5 ms·

The abstract mentions women self-assess more accurately than men. As a man and thinking about my own mindset with self assessment, I wonder if the definition of

by tjs8rj 6y ago

The abstract mentions women self-assess more accurately than men. As a man and thinking about my own mindset with self assessment, I wonder if the definition of “self-assessment” itself might differ between men and women on average. For myself, if you ask me to do a task in a discipline I know little about, I might assess myself as being capable of doing so even without the prior experience, because I figure “I can figure it out reasonably well on the fly”. This is a convoluted way of saying men may just be overconfident, but importantly not because we assume we k ow everything, but because we are more confident we can learn it even if we don’t know it. Maybe me writing all this while self-assessing myself is yet more male self-assessment hubris...

colineartheta 6y ago
No offense, but this mostly just reads as very sexist. >...we are more confident we can learn it even if we don’t know it. I’m confident women can learn things they aren’t familiar with, and as quickly as a man can. Your whole comment reeks of bias, actually.
- kortilla 6y ago
  Read it again. The comment you are mindlessly bashing is talking about men having more confidence in the ability to learn on the fly, not having more ability to learn on the fly.
  - colineartheta 6y ago
    I’m not mindlessly bashing anything, I’m speaking up about mindless sexism. You should read it again from the perspective that men and and women are equal, and that “men having more confidence” is a damaging psychology to have (sexist).
    - cutemonster 6y ago
      > from the perspective that men and and women are equal Do you mean "identical"? I wonder what makes you think that men and women would function precisely the same? (Apart from physical things) People can be different, but still be equal (as in equality)
- d3ckard 6y ago
  He didn’t say they can’t learn things, he said they are less confident. He actually used the word “hubris” while describing men. Stop making it into sexism, it’s the opposite if anything.
  - colineartheta 6y ago
    How is it the opposite? His claim is that women lack confidence, something I’m confident is false. Even giving the benefit of the doubt - that men are simply “more confident” - is sexist and frankly untrue, which is what I said originally. It’s people like you, and him, that make it difficult for women to with these damaging, blanket assumptions that you just take to be true.
watwut 6y ago
No, it is not different definition. Women think they can learn things too. However, if you ask them how good they are in something or whether they already know it, they are more likely to provide accurate answer. Also true story: if I am solving a problem and ask dude whether he knows the solution, he says yes I do, takes away my keyboard, starts googling and then refuses to return keyboard back, it is serious wtf annoying. Also, people react different to overconfidence from woman - in my repeated experience, if woman claims she can do something technical she then starts figuring it on the fly, she will be butt of jokes. I mean, I cant figure technical stuff out on the fly in presence of some people, cause they will seriously mess into it.
- psysharp 6y ago
  The problem in the middle can also be explained by him treating your question as rhetorical instead of as an actual question
- nsonha 6y ago
  As a man I did the take away keyboard thing many times in the past. In SOME of the instances the people asked for help were incompetent. Regardless, I think a better approach should be spending time helping them do it themselves instead.
  - watwut 6y ago
    In that particular situation, saying "no I don't know" would be only acceptable behavior, imo. If I am asking for my keyboard back, I should not have to physicality touch or fight you to get it back. Regardless of what you think about me.
    - Agenttin 6y ago
      We're all just really smart monkeys here, and communication is complicated. "He's always trying to fix things when I just want to talk" is this same interaction just in a home context. Same communication error. There's a gap, you're saying "Do you know, at this moment, how to do this" to which the answer is clearly no. However, men are hearing "Can you solve this problem for me". Giving you back the keyboard means admitting that I failed to fix it. EDIT: In my head, I feel like you've given up on the idea that I can help you, and you're probably going to go find someone smarter and more competent than me. In this context, a guy who doesn't want to give the keyboard back is afraid of admitting failure.
finjo 6y ago
I don't know how they conducted the experiment, but they mention something about a science assessment. If you ask about math and science, men are going to believe they're more competent than they actually are because they've been socialized to believe they're better at it. If they asked about cooking or cleaning, you'd probably get the opposite reaction. Of course men aren't inherently better at math nor are women better at cleaning. It's just that we socialize them to think they are.
- etripe 6y ago
  > men are going to believe they're more competent ... because they've been socialized to believe they're better at it. That's one of the central dogmatic feminist talking points that are just spouted off uncritically, along with other things men are supposedly socialised for, like wage negotiation and preferences for violence, taking up space and technical subject matter. Included is the starting position that women and men are the same and if women are perceived to be behind, it's because something was done to them irrespective of their own agency and accountability as individuals and adults. It's a conspiracy theory, and an infantilising one at that. In social sciences, this becomes social and/or (modern) historical determinism, leaning heavily towards assuming everything's a construct and caused by historical precedent, ignoring biology (other animals, hormones, sexual attraction, evolution), long-term history and global invariability of gender roles. Sure, that's a feel good narrative, but is it a rational stance supported by evidence? > If they asked about cooking or cleaning, you'd probably get the opposite reaction. If this is about socialisation, the simpler explanation is that men are socialised to project confidence, because that's what romantically/sexually rewarded. The link towards granular, per-topic confidence is more tenuous and requires you accept a lot of feminist baggage at face value or provide an alternate explanation. > Of course men aren't inherently better at math nor are women better at cleaning. No, but perhaps they are more interested in maths by virtue of the topic itself, or due to ancillary effects like future status and wages, like women are more interested in nesting than men. Similarly, men are generally more drawn to the concepts of service and duty than women are, which is why vastly more men work logistics, manufacturing, law enforcement, fire departments and the military. Personally, I find feminist axioms to be a very poor predictor of reality because they fail to account for mating strategies, personal choice, responsibility and preference - which is ironic for a movement that was initially about women's choices in the reproductive sphere.

