Which statement best summarizes gender differences in intelligence testing?

• A. There are no general differences, but males excel in visual-spatial and females in verbal tasks
• B. Males excel in all cognitive domains
• C. Females excel in spatial reasoning
• D. Males excel in verbal tasks

Answer: (A)

The key idea is that general intelligence is similar for men and women, but there are small, domain-specific differences. Across large studies, average IQ or general cognitive ability shows little to no difference between genders, with lots of overlap among individuals. However, when looking at specific skills, a pattern emerges: males tend to perform slightly better on visuospatial tasks (like mental rotation or navigation in some conditions), while females tend to perform a bit better on verbal tasks (such as vocabulary and fluency). These gaps are modest and many people of either gender outperform others on both types of tasks; environment, training, and cultural factors can influence performance as well. The other options imply universal superiority in certain domains or misstate which domain shows an advantage, which isn’t supported by the evidence.