Men can’t compromise without women around

This article has a few red flags, the true hallmarks of pop-science reporting:

  * Click-baity title
  * Single data point; no reference to other/related research
  * Plays on widespread cultural beliefs
  * Loaded with speculation

I'm neither agreeing nor disagreeing with their hypothesis or analysis, and it is definitely an interesting topic. But I also remember hearing about the researchers who tried to repeat 100 of the most famous social-science experiments, and less than half of them were actually reproducible.

And then, in some crazy meta-irony, I stumble upon this article [1] (funny enough, also from WaPo), which blasts the aforementioned study for all of its flaws.

Where does that leave us? I don't know, just color me skeptical about any pop-science media coverage. Regardless of how broadly any single experiment is conducted, I consider the entire experiment a single data point. I could add my own speculations about what this particular study means, but frankly I'd rather understand it, mentally digest it, and wait for more data points before trying to draw a line.

[1] https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/speaking-of-science/wp/2...

What terrible science. And terrible science journalism.

Link to underlying study: https://marketing.wharton.upenn.edu/mktg/assets/File/Lambert...

So many holes in this. First of all, the study construction is contrived and the results are vastly overgeneralized. It's so shoddy it's hardly worth pointing out all the issues.

Here's a thought experiment, though: say a study with questionable methodology were published and it's conclusion was that females negotiate less effectively than males (just as this study seems to imply males are less likely to compromise than females). Then let's say that the study speculates that this is because females are attempting to adhere to gender normative stereotypes, eg being meek or some such. Then let's say that some journalist writes up an article saying "Women can't negotiate without men around"... what would the reaction be?

This is a gross study and a really poor write-up, which is disappointing to see in the WP.

> This study has obvious limitations. Firstly, the sample was small and young. College men could be more headstrong than older adults who’d rather not fight over grill selection. Regardless, the compromise gender gap isn’t all that surprising. A national Pew Research last year found that 34 percent of Americans think female politicians are better at reaching compromises than their male counterparts. Only 9 percent said men were better.

Well, WashPo, you tried.

Change the object being picked out from grills to window curtains. let's see the results instead of vague posts in the comments section that other objects were tested.

An unlikely premise. What about government debate back in the time when women weren't part of the process? You can't get much done in a democratic government without compromise.