Who says men are better at Scrabble than women?

Scientists say men excel at the word game because women don’t like pointless hobbies. But I’m devoted to wasting time

nother week, another academic study asserting that “men are just better at this thing because ...” — this time in the much-anticipated (by someone out there, surely) Gender differences in Scrabble performance and associated engagement in purposeful practice activities from the University of Miami. Sounds like a rather dry and unexciting study, perhaps, unless you’re a media outlet that likes to use these opportunities to create more old-fashioned hokum about gender.

With repeated “If you can unscrabble (insert big word beginning with Z), you’re probably a man, huh huh huh” openers, reports about this study share the conclusions that 1) Men are just better at Scrabble than women, OK 2) Women play for fun, and 3) Men are willing to spend more time on the boring stuff, and that’s why they succeed.

As the original study words it: “Gender differences in performance [is] fully mediated by lower engagement in purposeful practice by females and by their rated preference for playing games of Scrabble.” And what some have reduced it to — women don’t like pointless hobbies that waste their time; men do.

If you’ve ever known an old snore who likes to go on about hobbies you don’t care about, who is also shaped like a woman or identifies as one, you’ll know that the above assertion about gender just doesn’t hold true for all of us. Plenty of women like devoting time to useless hobbies and boring pursuits, and are very happy to drone on at you about them. For instance — here I am.

But first, let’s waste some time on the laser-focused Scrabble study — this one with the aim to find out why there are problems getting women into Stem (science, technology, engineering and mathematics) professions, apparently. Released week before last, but using data collected as long ago as the 2004 United States national Scrabble tournaments, humanity is split into just two genders for the concluding points of the study.

Which is quite antiquated (you can get 24 points for “antiquation” in Scrabble, by the way — I confirmed this with a man), but then the 2004 tourney might not have featured many uses of the word “kyriarchy”, or “binarism”. Thirteen years ago, it was very different.

There’s no arguing with the fact — mentioned in the study — that the last 10 world Scrabble champions have been fellas. But there is room for arguing about the specifics raised about Scrabble (there’s always room for arguing in Scrabble) and gender in the study’s conclusion.

Being from a family where every Scrabble game has been won by my super-competitive sister and lost by my brother, hearing “men are better at Scrabble” put forward so confidently by various news outlets last week seems bizarre. Because, simply, that isn’t an indisputable or undeniable statement.

My family is a boardgaming bunch (of bores) with different specialisms and skill sets — like most families — none of which have ever appeared to be dependent on gender. My sister: Always wins Scrabble and Boggle. My brother: Particularly great with cooperative boardgames. Me: I met a play during coop games to go against the group, but am currently undefeated at Settlers of Catan. I hate boardgames. But I’ll spend time looking up strategies to win because I don’t like to lose. That’s a waste of time, perhaps, but you’re dealing with a winner here. At Catan, obviously — not in real life.

Pointless pursuit

I, a woman, like lots of women, devote time to pointless hobbies. Some of mine are reading about and watching documentaries about serial killers/cult leaders, for instance. Why: I don’t know; I’m not going to use that information any time soon (I promise). I waste time watching pro-wrestling every night of the week, soaking up all the names for move sets, the results, where the next pay-per-views are happening, all while knowing the results follow a predetermined script. I can’t place any bets as a result, and I’m not going to be challenging any of the performers to a strap match any time soon. So, why? Well, that pointless pursuit thing women aren’t supposed to be made for, I suppose.

My prizes for the devotion to time-wasting don’t include a Scrabble championship, but, instead, a perfect Catan record; and painfully detailed fact-retention on serial killer John Wayne Gacy, religious cult leader Jim Jones, and wrestler Rowdy Roddy Piper (none of which I will put in to use in real life, I promise). All of which, on reflection, probably makes me more of a loser than a winner. However, one thing that is certainly not determined by is my gender — and neither is my Scrabble score. Phoebe-Jane Boyd is a freelance journalist who writes on politics and pop culture.

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