Just in - Study proves many men are idiots.
Tongue-in-cheek scientific study proves that men are bigger idiots than women | National Post
In case there was any doubt before, a team of British researchers has proven men are idiots.
There is even a name for the field: Male Idiot Theory.
Researchers from Newcastle University decided to test the theory by examining sex differences in “idiotic risk-taking behaviour” among Darwin Award nominees over a 20-year span. The Darwin Awards commemorate those who die not in accidental deaths but in idiotic accidents involving “astonishingly stupid methods,” the team writes in the annual Christmas issue of the British Medical Journal.
Past winners include an Iraqi terrorist who mailed a letter bomb with insufficient postage, only to have it explode in his face when he opened his own “return to sender” letter, and a man who died after hitching a shopping cart to the back of a train. He was dragged three kilometres to his death before the train could stop.
Overall, males made up 88.7% of Darwin Award winners over the study period, a “highly statistically significant” sex difference in idiotic risk-taking behaviour, the authors report.
The finding, they conclude, supports their working hypothesis “that men are idiots and idiots do stupid things.”
The paper, a departure from the BMJ’s usual diet of serious medical studies, appears in the journal’s Christmas edition, an annual issue featuring quirky scientific papers based on real data. This year’s offerings include a study on which magazines disappear fastest from doctors’ waiting rooms (gossipy magazines are more likely to go missing than The Economist or Time) and “what’s on your surgeon’s playlist?”
The male idiot theory study is described as the first systematic review of its kind.
It has been well established that men are more likely than women to be admitted to hospital with accidental or sports-related injuries. They’re also more likely to die in car crashes.
At The Ottawa Hospital, males represent the majority of trauma patients, according to figures provided to Postmedia News. In 2013-14, men accounted for 69% of all trauma patients seen in emergency (446 men in total, compared to 200 women). Trauma cases involve unintentional falls, motor vehicle collisions and assault.
Cultural and social factors may partly explain sex differences in risk-seeking behaviour, the British team says. For example, men may be more likely than women to engage in contact sports or risky pursuits such as skydiving.
But the researchers focused on a class of risk in a league of its own — “idiotic” risk, defined as “senseless risks, where the apparent payoff is negligible or non-existent” and the outcome is usually very, very bad.
For their analysis, the researchers reviewed all Darwin Award nominations from 1995 to 2014. They relied on confirmed accounts only, excluding urban legends and “honourable mentions,” such as a man who lost a testicle while using a belt sander as an “auto-erotic” device. He repaired himself with a staple gun.
Of 332 nominations, men and women, typically “over-adventurous couples in compromising positions,” shared 14.
Of the 318 valid cases remaining, 282 awards were awarded to men, and just 36 to women.
Tongue-in-cheek scientific study proves that men are bigger idiots than women | National Post
In case there was any doubt before, a team of British researchers has proven men are idiots.
There is even a name for the field: Male Idiot Theory.
Researchers from Newcastle University decided to test the theory by examining sex differences in “idiotic risk-taking behaviour” among Darwin Award nominees over a 20-year span. The Darwin Awards commemorate those who die not in accidental deaths but in idiotic accidents involving “astonishingly stupid methods,” the team writes in the annual Christmas issue of the British Medical Journal.
Past winners include an Iraqi terrorist who mailed a letter bomb with insufficient postage, only to have it explode in his face when he opened his own “return to sender” letter, and a man who died after hitching a shopping cart to the back of a train. He was dragged three kilometres to his death before the train could stop.
Overall, males made up 88.7% of Darwin Award winners over the study period, a “highly statistically significant” sex difference in idiotic risk-taking behaviour, the authors report.
The finding, they conclude, supports their working hypothesis “that men are idiots and idiots do stupid things.”
The paper, a departure from the BMJ’s usual diet of serious medical studies, appears in the journal’s Christmas edition, an annual issue featuring quirky scientific papers based on real data. This year’s offerings include a study on which magazines disappear fastest from doctors’ waiting rooms (gossipy magazines are more likely to go missing than The Economist or Time) and “what’s on your surgeon’s playlist?”
The male idiot theory study is described as the first systematic review of its kind.
It has been well established that men are more likely than women to be admitted to hospital with accidental or sports-related injuries. They’re also more likely to die in car crashes.
At The Ottawa Hospital, males represent the majority of trauma patients, according to figures provided to Postmedia News. In 2013-14, men accounted for 69% of all trauma patients seen in emergency (446 men in total, compared to 200 women). Trauma cases involve unintentional falls, motor vehicle collisions and assault.
Cultural and social factors may partly explain sex differences in risk-seeking behaviour, the British team says. For example, men may be more likely than women to engage in contact sports or risky pursuits such as skydiving.
But the researchers focused on a class of risk in a league of its own — “idiotic” risk, defined as “senseless risks, where the apparent payoff is negligible or non-existent” and the outcome is usually very, very bad.
For their analysis, the researchers reviewed all Darwin Award nominations from 1995 to 2014. They relied on confirmed accounts only, excluding urban legends and “honourable mentions,” such as a man who lost a testicle while using a belt sander as an “auto-erotic” device. He repaired himself with a staple gun.
Of 332 nominations, men and women, typically “over-adventurous couples in compromising positions,” shared 14.
Of the 318 valid cases remaining, 282 awards were awarded to men, and just 36 to women.
