The Slippery Case of the Missing Butter
Every woman in the world has had the following conversation with a male who is standing in front of an open fridge
David: “Where is the butter
?”
Sara: “It’s in the fridge
”
David: “I’m looking there, but I can’t see any butter
Sara: Well, it’s there. I put it in ten minutes ago
!”
David: “No. You must have put it somewhere else. There is definitely no butter in this fridge
At that, Sara strides into the kitchen, thrusts her arms into the fridge and, as if by magic, produces a tub of butter. Inexperienced men sometimes feel that this is a trick and they accuse women of always hiding thing from them in drawers and cupboards. Socks, shoes, underwear, jam, butter car keys, wallets-they are all there, they just can’t see them. With her wider arc of peripheral vision a woman can see most of the obects in a fridge or a cupboard without moving her head. Her estrogen hormones allows her to identify matching items in a drawer, cupboard or across a room and later remembers objects in a complex random pattern such as where the butter or jam in the refrigerator. New research also suggests that male brains are searching in the fridge for the word B-U-T-T-E-R. If it’s facing the wrong way, he virtually can’t see it. This is why men move their heads. Men move their heads from side to side and up and down as they scan for the “missing” objects.