

Interesting, though it does contain what I thought was a gender stereotype:

"Men tend to solve navigation tasks by using orientation-based strategies involving distance concepts and cardinal directions, whereas women tend to base their activities on remembering the location of landmarks and relative directions, such as 'left from', or 'to the right of'."


I appear to navigate by the Ladies' method!

Small sample size, too.

Professor Francisco Ayala, from the University of California Irvine, and colleagues asked 10 men and 10 women to judge the beauty of artists paintings and photographs of urban and rural landscapes.


Anyone like to comment on the article?

[TobiasTheViking]

I navigate like a woman as well

[The Central Scrutinizer]

I navigate like a woman as well

That's because you're gay.

[calebprime]

I navigate like a woman as well

Me, too.

I'm not gay, I'm just sensitive. Or maybe I was dropped on my head when I was a baby. Or maybe all of my brain that should be devoted to maps of the world has been occupied by arcane fretboard, keyboard, notated "maps".

I'm special.

[Modified]

I navigate like a woman as well

I think most people navigate using landmarks, but that does you no good when you have to find a new route.

[Soapy Sam]

Toby's not gay. He's a throwback to Viking times when everybody navigated like that, because nobody had figured out where the lines of latitude were and maps had east at the top.

Or was that Dwarves?

I do navigate by reference to north etc, which is why I get loast a lot in town.
The GF literally can't tell left from right, to the extent that if I'm driving a route she knows and she tells me to go left, I go right automatically. I'm right 3 times out of 4, but it's still my fault for not asking for directions.

Her taste in art is wierd too, but then she can actually paint and I can't.

[timhau]

I use cardinal directions. That's why I love Manhattan, from 14th Street up.

[ZirconBlue]

I use cardinal directions.

I prefer to navigate "as the crow flies".;)

[Tsukasa Buddha]

I navigate like a girl >< .

[Miss_Kitt]

Lots of gender differences are hard to establish; the studies are few, the sample sizes tend to be small, and it's hard to separate nature from nurture effects.

I am more interested in following what kind of landmarks people use: Women often use shopping centers or stores as landmarks; men more often use physical structures like bridges or a building of a particular shape (rather than the store name) in my experience.

I mostly navigate by cardinal directions, and I have a ridiculous memory for routes I've taken. Plus, I have a decent sense of how far I've travelled in any given direction. I think most people use landmarks in urban settings, because when you're dealing with heavy traffic it's hard to keep track of actual distance travelled, etc.

Just my thoughts, MK

[Tiktaalik]

I navigate with a Garmin Nuvi. Is that male or female?

[Steven Howard]

I certainly don't navigate by "orientation-based strategies involving distance concepts and cardinal directions." I'm not even sure what that means, but it sounds difficult. And yet, I'm also terrible at remembering the locations of landmarks and relative directions. My navigation strategy mainly involves Google maps, having other people in the car, and/or getting lost a lot.

[quixotecoyote]

I'm definitely a direction and distance guy.

It requires landmarks to some extant, but if I know "it's about that far in that direction," I'll find my way there eventually.

Really annoys the people who want to know where they are during the trip, though.

[bpesta22]

Lots of gender differences are hard to establish; the studies are few, the sample sizes tend to be small, and it's hard to separate nature from nurture effects.

Just my thoughts, MK

I disagree in that the literature on sex differences on many things is massive. I think you'd be hard pressed to find a topic more studied in psychology.

To the OP, 10 each seems cheesy but it looks like they strapped em up to a new fangled MRI, which then makes it more reasonable.

Not finding differences with only 20 subjects wouldn't tell you much, but since they did find differences, they had enough subjects! (I know that sounds circular but power is only a concern when no results are found).

I have some disdain for neuropsychologists who get all the glory just because they take pictures of the brain when a person does X. Not saying the research isn't potentially valuable, it just doesn't seem very clever.

Also, when deciding whether it's junk science, the NAS is pretty elite.

[Andre H]

Its easier to find by direction and relative length away. But I rarely navigate like that, because people mostly describes what turns to make and I get lost. Im not good with city.

[roger]

I navigate via the Monte Carlo Drunken Sailor's walk.

[tyr_13]

I certainly don't navigate by "orientation-based strategies involving distance concepts and cardinal directions." I'm not even sure what that means, but it sounds difficult. And yet, I'm also terrible at remembering the locations of landmarks and relative directions. My navigation strategy mainly involves Google maps, having other people in the car, and/or getting lost a lot.

