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This is a good point, I hadn’t thought of it this way re: women being more verbal skewing the results. I wonder if there’s also a self selection happening and if men are less likely to want to admit it in the same way as it’s still less socially acceptable for them. I’m not sure Haidt and others have controlled for this variable. you’ve given me something to chew on.

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Thanks, Radical. The linguistic problem is twofold: the fact that most boys and men are somewhat verbally impaired but also the fact that the researchers themselves are usually women--at least three quarters of all psychologists are women--and therefore look for verbal cues that they expect to hear from girls and women. This is the feminization of depression (and many other problems).

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good point; psychology departments are so heavily female and they tend to study college students. It’s why I’m so skeptical of their findings, but Haidt and his group did larger studies I believe.

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