Women Talk Too Much, and So Do You

Well, you can tell by the way I use my walk / I’m a woman’s man – no time to talk. —”Stayin’ Alive,” Bee Gees

Researchers who claim that men talk less than women have never been within earshot of a gay boy in J. Crew 484s.

American neuropsychiatrist  Louann Brizendine, for example, says the average man speaks about 7,000 words a day, while the  average woman clocks in at 20,000. What’s up with that?

Over the period of a year, a fast-talking female could churn out 4.7 million more words than a male. That’s the equivalent of reading aloud Proust’s seven-volume In Search of Lost Time, from beginning to end, four times. Mon dieu.

I’m no scientist, but I’m guessing there weren’t many gay boys in Brizendine’s study. It’s well known that gay boys are indefatigable Chatty Cathies, particularly when engaged in their favorite blood sport: passing judgment on others.

In fact, that snark-driven loquaciousness is what makes gay boys an essential fashion accessory for straight women.

I bring all this up because Brizendine’s oft-criticized findings, the basis for her 2006 book, The Female Mind, re-surfaced a few days ago in a new study from the University of Maryland School of Medicine. The media pounced on it, of course. Who doesn’t love a gabby gals story?

The UM study, published in the Journal of Neuroscience, says there may be biological evidence to support the theory of Brizendine, and others, that women are more talkative than their male counterparts.

Researchers found that females had significantly higher levels of Foxp2, a brain protein that supports speech development. Here’s the catch: The test subjects were four- and five-year-olds. Even the researchers themselves aren’t sure how it will play out.

I’ll take a shot here. The girls discuss, in mind-numbing detail, a perceived slight experienced in kindergarten that day. The boys take turns crashing into each other. Does that about cover it?

Which brings me back to the gay male-straight female relationship. Often more honest and intense than a heterosexual marriage, this paradigm thrives among young women fed up with the dating scene. Think Will & Grace, in real time.

A straight girl and her GBFF enjoy many of the same activities—chatting, shopping, cruising hot guys. No wonder gay boys make the best girlfriends. Best of all, there is no sexual tension to ruin the friendship.

With sex out of the equation, straight girls and their GBFF can share  clear-headed dating advice. No hidden motives. They see this counsel as “more trustworthy” than similar advice from others, according to new research out of the University of Texas at Austin.

In the final analysis, male, female, gay, straight or otherwise,  everybody talks too much. Most of the time, I’d rather hang out with my dogs. Everything they say interests me. We speak the same language.