Analysis Of Sex Lies And Conversation Deborah Tannen

In "Sex, Lies, and Conversation; Why is It So Hard for Men and Women to Talk to Each Other," Deborah Tannen argues that the problems of men and women in marriage often stem from the fact that they misunderstand what the other person is really trying to say. Tannen notes that her own research concluded that women's most frequent complaint in marriage was that their husbands did not listen to them, but that when she examined actual conversations, she found that the problem was not that men don't listen, but that they listen differently (281). Leading Eleanor Maccoby to report the results of her own finding showing that children’s development is most influenced by the social structure of peer interaction (Tannen 282). Therefore, childhood experiences …show more content…
For example, little girls maintain their friendships through the exchange of secrets and mindfulness, while women regard conversation as the corner stone of a relationship (Tannen 282). Therefore, a woman expects her husband to be just like a best friend who listens and gives feed back on what she is trying to say. According to linguistic Lynette Hirschman, “women make more listener noise, such as ‘mhm’, ‘yeah’, and ‘uhuh’ to show ‘I’m with you’” (Tannen 284). However, men are found to give silent attention, making it seem like not any attention is being given to the women. Causing, women to interpret the attention of a man as no attention at all (Tannen …show more content…
According to psychologist Bruce Dorval, at every age girls and women faced each other making direct eye contact. While boys and men of all ages sat at angles to each other and looked at things within the room (Tannen 283). Therefore, the tendency for men to face away from women gives the impression that they are not listening even when they are. Also, girls, talk at length about one topic while boys seem to jump from one topic to the next. These conversational habits are as frustration to men as they are to women. Men expect silent attention; however, when there are listener noises men perceive them as impatience or overreaction. Another difference among men and women is how they express support. Women have the tendency to agree to each other, while men tend to point out the other side of an argument Men’s conversational duty can be seen to women as disloyalty, and refusal to offer the requisite support (Tannen 284). Men take too literally women’s “trouble talk”, just as women mistake men’s challenges and real