Anger by Unknown

Author:Unknown
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 0000000000000
Published: 2021-10-31T08:02:39+00:00

Most of the time I’m not a particularly volatile, angry person. And when I do get angry I don’t express it very well. I tend to oververbalize. I get snide.

These are all statements from men whom I interviewed, but they certainly match the female stereotype. The men and women I spoke with differed in what they had learned about anger as children, in what currently provokes them to anger, in their degree of comfort with feeling angry; but those differences were not predictably tied to their gender.

Indeed, of the many studies that have surveyed the kinds and causes of anger, very, very few have uncovered any sex differences; usually a surprised author will add a footnote to this effect and combine the findings for men and women. Given this consistent pattern, it is odd that only a few studies have been conducted expressly on the question of sex differences in anger. Apparently only a few psychologists have thought to doubt the basic belief that men are much more prone to anger than women. But the research that exists indicates that the impressions of clinicians, male or female, simply do not hold up.

That is, neither sex has a “special difficulty” in expressing anger. Many girls are indeed forbidden to express anger openly, especially to their parents, but so are many boys. It may be “unladylike” for a woman to lose her temper, but it is “unmanly” as well. A woman does have trouble expressing her anger directly to her boss, but so does a man, and if you doubt this, listen in to some bar conversations after work one day. People who feel they become angry too readily wish they could control it; people who don’t feel angry very often think that they should; and both kinds of people are to be found among both sexes.

In the following discussion, I will be talking only about anger. The sexes do differ in their likelihood of expressing other emotions, notably fear and sadness, apparently because women don’t have masculine standards of stoicism to live up to; and they do differ considerably in their willingness to talk about their feelings. (Remember how women’s social networks and tension-reducing conversations seem to be a strong factor in protecting women’s health.) However, as I am about to argue, neither sex has the advantage in being able to “identify” anger when they feel it or in releasing it once it is felt. Both sexes have trouble with anger, and this makes sense, for it is a troubling emotion.

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