Slashdot Mirror

← Back to Stories (view on slashdot.org)

Study Shows Good With Math Means Bad With People

Posted by ryuzaki0 on from the numbers-are-my-only-friends dept.

Sylentmode writes "A recent study by Brookings Institution's Brown Center shows that students who are good with math are less likely to be happy, and are likely to have low confidence. From the article "In essence, happiness is overrated" says study author Tom Loveless. I wonder if Loveless is just a nickname, because he is so good with math."

19 of 479 comments (clear)

  1. according to my calculations... by LeonardsLiver · · Score: 5, Funny

    people suck...

  2. more than just the two by User+956 · · Score: 5, Funny

    A recent study by Brookings Institution's Brown Center shows that students who are good with math are less likely to be happy, and are likely to have low confidence.

    Yeah, well, I think there's 10 types of people in this world. People who are good at binary, and ... 9 more.

    --
    The theory of relativity doesn't work right in Arkansas.
    1. Re:more than just the two by TheDreadSlashdotterD · · Score: 5, Funny

      You obviously aren't very good with binary. Does that make you happy?

      --
      I have nothing to say.
  3. Overrated by nine-times · · Score: 5, Insightful
    ...students who are good with math are less likely to be happy, and are likely to have low confidence. From the article "In essence, happiness is overrated" says study author Tom Loveless.

    Really? Didn't anyone stop to think that maybe math is overrated?

    1. Re: Overrated by Black+Parrot · · Score: 5, Funny

      > Didn't anyone stop to think that maybe math is overrated?

      According to my calculations, it's overrated by a factor of about 2.7

      --
      Sheesh, evil *and* a jerk. -- Jade
    2. Re:Overrated by nine-times · · Score: 5, Informative

      No I read the article (at least partially), but I was responding to the summary. The article seems more to be a rebuttal of education theory that started being implemented about 10-20 years ago. People kept focussing on making kids feel good and increasing their self-esteem, but they're finding that making kids feel good about math doesn't help them do well at math. If anything, it's the kids who worry about doing well enough in math that succeed.

      Not too surprising, if you ask me.

  4. Quite True by Sqwubbsy · · Score: 5, Insightful

    I do a bit of work with folks from the Netherlands. Great folks. Great country.
    One guy turned to me and said "I wish we could be as confident as you Americans are."
    Struck me dumb. This is a bright guy who I highly respect and yet his focus, despite his strengths, was on confidence.

    So I kicked his ass.
    (Just kidding.)

    --
    $30 Off All Plans: Use code TRIPLESAWBUCK
  5. Completley misleading summary by jpardey · · Score: 5, Insightful

    All the article says is that students who are less confident and less happy with math are more likely to do well, in relation to how they feel about it, and how it is taught. Even the article seems to be misreading what it seems the study says. Sounds to me that harder, more complete math classes lead to better math skills.

    --
    I have freaks! I did something right...
  6. Sounds bogus to me by unitron · · Score: 5, Funny
    "Good With Math Means Bad With People"

    If that were true I'd be much better at math.

    --

    I see even classic Slashdot is now pretty much unusable on dial up anymore.

  7. That's easy... by FlatCatInASlatVat · · Score: 5, Insightful

    One of the things it takes to be good at math is compulsiveness to complete tasks and to pay attention to detail. Those same drives are the ones that make you unhappy in the real world, which is by its nature messy, illogical and incomplete. Seems like in most arenas, the people who succeed are the ones who are internally driven and thus never really satisfied. Isn't that why most of the people at the top are off the bell curve in one or another aspect of social behavior?

  8. Re:Um, yeah? by servognome · · Score: 5, Funny
    How many guys do you know that can recite PI to the 100th place and swoon at the thought of the Pythagorean Theorem proven geometrically are going to turn on that red hot number at the end of the bar?

    They have numbers in bars?! I'm not sure about "turning it on" whatever that means, but I'd probably be able to factor it and recite it as a multiple of pi.
    --
    D6 63 0D 70 89 81 BB 8E 7B 7C 5F 5D 54 EA AB 73
  9. Blurb misrepresents the actual study by foonf · · Score: 5, Insightful

    What this study found is that students from countries with higher average math scores have lower average enjoyment of and confidence in math than those from countries with lower scores. This does not actually imply that people who are more proficient in math enjoy it less than those who do not, in general, much less that they are less happy overall. What it does suggest is that educational systems that produce students who are more capable may be less enjoyable or result in less confidence, which actually makes a good deal of sense considering how math is taught in many countries that tend to perform well in these international comparisons.

    --

    "(Man) tries to live his own life as if he were telling a story. But you have to choose: live or tell." --Sartre
  10. it's a learned disability by fishdan · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Children (especially girls) who show aptitude at math are treated as if they are social misfits, and their social missteps are toerated more than in "normal" children. Kids who are good at maath are frequently "taught" via positive reinforcement to be social misfits by society.

    --
    Nothing great was ever achieved without enthusiasm
    1. Re:it's a learned disability by misanthrope101 · · Score: 5, Insightful
      I always hear that, but I don't see it around me. Girls score higher than boys in most subject areas in school. Women make up more than half of all college students. A high percentage of law and medical students are female. Women are not penalized socially for being smart or articulate. What I have seen is that women who want to date a particular type of guy, the type who happens to be the jock alpha-male, have to try and fit in with the likes/dislikes of that type of guy, and they find themselves being someone they don't want to be, and resenting men for it.

