Communication
Masculine and feminine cultures and individuals generally differ in how they communicate with others. For example, feminine people tend to self-disclose more often than masculine people, and in more intimate details. Likewise, feminine people tend to communicate more affection, and with greater intimacy and confidence than masculine people. Generally speaking, feminine people communicate more and prioritize communication more than masculine.
Traditionally, masculine people and feminine people communicate with people of their own gender in different ways. Masculine people form friendships with other masculine people based on common interests, while feminine people build friendships with other feminine people based on mutual support. However, both genders initiate opposite-gender friendships based on the same factors. These factors include proximity, acceptance, effort, communication, common interests, affection and novelty.
Context is very important when determining how we communicate with others. It is important to understand what script it is appropriate to use in each respective relationship. Specifically, understanding how affection is communicated in a given context is extremely important. For example, masculine people expect competition in their friendships. They avoid communicating weakness and vulnerability. They avoid communicating personal and emotional concerns. Masculine people tend to communicate affection by including their friends in activities and exchanging favors. Masculine people tend to communicate with each other shoulder-to-shoulder (e.g. watching sports on a television).
In contrast, feminine people do not mind communicating weakness and vulnerability. In fact, they seek out friendships more in these times. For this reason, feminine people often feel closer to their friends than masculine people do. Feminine people tend to value their friends for listening and communicating non-critically, communicating support, communicating feelings of enhances self-esteem, communicating validation, offering comfort and contributing to personal growth. Feminine people tend to communicate with each other face-to-face (e.g. meeting together to talk over lunch).
Communicating with a friend of the opposite gender is often difficult because of the fundamentally different scripts that masculine people and feminine people use in their friendships. Another challenge in these relationships is that masculine people associate physical contact with communicating sexual desire more than feminine people. Masculine people also desire sex in their opposite-gender relationships more than feminine people. This presents serious challenges in cross-gender friendship communication. In order to overcome these challenges, the two parties must communicate openly about the boundaries of the relationship.
Read more about this topic: Gender Role