Effects of Gender Differences on Expressing Pain
Journal Title: Journal of Researches in Linguistics - Year 2020, Vol 12, Issue 1
Abstract
Abstract The present paper aims to investigate the role of language and gender in expressing pain. Pain is usually described as a personal subjective experience and sometimes it is believed that language is the only device to access this personal experience. Besides, considering physiological, psychological and social differences between men and women, gender affects the expression of pain. In this paper, I will investigate if men and women express their pain differently. To investigate this, 31 men and 31 women were asked to write one paragraph about a painful experience they had in the past. Qualitative analysis of the data (using MaxQda software and considering sensory, affective, evaluative dimensions of pain in McGill pain questionnaire) showed that although men and women’s texts had equal number of words, women’s texts had more coded segments. This implies that women describe their pain in more details. Both men and women expressed the affective dimension of their pain, but women expressed more emotions and described their pain more severely. As for the sensory dimension, men had more coded segments only for this category, but for other dimensions women rated higher. The results of the t-test tells that the difference between men and women in expressing the affective and evaluative dimensions of pain is significant while for other dimensions is not. Knowing about these gender differences in expressing pain can be beneficial to medical practitioners. Keywords: Expressing Pain, Measuring Pain, Gender Differences, Mcgill Pain Questionnaire Introduction The present paper aims to investigate the effect of language and gender on describing pain. The current definition of pain provided by the International Association for the Study of Pain (IASP) is “an unpleasant sensory and emotional experience associated with, or resembling that associated with, actual or potential tissue damage." Pain is generally described as a personal and subjective experience, largely influenced by personal moods, attitudes, and beliefs. Thus, it is sometimes believed that language is the only pathway to access this personal experience. As Bourke (2014) states, “pain is a social action and communicative act mediated through language, and influenced by social factors including gender, class, ethnicity, cultural expectations, and beliefs.” In this study, we aim to focus on the influence of gender on expressing pain. Materials and Methods The purpose of this study is to explore the effect of gender-related differences on describing a recollected painful experience. To this end, 31 men and 31 women were asked to describe a painful experience in one paragraph. Based on Strong et al. (2009), they were asked to describe “what happened, how they felt, what they did, and what others did for them.” The participants were given the choice to describe either a physical or emotional experience. The average age of the subjects was 30, ranging from 22-53, and they completed their task in around 15 minutes. Discussion of Results and Conclusions The texts were 4954 and 4958 words (159 words on average) for women and men, respectively, indicating similar eagerness for describing their pain. In the female group, 22 subjects described physical pain, and 9 described emotional pain. On the other hand, 18 subjects in the male group described a physical pain, while 13 described emotional pain. The qualitative analysis of the data was carried out using the MaxQda11 software. Four codes were defined to consider sensory, affective, evaluative, and miscellaneous dimensions of pain mentioned in the McGill Pain Questionnaire (MPQ). It should be noted that MPQ is a self-report measure of pain composed of 78 words, of which subjects choose those that best described their pain. Such words describe four dimensions of pain: sensory (pain location, intensity, quality, and pattern); affective (fear, depression, and anxiety related to pain); cognitive/evaluative (overall pain appraisal); and miscellaneous (different and varied aspects of pain). In addition, another code relating to functional limitations caused by pain (following Strong et al., 2009) was identified in this study. The descriptions were analyzed and the codes were identified. Any word or linguistic structure that matched the definition of codes was tagged with a code. Gender differences were identified according to the number of codes and their distribution pattern. The analysis showed that although both genders provided texts with approximately equal words, women’s texts had more coded segments. Compared to 189 codes found in women’s texts, 130 codes were found in texts written by the male subjects. This significant difference in the number of codes implies that women describe their pain in more detail. Even though both men and women expressed the affective dimension of their pain, women expressed more emotions (90 codes in women versus 47 codes in men) and described their pain more severely. Except for the sensory dimension, in which men had more coded segments (33 codes versus 28 codes), women rated higher in other segments. To evaluate the significance of such differences, a quantitative analysis was performed using SPSS. The results from the independent t-test revealed that the difference between men and women was significant in expressing the affective and evaluative dimensions of pain while insignificant in other dimensions. These differences among genders in expressing pain can be beneficial for medical practitioners to avoid gender-related biases in the assessment and treatment of pain.
Authors and Affiliations
Azam Estaji * Associate Professor, Department of linguistics, Faculty of letters and Humanities Ferdowsi University of Mashhad, Mashhad, Iran estaji@um. ac. ir
Keywords
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- EP ID EP705241
- DOI http://dx.doi.org/10.22108/jrl.2020.121341.1449
- Views 89
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