Men are from Mars Women are from Venus in the Presidential Debate

If you watched the presidential debate on CNN, you could watch the green and orange lines of the focus group reacting to everything each candidate said. What is quite amazing is that men reacted more slowly than women and men tended to react less to McCain's tough rhetoric than women.

Here are some quick reactions to what we saw tonight:

The Bullshit Discount

McCain's points, even when the lines hover above the flatline, are significantly discounted by the bullshit discount. He never reaches Obama's highs, because even when people reluctantly agree with him, they have to factor in the fact that they just don't believe anything he says.

Guys are Trainable

In the CNN focus group lines, which divided by gender, men end up in the right place -- agreeing with the thoughtful, cerebral Obama -- but they're at least a beat behind the women.
Maybe they have a different processing speed; maybe they are truly more thoughtful. But guys, for efficiency's sake, just listen to the ladies. It will save so much time in the long run -- and aren't you supposedly all about efficiency? Girl power; you know we're right. All you have to do is admit it. We promise, we won't gloat -- it's not in our nature! (Not!)

BOTTOM LINE: OBAMA WON THIS DEBATE ACCORDING TO THE FOCUS GROUP. WHAT DO YOU THINK?

Read more reactions to the Obama-McCain Town Hall Debate from HuffPost bloggers

Comments

[Cach]

She's trying to be provocative like Hairplugs McCain was trying to be funny, but I find her post a little insulting to tell you the truth.

[KarateKid]

Ms. Bergthold, you just figured that out??? Where have you been all this time.....Pluto?

[11907281]

"Women are Trainable" - put that in bold in an article when Hillary was running and you would have been run out of town.

[NCGigi]

I am so totally sick of girls against boys, nobody wins. Mars, Venus, who cares? We are all here together on Earth!

[krocklin]

I was puzzled too by the green and orange lines for men and women. I was glad the men DID NOT react positively to McCain's jingoism. And noticed it was less than the women.
But given that Obam'a flat lined far less than McCain, it was surprising that only 12 to 10 favored Obama.
On the other hand the methodology itself has to questioned. Let's say 5 women reacted really negatively to something and 7 more reacted really positively, according to their ideaological tendencies? What would the reading be. Probably better to register each respondent on a graph with 25 bars, separated by male and female. That way we could see the extremes in SOME of the respondents.
Though the men didn't react positively to McCain's agressive military positions, that may be partly because Obama was just as agressive in his military statements and McCain is just too old school and Bush-like.

[Linda Bergthold - Huffpost Blogger]

Although I wrote this last night very quickly -- probably too quickly -- I think the basic premise is still valid. There were some very odd reactions by the men and the women to some of the comments made by both candidates -- like when the women reacted positively to McCain's health care plan (as noted by one of you below) and when the men flatlined on the more red meat type war issues. But also, as one of the commenters pointed out, in the end, after an evening of showing very positive reactions to Obama, the group still split 12 to 10 when asked who they would vote for right now. Bradley, Schmadley, not sure to what degree it will matter, but the more Obama pulls ahead, the better chance he has of beating the racism with turn out and increased voter registration on the Democratic side. One union guy said that his buddies might not say out loud that they would vote for Obama but when they went in the booth, being a Democrat would win out.
I hope CNN or someone does a more thorough analysis of the reactions last night, but in the meantime all your comments are very insightful. Thank you!

[cmilburn]

I respectfully disagree with your premise. It is not that men are a beat behind women. I believe that it is that women are more emotional than men. Men are more pragmatic; women invest more feelings into what someone is saying. I, too watched those silly lines (CNN is WAY too graphic happy for me) and paid attention to what was being said as those lines moved. I could see that when home-oriented subjects were being talked about, the women's line was consistently higher than the one for men.

[karronna]

Sometimes I wonder if we're all on the wrong track with the Bradley effect thing. I have found myself thinking at several times lately, there are some people who would not say they are voting for Obama in public (never linking it to race ), but in private WOULD vote for him.

[Kassandra]

It's all in the Corpus Colosseum, that large bundle of nerves which connects the two halves of the brain. In wimmin, it's about twice the size of mens. We just process faster. Onward...............

[Marlyn]

The brains of men and women are wired differently.

Did you see Katie Couric on the Today Show a few years ago where she was given a task of listening with earphones to a different story being told to each ear? The task was to choose one of the stories to pay attention to and then answer questions about what was heard.

Men were able to do it with no problem, but women couldn't help themselves from having a quick listen to the "other" story, and thus lost concentration on the chosen story.

I can not ignore the sound of commercials on TV. I must use the mute, but my friend Jack has no problem shutting them out with his mind.

