Women really are better at multitasking

Women are able to juggle a number of tasks at the same time to a better degree than their male counterparts. This is the suggestion of new research published in BMC Psychology and carried out by investigators from the Universities of Hertfordshire, Glasgow and Leeds, which lends support to the commonly-held belief that females are better at multitasking than men.

The investigation included two experiments - the first involving 120 men and 120 women, the second featuring 47 of each sex - and it was shown that women are better at carrying out two activities at the same time and are more adept at tasks requiring high-level cognitive control.

Keith Laws, a Chartered Psychologist and Professor of Neuropsychology at the University of Hertfordshire, explained the tests saw participants carrying out multiple tasks either at the same time or immediately after one another, adding: "The results showed that women had a distinct advantage in both types of multitasking."

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