Mansplaining explained and dedicating a brain cell to Jennifer Aniston

Mansplaining is when a someone explains in a condescending, oversimplified, and often inaccurate manner, without regard to the fact that the explainee knows more than the explainer, usually done by a man to a woman. Why do men do it? Does mansplaining actually even exist?

Brain processing and recognition of visual imagery, such as people and objects, is thought to involve complex neuronal pathways with lots of connected brain cells each playing a role. But are multiple brain cells really necessary for this? Why don’t we just dedicate one brain cell to recognizing each important person in our life?

In this episode, Lu and Tirth discuss whether mansplaining is real and why it might occur and examine evidence showing that the visual recognition of certain people and objects may be the job of one specific brain cell.

Timestamps:

• 0:00 Intro
• 1:13 How was your week?
• 5:04 Mansplaining study
• 21:38 Neuron recognition study
• 35:25 What did you learn today, outro

Article links:

• Fokkema & Pollmann, 2024. Mansplaining explained: The role of the better-than-average effect and the interpretation bias in acts and accusations of mansplaining. Psychology of Language and Communication. https://sciendo.com/article/10.58734/plc-2024-0021
• Quiroga et al., 2005. Invariant visual representation by single neurons in the human brain. Nature. https://www.nature.com/articles/nature03687

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