American culture assumes a great difference in the way men and women experience emotions. Women are assumed to be far more emotional than men, both in experiencing the emotions internally, as well as expressing them to the outside world. While the genders may differ in how they express their emotions, men and women do not inherently differ in the frequency of emotionality. Men are not emotionless, and women do not overcompensate for men's lack of emotion.
The roots of our ideas about gender and emotion date far back. According to Simon and Nath, "Historians have documented that Americans' beliefs about women's emotionality and men's unemotionality (or emotional reserve) are rooted in the 19th century gender ideologies, which were used to justify the division of labor between women and men that developed during the early stages of industrial capitalism." (p. 13) At this time, women's role was in the household only, caring for the family, which required sensitivity to others. Men,......
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