The daily grind Reading 1 You are going to read an article about gender and the division of labour. Seven, paragraphs have been removed from the article. Choose from paragraphs A~H the one which fits each gap (1-7), There is one extra paragraph which you do not need to use. Men can’t help it; blame their biology hhome-makers and childminders, cooks and cleaners, I: aan ideal world men would be women. They would be ‘unabashed by wearing an apron. They would even use those ‘baby-changing stations’ that now forlornly decorate Public toilets in airports and motorway service arcas, =| Which is not say the new man does nor exist. You see him toting the baby on his back, or filleting the kiwi fruit for his partners supper However, the new man’s most salient Characteristic is his rarity: IPhe had feathers, he would be an cendangeved species. 2 So, are men just behaving badly? Or is there another reason why they shy away from the iron? Ironing a shiet does not call for extraordinary skill,and men living on their own rmunage it perfectly well, so why do they shrink from the duty when they are married? Men ate more susceptible to boredom; says Professor Marvin Zuckerman, an expert on neurotransmitters, What happens when you don't get variation stimulation? What happens when there is nothing changing, nothing novel? I's an unpleasant feeling. Not quite anxiety or depression, dissatisfaction. Men are more impatient and, when they're bored, they find different ways to express their boredom Bs E Except, of course, for thé problem of serotonin. ‘tall became routine, mundane, boring, You start to feel:"I did that yesterday, so why should I do it again today?" And then you start to think, "Well, I won't do it today. 'm not bothered today” And then it just deteriorates from there? 5 ‘The differences are visible in brainscans When a man docs a crossword puzzle, only the left side of his brain is active but a woman's brain lights up like Blackpool. She uses both sides of her brain while she solves the elues.And what is true of verbal challenges is true to much of bie, Studies show that, in general, the male's brain is focused while hers is more integrated, 6 Last year an experiment was set up (test Fisher's findings. Six men and six women were challenged to complete series of tasks in limited time. They had to wash up, brew coffee, make toast and scrambled eggs, ion a shiet and take 4 phone message: The result was a walkover for the 7 Kevin and Lisa finaly declared their experiment a failure When Kevin went back to work it was as though a burden hhad beca lifted, he was so chiepy! Lisa says, Kevin feels he {back doing what he should be."We get on much better now I'm at work because I come home and I'm satisfied for the day: I've done my work, T've done a good job; he says. So you can be a new man, if that is what you want but only by undergoing a sex change, Easier, perhaps, (0 ‘wear an unironed shirt?"The female's bran is architecturally designed to do several things at once, whereas the male brain is more | focused, more compartmentalised, more built to do one | thing after another; says Helen Fisher, an anthropologist | who is also studying the brain.’And, of course, the home is a place where you need to do alot of things all at once = like clean the loo,answer the telephone, defrost the peas, feed the dog, change the baby and iroa the shirts? ‘Take Kevin Beck and Lisa Bates. They fell in love. They married. Each was on their second marriage and each hnad two children and, because Lisa was on a fase track ‘career, they agreed that Kevin would be the house- husband.'T've always looked after myself he says,'and 1 thought that I could manage. 'm pretty tidy so I thought the house would be as neat and tidy as I want it.1 thought it should be a breeze’ DBiolouy, that’s why.The culprit is a neurotransmitter called serotonin, We all have it in our brains, but men have less of it,and the less serotonin you have the more impatient and impulsive you are, Serotonin acts as a braking system on our impulses. tt placates. It permits us to endure routine and boredom. And men are serotonin-challenged And it is not just multitasking, Studies also show that from carly childhood males have a greater tolerance for dirt-They do not see the stains on a bath or the dust on the bookshelves. Males also have a different sense of smell. He does not detect many of the pheromone. related odours (smelly socks, sweaty shirts) of which ‘women are acutely aware. He sees sweetness and order where she sees filth and decay All surveys of household responsibilities show that men are stubbornly resistant to their new role as house- Fnusbands, though interestingly the newer the felationship the more pliant he is. But once he has his | boots firmly under her table he becomes the old brute | fee agin only 2 percent of men in stable relationships help with the washing and ironing, However, as men cannot he women we have hat to settle for the next best thing’ the ‘new man’. His specifications were dreamt up by feminists who rigorously refuse (0 recognise any innate differences of aptitude or attitude between the sexes, Is not hard to imagine - there's no financial rewant and there's certainly no glamour; there's precious litle | Job suistuction and not much to look forward to from fone day to the next exe role of the housewife is uiflerent today and, more | importantly, so are society's attitudes towards i De more of the same, But the ‘The house got messier as Kevin's low boredom threshold rebelled. Blouses got burnt instead af ironed as his brain strayed in search of diversions. However it ‘was not only serotonin that was erippling Kevin's good intentions. The brains of the male and female are organised in diferent ways, and this organisation is not an accident of upbringing or culture - itis hard-wired into the cells from conception