[HAP]

Yes indeed--the gender contrast was striking. The best thing about this debate: Obama won by resonating with voters on substance, especially health care.

[lafemme]

It bears noting that the graph represents undecided voters, not all men and women. That said, I'm thankful that others now recognize McCain for the liar he is. He's been successfully pulling wool over our eyes for about 30 years. Hope John and Jane Q get that, but I doubt it.

[Maanu]

I agree with your points but injecting judgments on which gender is "always right" is irrelevant and cannot be substantiated.

I'm all for girl power and empowering women, just not at the expense of men, and not by reinforcing a false construct that men (raised by women BTW!) are wrongheaded.

Beyond that, it just sounds Palin-ish, in that you were going for cute and it was anything but.

[Pacojam]

Agreed.

I think the Palin pick blew McCain's credibility. It was obviously NOT putting country first. And it caused him to switch themes/talking points several times which further decreased his believability especially when many of these attacks were blatent falsehoods.

In contrast Obama's campain has maintained a unified theme and has taken the high road.

[ladyv]

I think women just process spoken language more quickly than men. We're more attuned to the nuances of voice and body language that help shape understanding of spoken language, so we get where people are going/get their intent quicker with spoken. It's a social skills/emotional intelligence thing IMO.

[Jjc2006]

Women not only process language better, they also give up the myth of the "Lone Ranger" saving the day long before men do. The reason women bought into "takes a village" so much earlier on, is because we experience it. Women are still, by the numbers, the predominant caretakers of the children and the elderly of a family. And doing that we still do 90% of the household chores.

Without other women, neighbors, sisters, older daughters and girlfriends to help us, we struggle to survive. We know we need the extra hands, the extra time. Too many (not all) men still see themselves as the protector against evil, the breadwinner, the hunter who cares for the needs (food and stuff) even if their wives are working too. Maybe it's anthropological. But the bottom line, women understand the need for social programs for the commons: education, health care........men buy into the macho phoniness of a W and a McCain in much larger numbers. Those are the facts.

[Cach]

yeah we get it. Women good. Men bad.

What are little boys made of?
Snips and snails, and puppy dogs tails
That's what little boys are made of !"
What are little girls made of?
"Sugar and spice and all things nice
That's what little girls are made of!"

Thank god, not all adults think in nursery rhymes.

[steveward14]

Interesting what you said about John McCain not being believable. I have the same reaction to both McCain and Palin - they seem to me to be telling whoppers. I mean real honest-to-god fish stories. I don't think it's just because they represent the opposition. I've disagreed with many Republicans in my time, but I didn't always get the sense they were outright lying. With these two, I picture salesmen pushing aluminum siding to unsuspecting homeowners, or swindlers bilking old people out of their life savings.

At the same time, I completely trust Barack Obama. I don't believe he knows everything a president needs to know, but I have confidence that he'll find the answers he needs, that he has the intellectual curiosity to dig past the surface of things to get to the best judgment possible. Why do I think so? I trust Obama's judgment because he comes off as a reasonable man. His temperament says to me he's not going to be rushed into things; he's going to listen to the evidence, weigh the facts, and act appropriately. Like a judge would, which isn't surprising since he's a constitutional lawyer.

So summing up, you have a man who comes across as a salesman versus a man who comes across as a judge. In our society, which of these two is generally considered more believable?

[cmilburn]

Are you familiar with the phrase "the ring of truth?" I believe that when Obama says things, it comes from his heart and he believes it. It "sounds" true. When McCain speaks, it doesn't resonate in my head; it doesn't "ring" true.

[pthesmith]

I noticed Obama tracked higher than McCain on a majority of the questions. Yet, when O'Brien asked who they would vote for "today," the majority said McCain. This is the problem that Obama faces; a problem the pundits hinted at tonight (especially Carville). People agree with Obama's positions, and his ideas resonate with them. But, they will not vote for him. Don't underestimate the role race is playing in this election cycle.

[anniegirl9]

I was going to point out the same thing. When asked who won the debate, it was a 12-10 split for Obama. Not a very decisive win in this focus group, but still a win. It was even noted that Obama clearly won with this group if you only took the graph into account. But when asked who they would vote for, the split went to McCain.
The other thing that bugged me was thier answers about what they wanted to hear from the candidates. These people seemed to want either candidate to pin-point exact figures to thier liking, like the gentleman who wanted to know an exact figure for what affordable healthcare would be. I do think both went into thier stump speeches too much - but how hard is it for undecided voters to get onto either of thier websites and read thier platforms more indepth.