Is this why, of the people I know, the men seem to enjoy board games employing strategy more than the women do?
In [Thursday's] New York Times economist economist Alan Krueger writes up a new book called Women Don't Ask: Negotiation and the Gender Divide, written by Linda Babcock and Sara Laschever, and forthcoming from Princeton University Press.
The bottom line of this book: women are less likely to negotiate than are men, and less likely to enjoy it. Krueger's summary notes: "Men see situations as adaptable; women see them as unchangeable. Men use metaphors like "winning a ballgame" to describe negotiations; women use metaphors like "going to the dentist." Women are "more likely than men to think that simply working hard and doing a good job will earn them success and advancement.""