Researchers from Norway scanned the brains of volunteers as they completed navigation tasks to discover men are more adept¹ at finding their way because they use a separate part of their brain.

 

Adding fuel to the fire, when women had testosterone dropped onto their tongues, their navigational skills improved.

 

Using 3D goggles² and a joystick, a total of 36 participants - 18 men and 18 women - had to orient themselves in a large virtual maze³ while functional⁴ images of their brains were continuously recorded.

 

In the MRI scanner, they were given 30 seconds for each of the 45 navigation tasks. One of the tasks, for example, was to 'find the yellow car' from different starting points.

 

The men solved 50 per cent more of the tasks than the women.

 

According to lead researcher Dr Carl Pintzka from the Norwegian University of Science and Technology (NTNU), women and men have different navigational strategies.

 

Men use cardinal⁵ directions – the use of north, south, east and west - during navigation to a greater degree.

 

'Men's sense of direction was more effective. They quite simply got to their destination faster,' he said.

 

'If they're going to the Student Society building in Trondheim, for example, men usually go in the general direction where it's located,' Dr Pintzka explained.

 

'Women usually orient themselves along a route to get there, for example, "go past the hairdresser and then up the street and turn right after the store."'

 

The study shows that using cardinal directions is more efficient because it is a more flexible strategy.

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