I'll give you examples to make it clearer. One is something like, "get off I-86 at exit 14 and head south on route-60. When 60 crosses 394, turn west onto 394. You'll be on that for about two miles. Your destination will be north."

The other is like, "Get off at the exit with the Mc-Mobile, Holiday Inn, and Bob Evan's and go right. You'll go past the cemetery and a couple of schools. By the Family Video and Wilson Farms, turn right onto the one way with the Catholic church and the library. The road gets bad and bumpy and there is a bridge. After the bridge just keep straight. There's a light by Bridgotta's and it becomes a five lane road after that. Past the Mobile there is a light and on your right is the Sam's Club."

I tend to use a combo of both. I hate it when I'm only give street names as if I'm going to drive slow enough to read every damn sign only to be able to read it half a second before I pass it.

[Aitch]

OK, it's my fault - I started the navigation derail (in the OP, yet!:cool:).

Would anyone like to drag the thread back towards Art Appreciation?

For instance:
The researchers suggest that this is because women are contextualising the information and thinking more about the details of what they are seeing, assessing the position of objects according broad categories, such as "above" or "below", or "left" or "right".

The men, they say, are focussing on the overall image using a more precise form of mental mapping.

In this case, I think I do both. I don't think I'm a hermaphrodite...:confused:

[ImaginalDisc]

. . .power is only a concern when no results are found).

So by you. . ."logic". . . a sample size of two is acceptable when differences are found.

[Aitch]

To the OP, 10 each seems cheesy but it looks like they strapped em up to a new fangled MRI, which then makes it more reasonable.

Not finding differences with only 20 subjects wouldn't tell you much, but since they did find differences, they had enough subjects! (I know that sounds circular but power is only a concern when no results are found).


Couple of points:
1. I didn't say it was 'cheesy' (what the heck does that mean in this context?); I said it was a small sample. Which it is.

2. "but since they did find differences, they had enough subjects!". I don't think so. They may (unlikely, but...) have found an atypical sample group. With a (much) larger group, they may start to find people (like some of the posters on this thread) who seem to react in ways that don't fit in with their current findings.

[Elaedith]

I am female but I navigate more like a man I think. All I know is that I can't stand directions that go 'take the first left, then the second right'. I think about everything in spatial terms and want directions that translate into a cognitive map. Males are more likely to give directions I can understand than females.

[bpesta22]

So by you. . ."logic". . . a sample size of two is acceptable when differences are found.

I'm not sure any statistical test can be done with two people as there's no variance in the male and female "groups". So, no.

Having done this for awhile now, a common but misdirected complaint (in my opinion) is the use of small samples when the samples nonetheless produced significant results. Related to that is the follow up complaint that the use of small samples makes "generalizability" invalid.

I think both are wrong for reasons that would really derail the thread. So, small samples are fine when the data are significant, and generalizing results to the population of "real people" is rarely a concern for most studies in social science.

To the OP, sorry to put words in your mouth. I got the implication that the small sample size here makes you think the study is crappy (or cheesy as I put it).

[Cavemonster]

I'm not sure any statistical test can be done with two people as there's no variance in the male and female "groups". So, no.

Having done this for awhile now, a common but misdirected complaint (in my opinion) is the use of small samples when the samples nonetheless produced significant results. Related to that is the follow up complaint that the use of small samples makes "generalizability" invalid.

I think both are wrong for reasons that would really derail the thread. So, small samples are fine when the data are significant, and generalizing results to the population of "real people" is rarely a concern for most studies in social science.

To the OP, sorry to put words in your mouth. I got the implication that the small sample size here makes you think the study is crappy (or cheesy as I put it).

Small samples dramatically increase the likelihood of a "third factor" influencing the results.

If I wanted to study smoking among men and women, let's say my particular university had some strong straightedge click forming among a group of males who are friends. Suddenly it becomes, not unlikely that I could find in a study of 20 people, 9/10 females who smoke and 1/10 males.

Imagine that all studies done had 20 participants. Over the course of millions of studies, a weird little anomaly like the one mentioned above becomes not just a possibility, but a certainty. Over a large number of studies of that scale, you would be guaranteed to get some which seemed to show a strong correlation but were actually the result of some strange 3rd factor that it would be impossible to control for unless you had specific knowledge of it.

Even a sample size in the hundreds can easily lead to a false positive. That's why we normally wait for multiple studies with very large sample sizes to give much credence, especially within sociology/psychology.

[bpesta22]

Cave, I didn't really follow your smoking example, but I agree with the last part of what you wrote-- no one study means much til it's replicated. But, that's true whatever the sample size of the original study.

