Why is that women seem to be able to multi-task so much better than men?... It must be how the brains are wired…

"Can men prepare a presentation while rocking the baby to sleep? And can they make breakfast, while ironing their shirts, even as they negotiate a major business deal on the phone? ".... Who can do” Multitasking”, Men or Women? My dear friend Sulekha Rawat put forth this question…It is not necessary that you agree with what I have to say.

It does not matter if it’s in the kitchen or the office, there appears to be a difference in the way that men and women handle multiple tasks. No offense to men… I believe that most women feel that we do it better…Don't worry all you men out there… I have good things to say about you also.

In my life as a mom with a home business and a child that I’m home schooling, I find that I am more likely to multi-task than my husband ever was. I often play with my daughter, make lunch and answer the phone all at the same time. My husband found that he had trouble focusing on even serving dinner for himself, unless someone helped him. Most moms I know can get the whole family out of the door and arrive at the destination on time with everyone’s warm clothes plus assorted snacks….and so on.

Moms tend to multi-task because they have to. Since they don’t often have the opportunity to do just one thing at a time, they have learned how to do many. The downside is that men seem to be more able to screen out other needs and distractions and truly focus on a task. As researches state, their productivity is just a good as women’s. I think in some ways men might ultimately be more efficient since their focus is more directed. Then again, women might have the capacity for the same level of efficiency (or even greater?!) when they have the opportunity to focus uninterrupted.

It is official − women are better at multitasking than men. Psychologists have proven that men really are worse at multitasking than women, although it does depend on the task. Professor Keith Laws, a psychologist at the University of Hertfordshire, who led the research, said: "We have all heard stories that either men can't multi-task or that women are exceptionally good at multi-tasking". Prof. Laws gave 50 male and 50 female students eight minutes to perform three tasks at the same time: carrying out simple Mathematical problems, finding restaurants on a map and sketching a strategy for how they would search for a lost key in an imaginary field. While women were able to perform well in all four activities at once, men performed, on average, worse when it came to planning to search for the key. Men tended to start their search in a less logical place such as the centre of the field and they would not cover the whole area when they were outlining their search. Women tended to enter in one corner and search in concentric circles or lines. The results showed, females were better able to ponder over a problem, while continuing to juggle their other activities at the same time.

It has been going on for ages — women can do more than one thing at once, while men struggle to match them. Why is it that men have problems doing something which come so easily to women? Of course, this is because of the natural differences between men and women, and does not mean that men are less competent or able than women. There are many different theories about why is it that women can multi-task. One is that women approach a problem in a different way in comparison to men. In a situation of two or more things happening at once, women are often able to judge how to handle the situation better than men. This reflects a woman’s natural ability to observe a situation as a whole and take time to plan how best to do things.

I personally have never met a man who could, that’s my down fall.... I think most women who are very independent, do not look for men who can do more than one thing at once. I also believe that if you try to push men around, they seem to go the opposite way. Some men are not used to handling many issues at once and need a multi-tasking partner. I believe that some men are multi-taskers…They seem to have the Military to thank for it.  I also think single parents have to be the highest under paid, over worked mulit-taskers… out there!

My advice is... DO NOT TRY to get men to multi-task….

If you do this…. it may be dangerous to your health!!!

Can You Visualise a man with a remote in one hand and a feeding bottle in the other?  LOL….

CopyrightMotifs@2010

Prof.Keith Laws research: By Richard Gray, Science Correspondent

Courtesy: Google

Labels: Man, woman, multi-tasking