x + Yx + Y

Cheng thinks like a mathematician: she sees past the distracting, superficial details of things to find their essences. When she turned that thinking upon gender, she found there wasn't much essence to speak of at all. Cheng explains what she calls ingressive and congressive personalities. Ingressive people are competitive, independent, bold, risk-taking, self-assured, and often have one-track minds. Congressive people focus on society and community, take the needs of others into account, emphasize interconnectedness, and tend to collaborate. As a society, we associate ingressive personalities with men and congressive personalities with women--and it is the source not just of gender inequality, but a great deal of individual unhappiness. Thinking about the problem like a mathematician makes it clear that most of what we ascribe to gender has nothing to do with gender at all. -- adapted from publisher info