Change Your Brain Every Day - The Male vs Female Brain

Episode Date: December 6, 2016

What can the brain teach us about dealing with the opposite sex or “why you really do have to ask your man more than once.

Hi, I'm Donnie Osmond, and welcome to The Brain Warrior's Way, hosted by my friends Daniel and Tana Amon. Now, in this podcast, you're going to learn that the war for your health is one between your ears. That's right. If you're ready to be sharper and have better memory, mood, energy, and focus, well then stay with us. Here are Daniel and Tana Amon.

Hey, everybody, this is Dr. Daniel Amen. And I'm Tana Amen. We have a very special show for you today. We are going to talk about the differences between the male and female brain. Oh, boy. And this can be scary. Or fun. Scary, funny, actually. So, I know more about this than I want to know. I am one of seven children. I have one brother and five, one, two, three, four, five sisters. In fact, I've often said that I love his sisters probably more than anyone because Daniel came fully trained and housebroken. So when you grew up with five sisters, I had very little training to do. And I am grateful for that.

Well, I remember after, you know, my mom brought home the fourth one. My brother and I said when she was pregnant with the fifth one, you bring it home. Another girl. We are leaving. So we threatened it home, another girl, we are leaving. So we threatened to leave. I was like eight. Oh gosh. I'm like, it's like, come on, we need another boy

to even things out here. Oh, that's so funny. And lo and behold, she brought home Joanne, my baby sister, another girl, and we left for about 45 minutes until we figured out we had no food. And my mom just happened to be- And your mom's a good cook.

An awesome cook. But she actually is one of the most powerful female brains that we have ever seen. I actually can attest to this. Your mother, for as tiny as she is, I honestly, she's like the matriarch. She's an amazing woman. And at, what is she, 85 now? 85, yeah. 85 years old. She's the general. She really is. I honestly, she's like the matriarch. She's an amazing woman. And at, what is she, 85 now? 85, yeah. 85 years old.

She really is. We call her the general. Not in a bad way, but just because she's got everything buttoned down. I mean, not kidding. And she's everybody's best friend. She is. And in addition to my five sisters, I have three daughters, 14 nieces, a granddaughter. And so the female brain has always been really interesting to me.

But here at Amen Clinics, we do imaging. We do brain imaging. And we actually built the world's largest database of brain scans related to behavior. And when we put them into a searchable database, the first question I wanted to ask the database is, dear database, tell me what is the difference between the male and the female brain? That's hilarious. And virtually every area of the female brain is busier. So are you trying to say that men are a little slow or that they are brain dead? Well, that we can just do a lot with a little. Oh, I see how you spun that.

But the male brain is actually 10% larger, even when you adjust for size, than the female brain. But the female brain has more connections and it's just much busier. Just busy, busy, busy. Which gives them some very specific strengths, but also some specific vulnerabilities. So looking at the science, at the research and the imaging work that we do, women have greater activity in their prefrontal cortex, the most human thoughtful part of the brain involved with things like forethought, judgment, impulse control, organization, planning. So the first thing, women have more

empathy, which is probably why they raise children. Well, we raise children and we also tend to be caretakers for the elderly. You know, we take care of parents. We're in the sandwich generation and it's just sort of a natural place we end up. 70% of the time, if an elderly person needs care, they're being cared for by a woman. Right. So they also have higher intuition and it's not just gas. Yeah. I remember the first time you told me, well, maybe it's just gas. And I was like, I seriously, it's a good thing you're not standing that close to me right now. See, and there's a lot of studies on what intuition really is. And if you think about this from hunter gatherer perspective, from a developmental perspective, hunters versus gatherers, you know, men tended to be the hunters. They would go out and they've got a lot of testosterone and they were, you know, they're out working and bringing stuff in to eat. Women were more community oriented. They were the gatherers, but there was a safety issue. So they were always looking around, paying attention to the environment

because they had to. Being the smaller of the sexes and also having men not there a lot, they were paying attention to danger. And so that's what intuition... So female sense of smell is heightened. Yes. That sixth sense is really a higher awareness of your environment. And after a woman has a baby, her brain actually gets remodeled to become much more sensitive. In fact, since you brought that up, after I had Chloe, my friends used to joke and my parents would joke that I could fall asleep on the top of a picket fence and nothing would wake me up. After I had Chloe, and you can attest to this, I sleep with earplugs because I'm such a light sleeper now.

And I can hear something on the other side of my house. If a window or a door opens, I am up and down the hall in a flash. It's the weirdest thing. Once you have a baby, you never sleep the same. It's just a very strange thing. So sleep, sense of smell goes up. And one of the things that I think is just incredibly unfair is a woman has better peripheral vision where a man's vision is more tunnel vision. Right.

So he's good at shooting things where she's more. Hey, I'm pretty good at it too though. She's more, she's better at scanning the environment. So if we're walking along and a pretty girl comes by and I happen to notice, I turn my head. Okay. But see right there. Wait a minute. Let me finish this. Let me finish this. So I turn my head and I totally get caught. But a woman, because of her peripheral vision, she can totally check out a cute guy and the guy doesn't notice it at all. It's not fair. But yeah, it's not fair. But here's the deal.

Here's the difference. You guys are checking out pretty girls and you always get frustrated with me because you think I'm not hearing what you're saying. Because what am I looking for when we're walking? Well, you're looking for the bad guys. I'm looking for bad guys. I notice every single person walking by. I am aware of what's happening around me. That is your awareness, your heightened awareness, which leads to your intuition.

So I'm having more fun than you are. Well, not if you get caught. You know, another thing about intuition that's interesting is it's a right hemisphere phenomenon. So there's actually differences between the hemispheres in the brain for right-handed people. It's often flipped for left-handed people, but the left side of the brain is more detail-oriented. It sort of is interested in the facts. The right side gets the big picture of situations, and intuition tends to be a right hemisphere. So you it's like this guy's trouble. I know it, but I can't explain it because it's the left hem. So it's the right hemisphere that notices it and gives you that feeling of anxiety. It's the left hemisphere that has the words for.

So really interesting, though, because I study this after being attacked I'm I study it and I practice martial arts and i'm i'm a security freak But one thing about intuition is once you start becoming aware of it and you stop talking yourself out of it And you pay attention to it. You'll start becoming more aware of those things. You'll actually Understand what it really is and you'll go. Oh, I know what that is instead of I don't know I don't know why that guy makes me uncomfortable. You'll actually start knowing why the guy makes you uncomfortable. So pay attention to it, nurture it a little bit. Don't get paranoid. That's the difference. You don't want to nurture paranoia.

Women's brains are also wired for collaboration. They have a higher limbic brain. Back to the gatherer phenomenon. And taking care of kids and and the elderly and men do it and we're much better at it than a couple of generations and they're often wonderful at it right but women's brains are more and that's why they often make great ceos right because they're much more about consensus we're talking about women women oh you know because men are more like i said it do it because I said it. Women are better at building consensus. And relationships, yeah.

Self-control, because they have better frontal lobe function. And, you know, the one statistic that just proves this out is who goes to jail. Right. Men, 14 times more than female well interesting i got about the baby thing again before i had chloe um i didn't worry much about traveling or what would happen or things like that once you have a baby and it's not it's not about paranoia or anything like that but it's always in the back of my head i need to be safe i need to be healthy because i have a child so whether it's traveling what is whether it's what i eat whether it's where i going, anything about what I am doing every moment of the day, almost it's in the back of my head. Is this safe to do?

Because I need to be safe for my child. Well, and that leads us to the next thing, which is for the female brain, one of the big strengths, but it leads to vulnerability is females have more worry. And I call it appropriate worry or appropriate anxiety because why do you think i'm somewhat paranoid well because you are i mean it's like if they only knew right go see trolls go see the movie i am branch in trolls i am if you go to that movie we have role reversal my husband there's a survivalist in there that's got food for like 10 years. And weapons. And he's got a fortress.

My husband is Princess Poppy. Okay. Nothing bad can happen in the world. I call him Princess Poppy. So if you haven't seen Trolls, you won't understand that. But the female brain has much higher anxiety. But that's why they go to jail 14 times less. Because they worry more

about what bad things can happen. And you absolutely need some of that or bad things happen. Now, it leads to vulnerabilities in the female brain. There's a higher incidence of anxiety and depression. According to one study from Canada, women have 52% less serotonin than men. And if you're on birth control pills, it drops it further. Brand new study out on people who take birth control pills have a higher incidence of depression. Well, and it not only drops that, it drops your B vitamins, which is also responsible for depression. And so because of the lower serotonin levels, higher anxiety and depression in the female brain, higher insomnia, higher eating disorders. Because this perfectionistic thing goes on.

Recovery perfectionist. You got it over that. They have higher struggles with pain. Right. And they can't turn their thoughts off. And which is why they can get addicted to sugar. Because sugar naturally boosts serotonin. The problem is it's

pro-inflammatory, it's addictive, it increases erratic brain cell firing and makes you diabetic and fat. There are healthier ways to do it. So we have some rules for men and rules for women. So the rules for women, why don't you do the rules for women and I'll do the rules for men? So the first rule is don't expect your man to act like your best girlfriend. This is just common sense. When you really do understand, after I saw the brain scans, it made me laugh, but it also made me realize, you know, when I could get frustrated at times when Daniel sort of looks at me like deer in the headlights, you know, and he's like that blank stare. And I'm like, okay, he's not one of my girlfriends. They don't behave the same way.

It's just a fact. And you're not going to get the same level of empathy and collaboration. They just want to fix it and make it go away. So if you start talking about a problem. He wants to fix it and make it go away. Because he cares about you. Not, and many women will take that. Well, he won't listen. He's diminishing me. No.

And it's just how he's wired. But think about it. He's a hunter. They go out and they kill problems. I don't want you to solve this for me. I just need you to listen. But even then, it's going to be hard for him because he cares about you. And he's going to do what guys do.

Fix it. Which is, let's just fix it. So don't expect him to be like your best girlfriends. So if you want him to listen, use fewer words. So actually, this is an interesting one. I get overwhelmed by sometimes how many words women use. Not all women are the same. So let's just know that right up front. Daniel often says the only time I scare him is when I act like a girl. And it turns out that it's because of a little hormone imbalance I've had in the past. So don't use as many words. Try to figure out a quick way to say it and let it sit for a minute. Active listening is so important.

And the third rule is you have to ask more than once. If you want something not just done, but you want him to do something a certain way, be patient. So don't get offended here, honey. But it's a little like when you're raising kids, right? You never get mad when they don't do it the first time. You just ask them again. You teach them again, right? So if they don't know what it is you want, they don't think like you do. They don't just like, they're not like one of your girlfriends.'re not like she'll ask once and he'll have a short attention span and not really process it.

And then rather than nudging in a kind way, she will start stewing on it. Right. And she will then. And he has no idea that you're doing. She has mentioned it a thousand times and now she's just mad. Because in her head, she actually mentioned it a thousand times, but not out loud. And keep in mind, women multitask pretty well. Men, they don't. So if he's doing something else. In the fourth quarter of the Laker game.

Right. So if he's in the middle of doing something else, he's on his email or he's watching a game and you ask him and you think he actually heard you, that's on you. So it's good to get him to repeat back in a kind way, not in a sarcastic way. All right. Rules for men. Do not expect your woman to act like your best guy friends. They have different brains. Help her take care of the home. Oh, my gosh. That is foreplay. I'm just saying. Because California, 90% of mothers work outside the house. Right. We're exhausted. And they're exhausted. And so if you want to get lucky, she's got to have energy to get lucky. And just like you said, it's foreplay. Right. The rule number three is smell great. I know this sounds really weird, but we do

have a stronger sense of smell. Like you said, it's part of that maternal thing. So if you don't smell good, it actually turns her off and she might not even know it or know why. Well, and the important thing is to ask her what she likes, because whether it's cologne or a bath soap, or she actually doesn't like it if you shower because she likes your natural scent. Okay, no. Most of us don't. Let's just face it. That's a male thing.

Sorry. No, that's him. Wrote to Josephine. Because he's a guy and he was a pig. And he said, I'm going to be home in two weeks. Please don't shower. Please don't bathe. Okay, men, forget what he just said.

Women don't like that. So, forget that. The female brain is different than the male brain. It's awesome. It's amazing. And if you want to learn more, you can check out my book, Unleash the Power of the Female Brain. So we would end with telling you to know your brain type specifically, because if you've had a brain injury or you've had anything going on like that it can affect your relationships also know that you're different like we just said and i'm going to add one bonus tip women this is for women i think it's very

destructive to your relationship when you hang out with other women who support your negative thinking about your man if you go complain about something going on in your marriage and your girlfriends are like, oh, you're right, that jerk. And they just support that. It's very destructive. And one thing I did is when I realized how important this is, I actually chose friends who raise me up, who, you know, I rarely ever do that. But when I, if I'm having a problem or I've had a problem and I say,

you know, hey, this is what's going on. They will automatically say, so, you know, have, this is what's going on, they will automatically say. So, you know, have you prayed about this? Have you talked about this? Maybe it's this going on and they raise you up to a different level and raise your expectations. So that would be my bonus tip. Same thing for guys. Thank you for listening to us.

We'll talk to you next time. Thanks for listening to today's show. The Brain Warriors Way. Why don't you head over to Brainwarriorswaypodcast.com. That's brainwarriorswaypodcast.com, where Daniel and Tana have a gift for you just for subscribing to the show. And when you post your review on iTunes, you'll be entered into a drawing where you can win a VIP visit to one of the Amen Clinics.

I'm Donnie Osmond, and I invite you to step up your brain game by joining us in the next episode.