      But I don't think many perl hackers want dumb women. Speaking as an English major, I don't like dumb women. I have met women who pretended to be dumber than they were, but without exception these women wanted to date a type of guy who wanted that in a woman. They ignore all the men who like strong, intelligent women, and then conclude that society painted them into a corner. It's sort of like men who date strippers--it's not that women are that way, but that women you like are that way. A woman having bad taste in men doesn't make me a pig. And all the smart women I know are respected by those around them. Yes, some are called "the B word," just as some rude, pushy men are called assholes. People are people, and no one gets a free pass.

    2. Re:it's a learned disability by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Interesting

      You obviously have the priveledge of being educated, and surrounded by educated people.

      I grew up in a small rural town. I was IQ tested in kindergarten because I was 'different', and after that was told to just deal with the work that I was given, cos I was too smart for the underfunded rural school system to deal with. (And my mum is a single mum, on welfare, and my younger brother is intellectually disabled. You wonder where the money went?)

      Primary school was pretty good. I sat in the library and learnt about whatever I wanted to. I did activities with the other kids, but mostly I was self-directed.

      High school things changed. I was put into the top stream for all the classes, but very soon I was confronted with the idea that 'Boys are Smarter', in particular 'Boys are Better at Maths'. Math wasn't my strong point in comparison to English and Science, so I was coming second. The person coming first was another GIRL.

      In the 10th grade I was the ONLY Student in the school to get an A (between 90-100%) on the school certificate state exams for Science.
      When I tried to enrol in Chemistry for year 11, I was told that Biology is the 'Girls Subject', and that I shouldn't study Chemistry because it was too hard for me. (None of the boys I asked had been warned off studying chem).
      I went to the principal who happened to be a woman, and she had me enrolled anyway.

      Since I left that little town and enrolled in University, I haven't dealt with that sort of crap. My boyfriend loves intelligent women, my friends love intelligent women, I know other intelligent women.
      But heaven forbid I offer an opinion on a topic such as the current political climate, or the economy when I go home for a weekend. They don't want to hear it, not from me.

      People that have not lived in a situation where it is just easier to act dumb cant understand.

      Even educated men can expect a woman to be stupid. My Boyfriend and one of his friends did their MBA together, and they used to love setting up some arrogant twat in an argument with me, and then pounce on him the moment I won. :)
      Ah, good times, good times.
      But with out the support of those guys telling my opponent not to talk over me, because I know what I am talking about, I would never have had the confidence to argue down men a decade my senior, with half an MBA under their belts.

      Or maybe they just think I am dumb cos I am young and cute and blonde. :P
      Maybe being female has very little to do with it.
      Some women don't get that support.

    3. Re:it's a learned disability by misanthrope101 · · Score: 5, Insightful
      But heaven forbid I offer an opinion on a topic such as the current political climate, or the economy when I go home for a weekend. They don't want to hear it, not from me.
      Everyone who isn't in step with O'Reilly and Coulter is shouted down in this political climate. I feel like a pariah just for saying something as obvious as "torture is wrong." Our culture is dominated by people who think that contempt and derision qualify as valid arguments. It's not as if these same people are all calm and logical when they aren't talking to women, and then break into the "how dare you" tone when someone with ovaries comes in the room. They're assholes with the rest of us, too.

      People that have not lived in a situation where it is just easier to act dumb cant understand.

      It's easier for anyone to act dumb. Doesn't matter if you're male or female. I get made fun of for having a decent vocabulary, for reading, for not watching TV and sports, and so on. I'm not saying "guys have it worse," only that much of the flak women think they're getting because they're female isn't really because they're female--we get it too.

  11. Obligatory Simpsons Reference by Nova+Express · · Score: 5, Funny
    Lisa: Dad, as intelligence goes up, happiness often goes down. In fact, I made a graph! [sadly] I make a lot of graphs.

    --
    Lawrence Person (lawrencepersonh@gmailh.com (remove all "h"s to mail)

    http://www.lawrenceperson.com/

  12. title is all wrong about what the study says by Glog · · Score: 5, Informative

    Slashdot's done it once again - it's patently stupid to say that "good with math means bad with people". This is not what the study says at all. It establishes a relationship between enjoyment of math and math skills. It also concludes that the more you were taught math as a fun game the less likely you are to be good at it. It mentions nothing at all about social skills in relationship to math.

  13. you have it bassackwards by misanthrope101 · · Score: 5, Insightful
    No, I think you have it backwards. Women do have that certain something that men want, but that isn't the reason they aren't penalized for being smart. That's why they aren't penalized for being stupid. A smart, articulate woman has overcome not a conspiracy to keep her dumb, but a collective willingness to let her get away with being less smart than a man, because of that thing she has that the guys are after. It works against her in the long run, because expecting less of you is holding you down, but they can still get away with more if they happen to fill a sweater niceley.

    An attractive woman can be a dunce and someone will still laugh at her jokes, hang on her every word, carry her luggage, and give her a job. For the wrong reasons? Absolutely. I sometimes think that's part of the reason that some men do find intelligent women frightening. Add the power they already have via their sex to their intelligence, and it can be daunting. The guy can be left wondering if she's thinking "I could sleep my way to the top and beat you anyway, but I'll play it your way just because I find this way more amusing for now." Even when a person has too much character to win that way, the fact that they have the option can be irritating.