Another Battle of the Sexes

Until fairly recently, cardroom poker was primarily a man's game. Fifty years ago, hardly any women played there. The number of women players has steadily increased, and the current explosion will accelerate that trend. However, there are still three huge differences between the sexes:

1. Far more men play in cardrooms.

2. The male-female ratio increases as the stakes get higher.

3. Far more men excel at tournament poker.

Although not many people will disagree with these points, I have never read a good explanation for them. I hesitated about writing on this subject because it might offend some people – both male and female. As "ESP is Nonsense!" (March 28, 2003) and a few other columns illustrate, I don't mind offending people when I'm sure I'm right. But now, I'm not so sure.

Most of the sexual differences are supported by research, but some research is controversial. And applying research to poker can get quite speculative. My positions should therefore be regarded as just opinions, not facts. Some men and women will emphatically disagree, but this issue is worth discussing. Since male-female differences at home, work, schools, and almost everyplace else have been discussed very frequently, I wonder why they have not been seriously discussed for poker.

The most important reason that more men play in cardrooms is that, until recently, women were not welcome or comfortable in many of them. Cardrooms were often "men's clubs." Many of them were in bad neighborhoods, and they were often dirty, smoky, and disreputable. Until the early 1980s, a few cardrooms actually refused to let women play! Even the women who loved playing in homes and private clubs would not go to cardrooms; it just wasn't done. Today's cardrooms are much nicer and more welcoming places, which has encouraged more women (and more men) to play in them.

The interesting question is not why more men play poker, but why far more of them excel in tournaments. Since there are no good statistics for ring games, nobody knows how well men and women do. However, most professionals are men, as are nearly all the top tournament pros. The Dec. 19 issue of Card Player reports tournament records on page 134. In "Overall Player Standings," 19 of the top 20 players are male. The top 10 players (and ties) for limit hold'em, Omaha, and seven other games are listed. A few players appear on more than one list, and I can't tell a few players' gender. However, of these 90-plus players, only three names are clearly female; that is, more than 95 percent of the top tournament pros are men. If you turn to the last page of this issue, you will see the same picture.

If a corporation had such an imbalance, there would be massive lawsuits claiming discrimination or a "glass ceiling." Since the rules don't favor either men or women, this imbalance can't be caused by discrimination.

However, since nearly all the tournament pros are men, the percentage of top winners who are male may not be higher than the percentage of entrants into the major tournaments. Why don't more women join the "tour"? I don't know. Some may think they can't succeed, while others may not want that lifestyle. The same factors (plus others) probably influence the numbers of men and women who choose to play professionally.

Let's look at some other causes for men's greater success at the top levels. The first reason is quite obvious: Men invented the game, and its rules and culture favor them. In fact, one reason that more men play is probably that they like math and aggression, two of poker's central elements. To succeed at poker, women must develop attitudes and behavior patterns that are not at all "feminine."

Thousands of studies have given a fairly clear picture of these differences, but they refer to averages, not individuals. Most characteristics are distributed as bell-shaped curves, and there is immense overlap between the distributions for males and females. For example, the average male is more aggressive than the average female, but many females are much more aggressive than the average male.

Males are unquestionably more aggressive than females. The primary cause is almost certainly testosterone, but there are also huge differences in social training. Boys are taught to be tough and competitive, while girls are taught to be sweet and cooperative. That pattern continues indefinitely; for example, corporations often reward aggressive men, but punish aggressive women. As socialization patterns have changed, differences in aggression have decreased, but males will always be more aggressive.

Some radical feminists insist that socialization causes all differences in aggression, but their position is ideological, not scientific. Countless studies have shown that very small boys are much more aggressive than girls, and that male lions, horses, cats, dogs, and virtually all other mammals are more aggressive than females. Those differences could not be caused by socialization.

Brandie Johnson objected that female lions do the hunting while the males sit on their butts. She's right, and Poker Babe noted that mothers defending babies are utterly ferocious. So, females can be more aggressive when something important is at stake, but males get into far more fights over dominance, territory, and females – the whole "macho" nonsense. In addition, virtually all wars have been started by men, and hardly any serial killers are women. Perhaps poker's goal of winning money is not important enough to arouse most women's aggressive impulses, while many men love to prove how tough they are.

Males score higher on math tests, but women do better on verbal tests. Some researchers believe these differences are primarily biological, but there has been a recent and very dramatic reduction in the differences between math scores. Changed socialization patterns almost certainly caused this reduction. Women were once discouraged from studying math, but this pressure has decreased sharply. There is, however, one exception to the trend: Males make nearly all the top scores.

Only young people take almost all of these tests – especially the SATs. Hardly anyone takes tests or studies math after completing formal schooling, and adults' math abilities and attitudes rarely change. Changed socialization patterns may therefore have little impact on today's poker players, but will probably affect future generations.

Poker is a mathematical game that rewards aggression, particularly during tournaments. Anyone who plays or watches tournaments knows that most of them are won by aggressive players. In addition, all the top tournament players – whether male or female – are very aggressive. Since men are better at math and more aggressive, they obviously have a huge natural advantage. There are, of course, exceptions. Some women are math whizzes, and everybody has played with aggressive women. Virtually all female professionals are aggressive and mathematically competent, which is very different from the feminine stereotype. To put it bluntly, to succeed at poker, a woman must act in non-feminine ways.

My thanks to Linda Johnson, Jan Fisher, Poker Babe, Brandie Johnson, and Mary McGuirk for their comments. Of course, none of them agrees with everything I said, and they have no responsibility for this material.

If you would like to learn more about yourself and other players, you can order Dr. Schoonmaker's book, The Psychology of Poker.