GENDER AND THE DEVELOPMENT OF WISDOM

Recent Psychological research into the realms and processes of growing wiser can be linked to gender theory and research documenting variation in human development. Drawing on an integrative model of wisdom including components in three domains (personality, cognition, and conation) and across three levels (intrapersonal, interpersonal, and transpersonal), we highlight potential differences in the ways that women and men attain and express wisdom, and we initiate a search for interactive patterns across the components of wisdom. Although it would be premature to claim that men and women differ globally in wisdom, there is sufficient evidence of divergences across the sexes to warrant more systematic inquiry.