In plain language
Research has repeatedly found that women tend to be more emotionally aware than men — better able to describe emotions in themselves and others in rich, differentiated ways. But why? One popular idea is that men are just as capable, they simply care less about emotional matters. This study put that motivation explanation to the test: if men are given a good reason to try harder, does the sex difference disappear?
A total of 316 university students (242 women, 74 men) completed the Levels of Emotional Awareness Scale (LEAS), a performance test in which people describe how they and another person would feel in various situations. Participants completed the scale twice, and before the second attempt they were randomly assigned either to a motivational condition — designed to make performing well personally rewarding — or to a control condition.
Motivation mattered: both men and women wrote more emotionally aware responses after the motivational intervention, while control participants did not improve. Motivated men managed to reach the level of women in the control condition — but they had to work significantly longer on the task to get there, and sex differences remained even after accounting for effort and motivation. The findings suggest that motivation genuinely shapes emotional awareness, but motivational differences alone cannot fully explain why women outperform men.
Key findings
- 316 university students (242 women, 74 men) completed the Levels of Emotional Awareness Scale (LEAS) twice, with participants randomly assigned to a motivational or control condition before the second administration.
- Women scored significantly higher than men on emotional awareness overall (M = 3.6 vs. 3.4).
- The motivational intervention worked: both men and women showed significant improvements in LEAS scores after the motivational instructions, whereas control participants did not improve.
- Motivated men's emotional awareness scores rose to equal those of women in the control condition — but the men had to work significantly longer on the task to achieve this equality (motivated men took about 18.6 minutes versus 13.2 minutes for motivated women).
- Sex differences in emotional awareness remained significant even after statistically controlling for self-reported effort and behavioral measures of motivation.
- The results suggest that a combination of motivational and ability factors — not lack of motivation alone — underlies sex differences in emotional awareness.
How to cite
APA
Ciarrochi, J., Hynes, K., & Crittenden, N. (2005). Can men do better if they try harder: Sex and motivational effects on emotional awareness. Cognition and Emotion, 19(1), 133-141. https://doi.org/10.1080/02699930441000102
BibTeX
@article{ciarrochi2005can,
author = {Ciarrochi, Joseph and Hynes, Keiren and Crittenden, Nadia},
title = {Can men do better if they try harder: Sex and motivational effects on emotional awareness},
journal = {Cognition and Emotion},
year = {2005},
volume = {19},
number = {1},
pages = {133--141},
doi = {10.1080/02699930441000102}
}
Related work
- All publications by Joseph Ciarrochi (searchable, with free PDFs)
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Author: Joseph Ciarrochi (ORCID 0000-0003-0471-8100). Free copy hosted with permission for scholarly use. Please cite the published version via the DOI above.