Battle of the Sexes: Men vs. Women on Vision

As an educator I am always the first to admit that my students teach me as much as I teach them (or at least hope to teach them), and this post is one of those examples as it is inspired by information that one of my Fall 2018 Introduction to Anthropology students shared with me.  I promised that student that I would look into this matter further as I was unfamiliar with it, and, to be honest, I had my doubts as to its legitimacy.  While the semester is now over it is better late than never (another comment I make to students) in regards to finally looking into the matter: do men and women differ biologically in regards to vision, and if so, to what extent?

Figure 1: Color vocabulary differences by sex/gender (Source: Ayman, 2017)

Anthropologically, we know that culture does play a role in the degree to which an individual recognizes color (Figure 1).  My dad jokes that my stepmother does not like going shopping with him because he never gets the colors right when she asked for a new article of clothing to try on (e.g. “Can you get me the magenta blouse?” and my dad returns with the maroon one).  At least in American (and many Western) culture(s) we can easily see these subtle color differences by looking at the color choices available in men’s versus women’s clothing (or for a real challenge, try picking out paint colors with someone of the opposite sex-note, not an exercise for the faint of heart).  Other studies have demonstrated that other cultures who put less emphasis on color differences (as evidenced in the lexicon of their language) there will not be a stark difference between males and females when it comes to color differentiation. 

The cultural differences in color identification are well known, but scholars focused more on biology were concerned about the overemphasis on the role of culture in this matter and sought to evaluate the potential biological contributions to this matter.  Two studies by Israel Abramov et al. utilizing a sample of American high school, college (undergraduate and graduate) students, and faculty members at Brooklyn College demonstrated statistically significant differences between men and women regarding their abilities to differentiate colors and to identify spatio-temporal variations.  Their research demonstrated that women are better able to distinguish color variations, often times seeing brighter colors than men.  Abramov and team believe this may be related to the fact that color genes are found on the X-chromosome, which could assist women (who have two X-chromosomes) and hinders men (who only have one X-chromosome).  It is well known in biology and medicine that genetically inherited color blindness is more common in men than women because this trait is a recessive one, and the presence of only one X-chromosome in men increase their likelihood of being color blind.  Unfortunately, the researchers could not sufficiently relate the differences in color differentiation to genetics, although their research seems to suggest as much.  They called for additional study on this matter.

Whereas women are better able to distinguish colors men are better able to identify spatio-temporal differences.  In other words, men are able to see color changes over greater distances as well as better adept at noticing movement (as a result).  This difference they attributed to our hominid ancestors and the roles that men and women took-withmen as hunter and women as gatherer.  Abramov et al. claimed that men as hunters would have a greater need to see over longer distances in order to identify potential prey and predators (so they do not become prey), which is a portion of their article that many popular science writers picked up on.  Unfortunately, Abramov et al. noted that these differences developed over time, and that children, particularly very young children, did not appear to have any biological differences that related to this difference between the sexes.  Therefore, it could be that men’s ability to see over greater distances was trained and fostered over time, whereas women, who are often times gatherers not out of choice but necessity (as they are the primary child rearers because women feed the children through breast feeding), would not have received that same level of training.  Therefore, it appears that while there may be some biological differences between men and women regarding this matter culture may account for some of the differences as well.

Ultimately, while we know that there are cultural differences when it comes to recognizing colors among various cultural groups and between men and women there is evidence to demonstrate that there is a biological component to these differences as well.  These differences are slight, but they appear to be culturally fostered, furthering the notion of the roles between men and women.  This overall demonstrates the need to study what it means to be human holistically in order to not fall into the trap that it is either nature (biology) or nurture (social/cultural) that makes any one person into who they are and to realize that it is most often a combination between biology and culture that defines each and every human on earth.

References

Abramov, I; Gordon, J.; Feldman, O; and Chavarga, A.  2012a.  "Sex & Vision 1: Spatio-Temporal Resolution."  Biology of Sex Differences 3: 20. 

Abramov, I; Gordon, J.; Feldman, O; and Chavarga, A.  2012b.  "Sex & Vision 2: Color Appearance of Monochromatic Lights."  Biology of Sex Differences 3: 21.

Ayman, S.  2017.  "Do Women See More Colors than Men?"  SciPlanet.com

Steffens, S.  2015.  "When It Comes to Color, Men and Women Aren't Seeing Eye to Eye." Psychology Today. April 8.