Sex and age differences in choice behaviour: the object-person dimension

Area of Science:

• Psychology
• Social Psychology
• Developmental Psychology

Background:

• A common belief suggests females are more socially oriented, while males are more object-oriented.
• Existing research often explores sex differences in social and object preferences.

Purpose of the Study:

• To investigate whether sex and age influence preferences for social (person) versus object stimuli.
• To examine the popular belief regarding sex differences in social orientation across different age groups.

Main Methods:

• Employed a 2x2 factorial design with sex (male/female) and age (young/older adults) as independent variables.
• Participants viewed pairs of pictures (object and person) for 30 seconds each.
• Measured interest by recording the time spent looking at each stimulus type.

Main Results:

• Confirmed a hypothesis that males and females differ in object-person preference.
• This sex difference was significant only in younger adults.
• Older adults, regardless of sex, showed equal and higher interest in social stimuli compared to object stimuli.

Conclusions:

• The typical sex difference in social versus object orientation is age-dependent, diminishing in older adulthood.
• Older adults exhibit a generalized interest in social stimuli, irrespective of sex.
• Masculinity and femininity scores provided limited insight into the age-related absence of sex differences.