Male/Female Art

Researchers from the University of California Irvine have demonstrated that men and women perceive art differently. Electrical activity in the brain showed that men used only the right parietal lobe when judging paintings, while women used both parietal lobes. The researchers suggest this difference evolved millions of years ago in hunter-gatherer societies, when men hunted animals and women collected berries and nuts, these tasks requiring different visual perceptions. Anyone who has ever collected blackberries knows that you need to spread your vision as widely as possible to locate the ripe fruits, whereas hunting prey requires the ability to exclude everything but the target. Only 10 men and 10 women were used as subjects, which is a very small sample. So it's early days yet, but a fascinating line of research.