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This is interesting, but I feel like it isn't as thorough as I would like. Men and women speak differently in ways that can't be masked by voice modulation and

This is interesting, but I feel like it isn't as thorough as I would like. Men and women speak differently in ways that can't be masked by voice modulation and I suspect that phrasing, choice of vocabulary, intonation etc. also play a role in how people are perceived. My hypothesis would be that men are more familiar with how men speak, so if a woman also spoke like that, they would see an improvement. I'm not saying my prediction would definitely be correct, but I think it is an obvious one to consider and this post didn't attempt to address it.

wetpaws 8y ago
Did you just assume the way people speak is influenced by their gender?
- wcarron 8y ago
  Is your comment satire?
  - AckSyn 8y ago
    I'm going out on a limb here but I think they were serious in a way that's bad.
  - wetpaws 8y ago
    https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Poe%27s_law https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Poe%27s_law
travisoneill1 8y ago
Thorough enough to make the person on the other side of the phone think they were talking to the intended gender. The point of the experiment is to control for gender, not other factors like style of speech. That would need a separate test.
DoreenMichele 8y ago
One day recently, my oldest commented on his observations that when he picks up food at the deli for us, he and other men say things like "Give me half a pound of potatoes." Women typically say things like "Can I have..." They sound like they are asking permission to eat even though they are a paying customer. My experience is that other people are weirded out when I talk in an empowered fashion like a man. Some people give me push back over that because sexism is alive and well. So it isn't a slam dunk cure for a woman to learn manly phrasing. But, yes, I think you are correct that men and women typically phrase things differently, so masking the voice is insufficient.
- daenz 8y ago
  My experience has been that people are weirded when someone talks from a non-natural perspective. I've met many women who talk naturally in a confident and assertive way, and it doesn't feel like they're forcing it, or telling themselves "I'm going to try to sound like an empowered man when I say this." It just seems to fit holistically in the situation. I personally get push back when I try to sound more confident than I actually am on an issue, vs when I actually am very confident on an issue. People seem to be good detectors of subtle cues. So I guess my point is, are you only noticing it when you are testing for it?
  - DoreenMichele 8y ago
    That sentence could probably use some sort of proviso. I don't mean all people, all the time and I certainly am not testing for anything. I'm just living my life and periodically run into push back over things I had no idea would get some kind of reaction when I did them. I had a corporate job for 5.25 years. My department had around 500 people in it. I routinely sat up front in large meetings, in part because I have terrible eyesight. One day, the highest ranked woman in my department said to the guy who was her only equal in rank "Look at Doreen, sitting up front." I don't sit up front to signal aggressive type A personality stuff or ambition or whatever, but other people interpret it that way. I went to GIS Summer School, an 8 week program that covered a normally year long certificate. It's a two thirds male field and most classes were two thirds male. The last week of this program, I realized that I was the only woman who routinely sat up front. Most women sat in the last two rows of class. I'm routinely interpreted as highly aggressive and pushy for doing things that are totally normal and completely unremarkable when men do them. It's fine if a guy does it. It's normal for men to sit up front. No one accuses them of anything for not hiding themselves away in the back row seats. But it gets a fair amount of attention for me to sit up front, and not in a good way. This was viewed by the highest ranked woman in my department as noteworthy and she said it in front of a bunch of people loud enough for me and everyone else there to hear. She didn't discuss it with her equal privately nor comment on it to me privately. You could interpret that as a rebuke, like "how dare she do that!" You could also interpret it as a shocked reaction by a woman who is presumably a great deal more empowered than most people regardless of gender, yet could not imagine doing anything as daring as sitting up front, apparently. She also got very defensive when I said my sons had taken over the housework and cooking. Her husband followed her from another state so she could take the job, but she still did most of the women's work at home. Most of my female colleagues were shocked that my sons took over the housework and cooking at home after I went from homemaker to primary breadwinner.

wetpaws 8y ago

Did you just assume the way people speak is influenced by their gender?

wcarron 8y ago
Is your comment satire?
- AckSyn 8y ago
  I'm going out on a limb here but I think they were serious in a way that's bad.
- wetpaws 8y ago
  https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Poe%27s_law https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Poe%27s_law

travisoneill1 8y ago

Thorough enough to make the person on the other side of the phone think they were talking to the intended gender. The point of the experiment is to control for gender, not other factors like style of speech. That would need a separate test.

DoreenMichele 8y ago

One day recently, my oldest commented on his observations that when he picks up food at the deli for us, he and other men say things like "Give me half a pound of potatoes." Women typically say things like "Can I have..." They sound like they are asking permission to eat even though they are a paying customer. My experience is that other people are weirded out when I talk in an empowered fashion like a man. Some people give me push back over that because sexism is alive and well. So it isn't a slam dunk cure for a woman to learn manly phrasing. But, yes, I think you are correct that men and women typically phrase things differently, so masking the voice is insufficient.

daenz 8y ago
My experience has been that people are weirded when someone talks from a non-natural perspective. I've met many women who talk naturally in a confident and assertive way, and it doesn't feel like they're forcing it, or telling themselves "I'm going to try to sound like an empowered man when I say this." It just seems to fit holistically in the situation. I personally get push back when I try to sound more confident than I actually am on an issue, vs when I actually am very confident on an issue. People seem to be good detectors of subtle cues. So I guess my point is, are you only noticing it when you are testing for it?
- DoreenMichele 8y ago
  That sentence could probably use some sort of proviso. I don't mean all people, all the time and I certainly am not testing for anything. I'm just living my life and periodically run into push back over things I had no idea would get some kind of reaction when I did them. I had a corporate job for 5.25 years. My department had around 500 people in it. I routinely sat up front in large meetings, in part because I have terrible eyesight. One day, the highest ranked woman in my department said to the guy who was her only equal in rank "Look at Doreen, sitting up front." I don't sit up front to signal aggressive type A personality stuff or ambition or whatever, but other people interpret it that way. I went to GIS Summer School, an 8 week program that covered a normally year long certificate. It's a two thirds male field and most classes were two thirds male. The last week of this program, I realized that I was the only woman who routinely sat up front. Most women sat in the last two rows of class. I'm routinely interpreted as highly aggressive and pushy for doing things that are totally normal and completely unremarkable when men do them. It's fine if a guy does it. It's normal for men to sit up front. No one accuses them of anything for not hiding themselves away in the back row seats. But it gets a fair amount of attention for me to sit up front, and not in a good way. This was viewed by the highest ranked woman in my department as noteworthy and she said it in front of a bunch of people loud enough for me and everyone else there to hear. She didn't discuss it with her equal privately nor comment on it to me privately. You could interpret that as a rebuke, like "how dare she do that!" You could also interpret it as a shocked reaction by a woman who is presumably a great deal more empowered than most people regardless of gender, yet could not imagine doing anything as daring as sitting up front, apparently. She also got very defensive when I said my sons had taken over the housework and cooking. Her husband followed her from another state so she could take the job, but she still did most of the women's work at home. Most of my female colleagues were shocked that my sons took over the housework and cooking at home after I went from homemaker to primary breadwinner.