Differences between men and women...

The first thing an expecting mother excitingly proclaims about the unborn child is, “it’s a boy!” or “it’s a girl.” This fact shows that prior to even taking a single breath, parents already decide the type of environment they will provide for their child, what they should and should do. These stereotypes only grow stronger as the child grows. Lise Eliot shows in her book, “ Pink Brain, Blue Brain: How Small Differences Grow into Troublesome Gaps—and What We Can Do About It,”  that the differences between boys and girls are not as vast as they are thought to be, and paralleling her is Bobbi Carothers in her research done at University of Rochester.  

The main premise of both these sources is that men and women overlap psychologically more than they differ.  Carothers and her team compiled raw data on gender-difference studies. They compiled data on 13,301 individuals who had participated in 13 different studies looking at 122 behavioral and personality factors that might differ between genders.

As expected, as there were some differences, as men and women have different brain sizes. On average, women reacted to bad news with greater stress and anxiety than men. Carothers found that differences in aggression, sexuality, frequency of smiling, weight, height and arm circumference existed.

There were no statistically significant differences in men and women in aspects such measures as interest in science, casual sex, frequency of thoughts about sex, and the appeal of certain traits such as virginity, looks, wealth in a mate, attitudes toward close relationships, empathy, extroversion and openness to new experience, caregiving, self-sacrifice and desire for justice.

Thus, Eliot and Carothers bring up important points that gender differences are not as profound as some may be lead to believe by older research. 

Resources:

http://www.livescience.com/27226-men-women-alike-psychologically.html

Eliot, Lise. “Learning Through Play in the Preschool Years.” Pink Brain, Blue Brain: How Small Differences Grow into Troublesome Gaps- And What We Can Do About It. Boston: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, 2009. 103-42. Print.