title: Gender differences associated with orienting attentional networks in healthy subjects.
abstract: BACKGROUND
  Selective attention is considered one of the main components of cognitive functioning. A number of studies have demonstrated gender differences in cognition. This study aimed to investigate the gender differences in selective attention in healthy subjects.
  
  
  METHODS
  The present experiment examined the gender differences associated with the efficiency of three attentional networks: alerting, orienting, and executive control attention in 73 healthy subjects (38 males). All participants performed a modified version of the Attention Network Test (ANT).
  
  
  RESULTS
  Females had higher orienting scores than males (t = 2.172, P < 0.05). Specifically, females were faster at covert orienting of attention to a spatially cued location. There were no gender differences between males and females in alerting (t = 0.813, P > 0.05) and executive control (t = 0.945, P > 0.05) attention networks.
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  There was a significant gender difference between males and females associated with the orienting network. Enhanced orienting attention in females may function to motivate females to direct their attention to a spatially cued location.
authors.affiliation: Department of Neurology, First Hospital of Anhui Medical University, Hefei, Anhui 230022, China.
authors.forename: Gang
authors.initials: G
authors.lastname: Liu
authors.forename: Pan-Pan
authors.initials: PP
authors.lastname: Hu
authors.forename: Jin
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Fan
authors.forename: Kai
authors.initials: K
authors.lastname: Wang
mesh_terms: D000293:Adolescent; D000328:Adult; D001288:Attention; D056344:Executive Function; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D009949:Orientation; D011930:Reaction Time; D012727:Sex Characteristics