It's true! Men hate it when women succeed: Research

Friday, October 11, 2013 by: Mike Bundrant
Tags: women, success, gender differences

(NaturalNews) Many successful women have long suspected that men can't handle being out performed by the opposite sex. According to a recent study, their suspicions are likely correct.

The study, conducted by psychologists at the University of Florida, was actually not meant to test the hypothesis that men are intimidated by women's success.

The intention was to investigate heterosexual peoples' responses to the success or failure of their partners, but it turned out that men and women responded very differently.

When told that their partners scored in the top percentile on an intelligence test, women reported an improvement in their self-esteem, while men reported feeling worse about themselves.

The critical difference

It seems women are able to view their partners' success as part of their own, while men view their own relative success as a key component of their self-esteem. Women also tended to have a positive outlook for the future of the relationship when their partners succeeded, while men tended to believe the relationship was headed downhill.

Since this study simply recorded the results of this phenomenon and did not investigate its causes, researchers can't say for sure exactly what is causing men to feel intimidated by the success of their female partners. It could be because of deep-rooted societal norms that dictate men should be responsible for providing for their partners and families, or it could be that men are simply more competitive in general.

Whatever the reason for their insecurity, it seems men will have to learn to adopt to a society with an increasing number of female breadwinners. According to data published by the US Bureau of Labor Statistics in 2009, 40 percent of primary breadwinners were women.

Experts predict that this percentage will continue to increase, with female breadwinners tipping the scales to become the majority by 2025. This is due to a combination of factors including more women than men getting college degrees, as well as largely male dominated industries getting hit especially hard in the recent recession.

There is some evidence that men are indeed adjusting. A 2008 study by the Families and Work Institute revealed that young men in 1977 were more likely to say men should be the primary breadwinners and women the primary caretakers, while they were much less likely to say this in 2008.

So it seems that most modern young men will at least say they don't mind women being the primary breadwinners, but their feelings may still have some catching up to do.

Women: do you hold back in order to protect your man's ego?

Men: are you blowing your relationship because she is more successful than you?

All of the above smacks of self-sabotage. Holding yourself back in life or mistreating another person because of their success takes you in the opposite direction of happiness and peace.

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To watch a free video on the pernicious nature of self-sabotage and how to free yourself from it, click here.

Sources:

Gender Differences in Implicit Self-Esteem Following a Romantic Partner's Success or Failure. http://www.apa.org/pubs/journals/releases/psp-a0033769.pdf

Study Confirms Women's Suspicions: Men Are Afraid Of Their Success. http://www.mintpressnews.com

Women: The New Breadwinners. http://www.elle.com

About the author:
Watch the free video The AHA! Process: An End to Self-Sabotage and discover the lost keys to personal transformation and emotional well-being that have been suppressed by mainstream mental health for decades.

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Mike Bundrant is co-founder of the iNLP Center and host of Mental Health Exposed, a Natural News Radio program.

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