I'll let the behaviorists chime in but I think Skinner did some very nice science with small samples of rats. It's not the N size that's important, it's the degree of control the experimenter has over these third variables.

I'd rather have a small sample well controlled lab study over a huge sample uncontrolled field study, for example.

Here though we're only trying to establish a sex difference. Finding persons-who don't fit the pattern aren't really relevant (seems anecdotal). To the extent that people find this area interesting, I think the authors did enough to show the difference is worth further investigating (and the NAS seems to agree), and that the conclusion of a sex difference seems reasonable, but as always, needs replication.

One doesn't need a difference where every member of group x scores different from every member of group y for the difference to have meaning.

[bpesta22]

I think I do understand your example now, Cave. A "yes" I smoke / "no" I don't measure as a DV is vastly different from what I imagine are multiple and numerous and detailed measures of brain activation for each of the 20 subjects in the OP article. Deciding to smoke or not seems much more controlled by external factors than would be which area of the brain lights up when I evaluate art.

Plus, if you keep the proportionally of your stacked-deck example, the same problem would exist with any sample size.

Plus, there's a massive literature on sex differences in spatial perception which seems consistent with what the authors claim re navigation skills.

[ImaginalDisc]

I'm not sure any statistical test can be done with two people as there's no variance in the male and female "groups". So, no.

Having done this for awhile now, a common but misdirected complaint (in my opinion) is the use of small samples when the samples nonetheless produced significant results. Related to that is the follow up complaint that the use of small samples makes "generalizability" invalid.

I think both are wrong for reasons that would really derail the thread. So, small samples are fine when the data are significant, and generalizing results to the population of "real people" is rarely a concern for most studies in social science.

To the OP, sorry to put words in your mouth. I got the implication that the small sample size here makes you think the study is crappy (or cheesy as I put it).

So were you wrong before, or are you wrong now?

[Cavemonster]

I think I do understand your example now, Cave. A "yes" I smoke / "no" I don't measure as a DV is vastly different from what I imagine are multiple and numerous and detailed measures of brain activation for each of the 20 subjects in the OP article. Deciding to smoke or not seems much more controlled by external factors than would be which area of the brain lights up when I evaluate art.

Plus, if you keep the proportionally of your stacked-deck example, the same problem would exist with any sample size.

Plus, there's a massive literature on sex differences in spatial perception which seems consistent with what the authors claim re navigation skills.

What if, at that same university, there were very strong men's athletics and weaker or nonexistent women's programs, therefore, in that setting, you stood a good chance of getting 10/10 male athletes and 0/10 female athletes

The constant practice of watching a small ball in a large field can have serious effects on your spatial thinking. that's just one random example. There are an infinite number of 3rd factors that can influence spatial thinking. The larger a study size, the more the likelihood of these factors influencing the results shrinks.

[bpesta22]

So were you wrong before, or are you wrong now?

Compelling counter argument!

[Elaedith]

What if, at that same university, there were very strong men's athletics and weaker or nonexistent women's programs, therefore, in that setting, you stood a good chance of getting 10/10 male athletes and 0/10 female athletes

The constant practice of watching a small ball in a large field can have serious effects on your spatial thinking. that's just one random example. There are an infinite number of 3rd factors that can influence spatial thinking. The larger a study size, the more the likelihood of these factors influencing the results shrinks.

If there is a systematic confound, it will still be present with a larger sample. The effect of the '3rd factor' will remain and the probability of finding a significant difference between the groups as a result of this confound will increase as the sample size increases due to a rise in power. An increase in sample size will result in a small effect eventually being significant regardless of what is causing the effect (including a 3rd factor). With a big enough sample a difference that is trivial in size and has no important implications even if genuine, will become statistically significant.

The probability of obtaining a difference between two groups due to random bias or error in sampling is higher with a smaller sample size. The probability of this effect being statistically significant, does not increase, because statistical tests take sample size into consideration. Therefore, to get a statistically significant effect with a very small sample the effect must have been extremely large, and / or the variation within each group very small. Regardless, if the probability of getting such an outcome by random error or chance is less than 5% (which is all the test tells you), then the sample size is irrelevant to this conclusion. Why the result occurred (innate difference, environmental factors, or confounding variable) is a completely separate issue and cannot be addressed by statistical significance or sample size.

