Why Women Talk More Than Men: Language Protein Uncovered

[bananas]

http://www.scienceworldreport.com/articles/5073/20130220/why-women-talk-more-men-language-protein.htm

Why Women Talk More Than Men: Language Protein Uncovered

Catherine Griffin
First Posted: Feb 20, 2013

You know all the times that men complain about women talking too much? Apparently there's a biological explanation for the reason why women are chattier than men. Scientists have discovered that women possess higher levels of a "language protein" in their brains, which could explain why females are so talkative.

Previous research has shown that women talk almost three times as much as men. In fact, an average woman notches up 20,000 words in a day, which is about 13,000 more than the average man. In addition, women generally speak more quickly and devote more brainpower to speaking. Yet before now, researchers haven't been able to biologically explain why this is the case.

Now, they can. New findings conducted by researchers at the University of Maryland School of Medicine and published in The Journal of Neuroscience show that a certain protein may be the culprit.

In 2001, a gene called FOXP2 appeared to be essential for the production of speech. In order to test this protein, the team, led by J. Michael Bowers and Margaret McCarthy, looked at young rat pups. These animals emit cries in the ultrasonic range when separated from their mothers. The team recorded the cries over five minutes in groups of 4-day-old male and female rats that had been separated from their mothers. They found that male pups had up to twice as much of the protein FOXP2 in regions of the brain known to be involved in vocalization--perhaps an unsurprising finding since researchers noted that males made twice as many cries as females.

Next, the researchers wanted to test their findings in humans. ...

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[randome]

1. Interesting. But I find that men chatter every bit as much as the most talkative woman.

About sports, about the weather, about 'manly' things like rock climbing. I find it annoying to be around anyone who can't deal with silence and feels the need to fill the air with eminently forgettable chatter.

[OKNancy]

2. my husband needs to be a subject in that study

he's a yacker... drives me crazy

[pipi_k]

6. hahahaha!! Mine too!

I swear he talks twice as much as I do.

I live inside my head and can go hours without saying anything. People need to understand that I'm not angry or pouting or whatever. I just often have nothing to say.

He, OTOH, will even talk to himself.

[eShirl]

10. mine will not. shut. up.

[SoCalDem]

3. Perhaps because the female was usually responsible

for imparting knowledge to the offspring? Learning language is usually accomplished by hearing/repeating/receiving kudos..over and over and over, so it would seem natural to me that the person (Mom) responsible for that task would be more verbal...

Gatherers (women) would likely be more verbal since the "Prey" (veggies, roots, etc) were not going to run away at the sound of human voices, and the cluster of female & children's voices may also have been enough to scare away small-ish predators that might mess with the ambulatory kids in tow.

It also makes sense for mothers to press for verbal resolution , since there is a huge investment in that child they are raising. Physical "resolution" could lead to injury...the smallest of which could lead to infection/death.

Life expectancy used to be quite short, so a mother might have had precious little time to teach all that had to be known.. Talking was something that could be done while doing other things.

Talking hunters (males) were probably not very successful hunters.

[Fawke Em]

4. The only reason I talk so much is because I have to keep repeating myself

to my husband who doesn't listen the first two times.

[bananas]

5. Hmm - maybe there's another protein for listening? nt

[Marr]

7. If evolution had deemed it at all advantageous, I'm sure we'd have one.

[pipi_k]

8. This is where

having partial hearing loss makes a pretty good excuse.

Mr Pipi has hearing loss in his right ear...I have hearing loss in my left ear.

Every single day is an adventure, especially when there's background noise.

"WHAT??" "Huh???" "WHAT? WHAT?"

[actslikeacarrot]

9. Maybe switch seats? n/t

[WinkyDink]

11. Ridiculous. Yes, I'm sure women talk more frequently than men in, say, the Middle East.