He's Not as Smart as He Thinks

Reference

Raymond, J. (2008, January 23). He’s not as smart as he thinks. Newsweek. Retrieved March 30, 2011 from http://www.newsweek.com

Summary

In the article, the author talked about the difference between men and women. He mentioned that the men thought they are smarter than the women, but the researchers proved that they were equal in terms of IQ. The writer made an interview with Adrian Furnham, a professor of psychology, to investigate about this subject. According to the author, the professor said that the men got higher score on some skills such as spatial awareness, but the women got higher score in language development and emotional intelligence. Moreover, 30 international studies proved that the men overstated their intelligence when the women underplay it. Also, he mentioned two factors that were affecting perception which are the male hubris and female humility, and distribution of IQ. He showed that the men and the women thought the men were smarter across generations. Also, they thought their sons were smarter than their daughters. He discussed how parents sent wrong messages to their children about their abilities. When the professor saw the results of some schools, he found that girls did better than the boys, but the men and women thought the opposite. He mentioned that the men were more confident about their skills, so they thought that they were more clever and smarter. According to the author, the abilities or effort increases self-esteem, so the self-esteem training and therapy are not a good idea. He mentioned that the people always have a strong feeling about intelligence and gender.

Reaction

I enjoyed this article because it is an interesting subject. Before I read this article, I thought that the men are more intelligent than the women because Saudi Arabia is a closed society, so the men are responsible about everything and the women just take care of the house and children. Therefore, the men are showing up their abilities to do everything, and the women just sit at home and do some little work, so the men become smarter than the women in this point, or this point shows you why some people think that the men are smarter than the women. After I read this article, I changed my mind, and I agreed with the author. Based on what I read, the men and women are equal. Moreover, some research studies show that the women are outperforming the men. In Saudi Arabia, you can find that the girls are doing better than the boys in the school, and this is similar to what the author said. Therefore, when you think about this topic, you will find that the men are intelligent in some things and the women are intelligent in other things, so the results will be equal between the men and the women. The last thing that I want to mention is arrogance. We do not have to be arrogant even if we are smarter than the other, but we could be more confident about our IQ. That is not wrong. In conclusion, I believe that if the men are smarter than the women, there will not be successful women, but that is not true because there are a lot of successful women who lead the world in different fields. There is an Arabic proverb that says “there is a great woman behind every great man”.

BJ...