The Nurturing Instinct Essay, Research Paper

The Nurturing Instinct

Can a male survive without his mother at college as well as a female can in performing simple tasks? I believe that it is more difficult for a male to go away to college than it is for a female. A female may inherit a mothering gene, which could give her some ideas of what to do while on her own. They have grown up with the nurturing gene inside of them and this is observed when they are young playing house as young children.

When it is time for a person to go to college they are leaving their parents for what is sometimes the first time. This experience causes both sons and daughters to explore life on their own. Making many decisions on their own can be very difficult for several teenagers. Performing simple tasks, such as doing laundry that many parents did for them in the past, can also cause the teenagers to be confused. Some simple questions such as, ?Which colors go together?? or ?What should the setting be on the washer?? can make the college student frustrated. There are so many choices who knows which is the right one. Their parents may have always been there to help answer their questions but they are no longer standing by their side.

When moving away from her parents, a female tends to get in touch with her inner-self. Her nurturing instincts seem to come out. They are more independent then males, who sometimes rely on their female friends at school to help them out when they move away from their mothers. This brings out that mothering instinct in the female. One does not often see a male down in the laundry room explaining to a female how to do laundry. During the first few weeks of school males may be seen asking many questions usually to females about how to operate the laundry machines and how much detergent to use. A female usually figures out how to do things by herself, but a male usually just asks for help, sometimes being a victim of stupidity.

For example, a male neighbor in my dorm came to me and pulled me into his room. He had a look of terror on his face. He looked at me and said, ?My mom made a big mistake?. She bought me detergent with bleach alternative in it! I can?t believe she would do this! What am I going to do?!? Then that look returned when he spoke these words, ?Isn?t that going to bleach all my clothes?!?

He thought that bleach alternative was plain bleach. I just started laughing at him. I explained to him that it was actually another way of getting your clothes clean without bleach. I then assumed that he probably did not help with laundry at his house.

Another simple task that many males have trouble with is ironing. Females usually know how to iron out their shirts if they are wrinkled. In my dorm it was very common in the beginning of the semester for a guy to come knocking on my door and ask me if I could help them iron. I taught many guys exactly what to do with an iron because some of them had no clue. Others tried to iron and made the garment look worse. They did not understand the concept of the smooth motion. A friend of mine replied, ? I just didn?t know what to do,? when he was asked what he didn?t understand about ironing.

As we look through the residence halls we can find many males that do not understand how to iron or wash laundry. In a survey of guys that live in my dorm I asked them if they knew how to do laundry and ironing before they came to school. I asked twenty-five of my guy friends and the response was that twenty-one out of the twenty-five could not wash laundry and nineteen out of twenty-five could not iron. When I asked the question to twenty-five females the response was reversed. Only five out of the twenty-five girls did not know how to wash their clothes and three did not know how to iron. This is a perfect example that females represent their traditional role; they understand how to complete simple tasks. These examples all show that females are probably in touch with their nurturing side and have been forever. They are able to handle themselves because of their instinct they got from their mother.

I think you can see why it is easier for a female to move away from the nest. They are leaving their mothers but also taking part of her with them. A male on the other hand does not have that gene and can be quite clueless the first few weeks of school.