[bpesta22]

What if, at that same university, there were very strong men's athletics and weaker or nonexistent women's programs, therefore, in that setting, you stood a good chance of getting 10/10 male athletes and 0/10 female athletes

The constant practice of watching a small ball in a large field can have serious effects on your spatial thinking. that's just one random example. There are an infinite number of 3rd factors that can influence spatial thinking. The larger a study size, the more the likelihood of these factors influencing the results shrinks.

These third factors are only error variance unless they systematically vary with males and females.

Plus, it's also possible the cause is reversed-- people with the innate ability to track small balls in large fields are more likely to play sports where that's important.

I'm not disagreeing with most of what you say, I just think small sample studies get a bad rap. All of the criticisms of them apply to studies with larger samples as well.

In this specific study, I'm guessing it's very expensive to run people on that machine. Running thousands when 20 gets results would seem to be a massive waste of resources, esp. when the results of any one study would be subject to replication before it's relied on.

[bpesta22]

I think Ela nailed it. My apologies for not being as clear / non-arrogant (?) as her.

[bpesta22]

Compelling counter argument!

I read your reply as you are wrong before AND are wrong now, which is why I replied with the above.

I see now it was an OR. I'm sorry but I don't see the contradiction across my replies. Feel free to point it out.

[gumboot]

I use a multitude of navigation methods. And in my experience, both men and women are equally incompetent at following directions. But models are worst.

[timhau]

And in my experience, both men and women are equally incompetent at following directions.

People are, in general, even worse in giving directions. That's why I never ask for them (unless I know I'm within a city block of the spot I want to find, and just can't find the entrance). I ask them to point where we are on a map, and if they can do that, I just ask something that helps me with general orientation (such as "Which way is uptown?" or "Where is the Tiber?").

[Seanette]

I tend to go by landmarks. Telling me "go north X amount, then turn east" doesn't always help me much (I now own my late FIL's GPS, which does help. Doesn't talk, but that arrow on the screen gets the job done). Telling me "turn right at X business or distinctive building" is useful.

I also suffer from NoSenseOfDirection, to the point that I once got lost on a college campus I visited in high school. With a map in my hand. Here in Sacramento, I avoid the I-80 unless I have a passenger who's better at navigating than I am, since when I do take that freeway, I have a tendency to wind up in the wrong county.

[ZirconBlue]

How does the Dirk Gently method (find someone who looks like they know where they're going and follow them) fit in?

[Aitch]

It would appear that some people believe that women's art is different from men's, or that they have their own artistic language (http://www.ft.com/cms/s/2/6de9f870-09dd-11de-add8-0000779fd2ac.html).

I'm not that impressed by the article - it appears to be a cross between feminist art theory and conceptual ************. But I could be wrong. :eek:

[zooterkin]

I'll give you examples to make it clearer. One is something like, "get off I-86 at exit 14 and head south on route-60. When 60 crosses 394, turn west onto 394. You'll be on that for about two miles. Your destination will be north."

That's what I took that description to mean, too. I'd say that method of navigation only works in certain countries, which tend to have roads laid out in a North/South, East/West grid (and even then it falls down; I remember trying to work out which way was North on the highway I had to join, since at the point I was joining the road it was actually laid out East/West).


The other is like, "Get off at the exit with the Mc-Mobile, Holiday Inn, and Bob Evan's and go right. You'll go past the cemetery and a couple of schools. By the Family Video and Wilson Farms, turn right onto the one way with the Catholic church and the library. The road gets bad and bumpy and there is a bridge. After the bridge just keep straight. There's a light by Bridgotta's and it becomes a five lane road after that. Past the Mobile there is a light and on your right is the Sam's Club."

Possibly one gender difference would be the choice of landmarks. In the UK, it would be very common for men to give directions using pubs as landmarks; probably less common for women to do so.

I tend to use a combo of both. I hate it when I'm only give street names as if I'm going to drive slow enough to read every damn sign only to be able to read it half a second before I pass it.
I honestly couldn't give you the last 4 street names before you got to my house, and I've been there nearly 4 years, but I could describe the junctions and give a rough guide to the distance. No idea about the compass directions, but given that none of the roads is straight it wouldn't help anyway.

[soylent]

Another lady here, apparently.

I use cardinal directions. That's why I love Manhattan, from 14th Street up.

Do you also measure distances with the taxicab metric?

[ZirconBlue]

Sorry, Aitch. Apparently most of us find the "navigation" topic more interesting than the "art appreciation" topic.;)

[Aitch]

Sorry, Aitch. Apparently most of us find the "navigation" topic more interesting than the "art appreciation" topic.;)

Fair enough - is there a Cars and Navigation folder to move to? :rolleyes: