Women reconstruct more details than men for a complex five-minute narrative: implications for right-hemispheric factors in the serial memory effect.
A total of 20 men and 20 women listened to a 5-min. ambiguous narrative (the "Billy" story). When the subjects were asked (unexpectedly) to reconstruct the details of the story as a written narrative 30 min. later, women employed about 50% more words and comparably more accurate detail than the men. Covariance for pre-experimental experiences suggested that the women's proficiency could be related to the greater representation of linguistic processes within the right (non-dominant) hemisphere. The hypothesis that the classic deficit of reconstructional accuracy for events during the middle of a story is related to right-hemispheric inhibition was also supported. Subjects who recalled the fewest details reported more vivid dreaming during the subsequent two days.
Persinger
M A
MA
Department of Psychology, Laurentian University, Sudbury, Ontario.
Richards
P M
PM
D000328:Adult; D001288:Attention; D004292:Dominance, Cerebral; D004325:Dreams; D005260:Female; D005783:Gender Identity; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D011939:Mental Recall; D012691:Serial Learning; D013067:Speech Perception; D014705:Verbal Behavior; D014706:Verbal Learning