Remember our earlier blog, about our Year 13 A Level English Language students investigating Deborah Tannen’s Difference Theory, which proposes that men and women use language differently…?

Here’s what happened next!

Following their Lego Tower experiment, the students spent several lessons analysing the data from interviews and recorded transcripts. They then wrote up their findings formally in a report entitled “What’s the difference? An analysis of male and female use of imperatives and suggestions.”

Their findings were quite striking, and seemed to show that Tann’s predictions, made over a quarter of a century ago, still hold true. Namely: 

• Women speak less in mixed gender groups than in single-sex groups, whereas men speak more in mixed gender groups;
• Men are more likely to criticize or negate others while women are more likely to praise or affirm. Men made more than double the number of negations, regardless of grouping;
• Men are more likely to use orders than women, again regardless of grouping; in mixed groups women hardly used orders at all and even in single sex groupings, the frequency of orders was less than half that of men;
• In the mixed gender group, it would seem that both male and female participants were unaware of the fact that the male participants spoke over 50% more than the female participants. 

Given the often repeated (false) stereotype that women talk more than men, the first and last findings were particularly interesting: it was men who did most of the talking! 

All in all, it was a successful and enlightening investigation.