A glimpse into our sexist brain

Whether you are taking a leisurely stroll on a tranquil beach or you let your eyes casually fall upon on a cover of magazine, you can immediately sense the presence of sexism and objectification, with women being the focal point of it all. Some gets caught in the wrong end of its microscope while others actually thrive on it; sexism affects all of us in varying magnitudes. Speculations have been rife that sexism and objectification are by-products of social programming and mankind’s thirst for power. Recently, upon conducting a research on this controversial topic, results point to the evolutionary nature of brain as the root cause of sexism.

Upon stumbling into images of men and women, it has been revealed that the brain perceives them in different mannerism. Staying true to its intricate and complex nature, the brain dissects women’s physique part by part whereas it illustrates men’s physiques as an unabridged unitary member. This trend became rather crystal-clear when the research participants demonstrated a better memory of recognizing individualistic parts of women and vice versa. No wonder sexism is rife and various implementations to curb it have been nothing short of abject failure! Sarah Gervais, a psychologist of the University of Nebraska points out that woman are subjected to objectification on a regular basis. She enthuses that the objectification is not only subjected to women who are in the porn industry or modeling industry but ordinary women as well. Unsurprisingly, sexism is synonymous with a host of psychological complications such as depression, low level of self-esteem, eating disorders and various others. In addition, sexism can also create mental barriers as one study indicates that female victims of sexism have been linked to poor mathematic grades.

The human brain holds the answer to numerous mysteries that life has in store for us. We have just scratched the surface.