Multitasking women
-
- September
- 22
As I mentioned a few days ago, Sleepy Hollow psychologist Carin Rubenstein’s new book is filled with wisdom — backed up by research.
After my interview with her yesterday, I’ve learned one of the reasons women function so well is that our brains are wired to multitask. Perhaps that explains why we become such good caretakers of children and parents while holding down a job. It’s that ability to compartmentalize.
Rubenstein, mother of two kids in their early twenties, just came out with “The Superior Wife Syndrome,’’ and we chatted at her home about the difficulties faced by most husbands and wives, especially once children arrive.
She told me that a woman can make dinner, help a child with homework and call in a prescription to the pharmacy all at once, and do everything well. A man, on the other hand, cannot focus on helping a child with homework if he is watching a football game.
Oh. That explains a lot.
I always wondered why so much energy goes into watching a game, and why other things can’t be accomplished at the same time. Do you agree it’s because of the way men’s brains are wired? Or is it something else?
Do most men really want to help out at home or is watching TV the perfect escape?
Men, feel free to comment here. Steve…are you there?
This entry was posted
on Tuesday, September 22nd, 2009 at 5:54 pm by Linda Lombroso.
You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed.
Print
| 
Email
Baby boomer Linda Lombroso was born in Queens and grew up in Port Washington. She began her journalism career at New York Magazine and Rolling Stone, and came back to the field after spending 10 years as a stay-at-home mother. Linda joined The Journal News in 1997 and has been a Life & Style writer since 2000. She has three children.
My mom multitasked, I multitask. My husband, my boss, my son can’t. My daughters, my female friends can. Or men just don’t want to. Who is really smarter?
I think men are. I tend to get more stressed than my husband because he deals with one thing at a time. It has been raised more than once during our marriage.