by tjs8rj 6y ago

colineartheta 6y ago

No offense, but this mostly just reads as very sexist. >...we are more confident we can learn it even if we don’t know it. I’m confident women can learn things they aren’t familiar with, and as quickly as a man can. Your whole comment reeks of bias, actually.

kortilla 6y ago
Read it again. The comment you are mindlessly bashing is talking about men having more confidence in the ability to learn on the fly, not having more ability to learn on the fly.
- colineartheta 6y ago
  I’m not mindlessly bashing anything, I’m speaking up about mindless sexism. You should read it again from the perspective that men and and women are equal, and that “men having more confidence” is a damaging psychology to have (sexist).
  - cutemonster 6y ago
    > from the perspective that men and and women are equal Do you mean "identical"? I wonder what makes you think that men and women would function precisely the same? (Apart from physical things) People can be different, but still be equal (as in equality)
d3ckard 6y ago
He didn’t say they can’t learn things, he said they are less confident. He actually used the word “hubris” while describing men. Stop making it into sexism, it’s the opposite if anything.
- colineartheta 6y ago
  How is it the opposite? His claim is that women lack confidence, something I’m confident is false. Even giving the benefit of the doubt - that men are simply “more confident” - is sexist and frankly untrue, which is what I said originally. It’s people like you, and him, that make it difficult for women to with these damaging, blanket assumptions that you just take to be true.

watwut 6y ago

No, it is not different definition. Women think they can learn things too. However, if you ask them how good they are in something or whether they already know it, they are more likely to provide accurate answer. Also true story: if I am solving a problem and ask dude whether he knows the solution, he says yes I do, takes away my keyboard, starts googling and then refuses to return keyboard back, it is serious wtf annoying. Also, people react different to overconfidence from woman - in my repeated experience, if woman claims she can do something technical she then starts figuring it on the fly, she will be butt of jokes. I mean, I cant figure technical stuff out on the fly in presence of some people, cause they will seriously mess into it.

psysharp 6y ago
The problem in the middle can also be explained by him treating your question as rhetorical instead of as an actual question
nsonha 6y ago
As a man I did the take away keyboard thing many times in the past. In SOME of the instances the people asked for help were incompetent. Regardless, I think a better approach should be spending time helping them do it themselves instead.
- watwut 6y ago
  In that particular situation, saying "no I don't know" would be only acceptable behavior, imo. If I am asking for my keyboard back, I should not have to physicality touch or fight you to get it back. Regardless of what you think about me.
  - Agenttin 6y ago
    We're all just really smart monkeys here, and communication is complicated. "He's always trying to fix things when I just want to talk" is this same interaction just in a home context. Same communication error. There's a gap, you're saying "Do you know, at this moment, how to do this" to which the answer is clearly no. However, men are hearing "Can you solve this problem for me". Giving you back the keyboard means admitting that I failed to fix it. EDIT: In my head, I feel like you've given up on the idea that I can help you, and you're probably going to go find someone smarter and more competent than me. In this context, a guy who doesn't want to give the keyboard back is afraid of admitting failure.

finjo 6y ago

I don't know how they conducted the experiment, but they mention something about a science assessment. If you ask about math and science, men are going to believe they're more competent than they actually are because they've been socialized to believe they're better at it. If they asked about cooking or cleaning, you'd probably get the opposite reaction. Of course men aren't inherently better at math nor are women better at cleaning. It's just that we socialize them to think they are.

etripe 6y ago
> men are going to believe they're more competent ... because they've been socialized to believe they're better at it. That's one of the central dogmatic feminist talking points that are just spouted off uncritically, along with other things men are supposedly socialised for, like wage negotiation and preferences for violence, taking up space and technical subject matter. Included is the starting position that women and men are the same and if women are perceived to be behind, it's because something was done to them irrespective of their own agency and accountability as individuals and adults. It's a conspiracy theory, and an infantilising one at that. In social sciences, this becomes social and/or (modern) historical determinism, leaning heavily towards assuming everything's a construct and caused by historical precedent, ignoring biology (other animals, hormones, sexual attraction, evolution), long-term history and global invariability of gender roles. Sure, that's a feel good narrative, but is it a rational stance supported by evidence? > If they asked about cooking or cleaning, you'd probably get the opposite reaction. If this is about socialisation, the simpler explanation is that men are socialised to project confidence, because that's what romantically/sexually rewarded. The link towards granular, per-topic confidence is more tenuous and requires you accept a lot of feminist baggage at face value or provide an alternate explanation. > Of course men aren't inherently better at math nor are women better at cleaning. No, but perhaps they are more interested in maths by virtue of the topic itself, or due to ancillary effects like future status and wages, like women are more interested in nesting than men. Similarly, men are generally more drawn to the concepts of service and duty than women are, which is why vastly more men work logistics, manufacturing, law enforcement, fire departments and the military. Personally, I find feminist axioms to be a very poor predictor of reality because they fail to account for mating strategies, personal choice, responsibility and preference - which is ironic for a movement that was initially about women's choices in the reproductive sphere.