Women outperform men when confidence is measured in intelligence testing, study finds
University College Cork
- Findings show that women outperform or match men in key cognitive tasks when confidence is measured alongside performance.
- The study challenges long-standing gender stereotypes that women are less competitive or confident than men.
- The study finds that standard intelligence tests may misrepresent ability by ignoring how confident people feel about their answers.
A major new study reveals that women outperform men in aligning confidence with correctness, particularly in intelligence-related tasks.
The research challenges long-held assumptions about gender differences in intelligence, competitiveness and financial literacy, offering fresh insights into how confidence, not just correctness, shapes performance.
The research, conducted by researchers at University College Cork, University of Cape Town and Georgia State University, overturns a long-standing generalisation in empirical economics that women are statistically less competitive than men.
The study also finds that financial incentives significantly affect performance on fluid intelligence tests, challenging the assumption that test-takers are always equally motivated.
Beyond right and wrong: Confidence matters
Study participants competed for cash rewards, and on average, female participants earned more than males. The study found that women process the confidence of their answers more accurately than men when tackling uncertain or risky test questions related to intelligence – because male subjects were over-confident about their answers and over-competed.
These findings challenge prior policy advice that women should be more competitive, suggesting instead that efforts should focus on encouraging greater self-awareness and more calibrated confidence among men.
When it comes to financial literacy, women show greater accuracy in confidence than their male counterparts.
Professor Don Ross, Professor in the School of Society, Politics, and Ethics at University College Cork, said. “These findings challenge the outdated narrative that women are inherently less competitive. Our results show that women are often more accurate in judging their confidence under pressure - and that matters. When measured properly, women show strong intelligence, compete and take risks when it makes sense to do so, and display high levels of financial literacy.”
“It is not the case that women lack the confidence to take on the risks of competition: they respond exactly as any risk averse agent should – it’s that society often encourages men to be overconfident,” Professor Ross said.
Key findings of the study include:
- Confidence is often misread: Claims that women are under-confident in domains like intelligence, competitiveness, and financial literacy are shown to be based on flawed performance metrics. When measured correctly, women show stronger alignment between confidence and correctness.
- Incentives drive performance: Participants performed significantly better on fluid intelligence tests when financially motivated. This suggests that test results can understate ability when motivation is not evenly distributed or assumed.
- Confidence matters but is rarely measured: Standard tests typically record only the “most likely” answer, ignoring how sure individuals are about their responses. This can misrepresent understanding, especially in complex or ambiguous tasks.
- Cognitive inequality is shaped by cultural scaffolding: The study highlights the importance of social and cognitive scaffolds - such as language, tools, and interaction - which vary by culture and socioeconomic background. These structures play a vital role in shaping confidence, cognition, and test performance.
- Smarter by design: The researchers developed a testing interface that requires individuals to report their confidence levels alongside their answers. This boosted cognitive performance, particularly for women and Black participants, indicating that these groups are often underestimated by conventional testing methods.
Rethinking measurement
The study calls for a reassessment of how cognitive skills, particularly fluid intelligence, are measured and interpreted — both in research and in policy-making. It argues for broader definitions of intelligence that include self-awareness, the use of tools, and the ability to assess uncertainty - factors critical for real-world problem-solving.
“A lack of total certainty doesn’t mean someone is less intelligent. In fact, the ability to recognise uncertainty and seek support - like organising information or using language as a mental tool - is itself a sign of higher-order thinking,” Professor Don Ross said.
With intelligence playing a central role in educational and economic outcomes, improving how we evaluate it could help address broader issues like inequality and access.
Journal
Journal of Political Economy
Method of Research
Observational study
Subject of Research
People
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