Cleverest Women Drink You Under The Table

The Telegraph article, "Cleverest Women are the Heaviest Drinkers," reports on a comprehensive study carried out by the London School of Economics that followed thousands of 39-year-old women. The study determined that the more educated women are, the more likely they are to drink alcohol on most days. Similar trends were spotted for men, but in the case of women, their alcohol consumption could even be predicted from their scores in school tests taken when they are as young as five. "Women who achieved "medium" or "high" test marks as schoolgirls are up to 2.1 times more likely to drink daily as adults."

The scientists reasoned the women tended "to have children later, postponing the responsibilities of parenthood" and also, "may have more active social lives or work in male-dominated workplaces with a drinking culture."

Obviously, the blogosphere has more entertaining speculation. Everything from "college being a four-year pub crawl" and acclimatizing educated women to drinking cultures (*cough*, not my college) to the pleasure women derive from delving in the sense of entitlement drinking provides and the availability of such commodities dependent on the larger size of their pocketbooks. One of my personal favorites, expounded on the amount of alcohol it takes a smart person to deal with how retarded the world is.

But borrowing an example from the Cokie Roberts, Don Imus, and Chris Wallace scandal, "No, We're Not Going to Shut Up," Michel Martin from NPR illustrates how there is a strong historical impression that women should sit down and shut up in the workplace.

"It used to be that men with a shred of power could say whatever they wanted about women and women had to put up with it, or get a man to duel for them or something...I cannot help but think that what the fury is really about is the loss of entitlement."

Studies show that women who are as assertive as men at the office are struck by a Double-Bind Dilemna. From the New York Times article, "Feminine Critique,":

"...women who act in ways that are consistent with gender stereotypes...are considered less competent. But if they act in ways that are seen as more “male” —“act assertively, focus on work task, display ambition” — they are seen as “too tough” and “unfeminine.”

And if you are damned if you do and damned if you don't without cultivating a suitable outlet for your rage, any wonder why that glass of chardonnay is looking a little less frisky? [via the Gothamist, thanks Maria].