differenceblog, posts by tag: self-assessment - LiveJournal

Kathryn "Kate" Graham, a researcher at the Canadian Institutes for Health Research (CIHR), has done a lot of research into gender differences in alcohol abuse. This week, Graham and Massak (2007) released results from a phone survey of over 14,000 Canadians about their use of alcohol and antidepressants. They found that while both depressed men and women drank more than their non-depressed counterparts, depressed men on anti-depressants did not drink significantly more than non-depressed women. This relationship was not true for depressed women. Based on the same survey, Graham et al (2007) found interesting patterns in the relationship between alcohol dependency and depression, suggesting that the mode of measuring each may explain many of the inconsistencies on literature on this subject.

Like previous studies we've looked at on alcohol use (see Girl Drinks, 10/3/06), Graham's study found large differences in the use of alcohol by men and women in general. For example, the greatest-drinking group of women (depressed women on anti-depressants) had on average 264 drinks per year, in comparison to the least-drinking group of men (depressed men on anti-depressants) who had 414. The CDC (2006) defines moderate drinking as 1 drink per day for women and 2 drinks per day for men, which is well within the range of the results of the survey. According to the National Survey on Drug Use and Health (2002), the average consumption in the U.S. is about 428 drinks/year for men, and 193 drinks/year for women (these figures estimated from drinks/day of drinking and days drinking/month figures - no per annum figures given).

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I have a personal rule that's served me well over the years. If I feel like I "need" a drink, I don't have one. Alcohol (for me, anyway) is a mood intensifier, not a mood enhancer. It's also very hard for me to keep the concept of "fairness" out of drinking once I start. It's not "fair" that I can't drink as long or as much as my friends (who tend to weigh 30-50 pounds more than I do). While my muscle mass has increased on testosterone, my alcohol tolerance hasn't, and my competitive streak seems to have gotten worse, so it's something I need to be aware of.

What do men exaggerate and women downplay? Their computer skills.

Eszter Hargittai and Steven Shafer put 51 women and 49 men through internet-use skill test, and found that the women consistently rated their skill lower than comparably skilled men. The skills test gave participants a number of subjects to research, and allowed them to search for the information however they saw fit (with the researcher watching over their shoulder).

Hargittai and Shafer found no statistically significant difference between actual skill levels for men and women. However, "not one woman thought of herself as an `expert' user, and not one man thought of himself as a complete novice." The sex of the researcher administering the survey and observing the web use was not mentioned, and that seems like an oversight. The survey about web use was administered orally to "establish rapport." It would be interesting to see how results differed with less face-to-face interaction with researchers, or with an interviewer of a different sex. As was demonstrated by research done by BMW, directions from a man and from a woman can be met with very different responses. A similar experiment, with male and female researchers and an incentive to perform well would likely yield different results.