Are women more empathetic than men?

"Are women more empathetic than men?" 

"Are females more caring than males?"

"Girls are more caring than guys?"

These are all common ways of wording an interesting question that has been a minor debate for quite a while. But, amazingly, there has been scientific evidence backing this claim. It is also suggest that men are more likely to desire revenge more than women. Let's look at the psychology of empathy.

[This article is looks at the results of Singer et al. (2006) results, see article links later in the article for more details]

Specific parts of the brain become active when an individual feels empathy, as shown below. Other parts of the brain turn on when a person is psychologically rewarded (and as a result and feels better)

Scientists by using this method can infer how a person is feeling. Now, we play the Ultimatum game. Basically, the gist of the game is a follows:

• A participant plays the Ultimatum game with two other people, who are supposedly also "participants". Little does he or she know that they are actors hired for the experiment.
• One actor, Actor A, is fair to the participant. With the money he or she receives, they split it evenly with the participant. 
• One actor, Actor B, is unfair to the participant. With the money they receive, he splits it unfairly with the participant. (For example, Actor B gets $100 which the participant knows about and says "Hey, I'll offer you $20.")

As a result, the expected result would be the participant likes Actor A and dislikes Actor B. The participant then sits in a MRI machine and watches (possibly through a monitor) Actor A and Actor B receive an electrical shock. Have a look at the results. Here's where things get interesting...

(Reproduced from Singer et al. (2006))

What is observed is that in both men and women feel empathy for the fair player Actor A. Women generally also feel empathy for the unfair player Actor B. Looking at the males, we see that males generally don't feel empathy for the unfair player. In fact, we see something more interesting. Males are psychologically rewarded when the unfair player gets shocked. The parts of their brain that rewards them turns on more often then in women. 

(Reproduced from Singer et al. (2006))

So what does this study suggest exactly.

• Men when treated unfairly feel less empathy for the person that is pass that injustice onto them. 
• Men feel good when people that have treated them unfairly are punished by the heavens
• The same is less true in women

There we have it. Women are more empathetic than men. Men also have a higher desire for revenge than women. We don't know if this is always true since this is a very specific situation, but I can hear the male participants subconsciously cry out "Turn up the voltage!".

"Are men better than women?"... that is a question for another day.

Reference link to Singer's original article.