Rossputin.com: Rational Thinking About Our World

re "A stereotype that's all talk" (Baltimore Sun, 7/6/07)
http://www.baltimoresun.com/news/health/bal-te.talk06jul06,0,4697892.story?

The new study in the journal Science which purports that women do not talk more than men defies standards for well-structured research as well as common sense.

The study comprised a total of 400 people, a fairly small sample for this sort of study, but even worse they were all university students. So, not only are they a self-selected group of people who are likely to be talkative as they are deeply involved in learning, which requires communication, but they are all also in a very narrow age band.

But beyond the study sample casting real doubt on its results, the conclusion doesn’t jibe with our daily experience. Anybody who has been living on earth for at least a double digit number of years has noticed the obvious differences between how much less adult men tend to speak than women. And, does anybody out there believe that a guy speaks as much after marriage as before? We don’t dare! Sorry, Dr. Pennebaker, but your study results strike this male as obviously wrong, and your study methods explain why. (I’ll stop writing here…if you want more thoughts on the subject, ask my wife.)