Women’s guilt conscience is stronger than men
Didn’t we already know that women are more sensitive than men and that they feel more guilt than them? But time and again we need to reinforce this fact and make men admit their insensitivity. Researchers have established that not only do women feel the emotion more intensely, but that men feel ‘too little’ guilt when they behave badly. Guilt pangs about their actions hit the middle aged women the most according to the study by academics at the University of the Basque Country in Spain. On the contrary, men in the age-group of 25 to 33 were the least sensitive, displaying ‘relatively low’ feelings of guilt. According to the study, feelings of guilt are more intense among women, not only among adolescents, but also among young and adult women. Women also top the charts in the arena of interpersonal sensitivity. However, as men start to hit the middle-age, they tend to feel guilt more strongly. The reason for this phenomenon was because women were socially conditioned to do so, rather than there being a physiological or evolutionary reason for the difference.
One of the researchers of the study attempted to eradicate this difference by suggesting educational practices and a whole range of socializing agents must be used to reduce the trend towards anxious-aggressive guilt among women and to strengthen interpersonal sensitivity among men. The survey was conducted among three groups – 156 teenagers, 96 young people and 108 older adults, split equally among men and women. They were judged on ‘guilt grounds’ and their response to it as well as their empathy towards others.
[Telegraph]
