Simper Fi

There's always been an attraction between this guy and me. I've been thinking of testing the waters with him romantically, but he recently mentioned that he freaks out when women cry. He says he just has no idea what to do. Well, I'm an emotional person -- generally happy but also a big crier. Are we a bad match, or could I teach him to soothe me?

--Waterworks

Most men are comfortable dealing with any leaky item -- as long as it can be fixed with an adjustable wrench and a Phillips screwdriver. If there's a decoder ring for human emotion, it's the female brain. Psychologist Simon Baron-Cohen finds that men, generally speaking, just aren't as good as women at what's called "theory of mind" -- the ability to "infer what other people might be thinking or intending." He explains that women, from childhood on, tend to be the "empathizers" of the species, driven to identify others' "emotions and thoughts, and to respond with the appropriate emotions" (say, by hugging a teary-eyed person instead of treating them like a statue weeping blood). In contrast with female "empathizers," Baron-Cohen describes men as the "systematizers" of the species. This is a fancy way of saying they're engineering-focused -- driven, from a young age, to identify how inanimate stuff works and "derive the underlying rules that govern the behavior of a system." However, these are "reliable" rules, like the law of gravity -- "What goes up must come down" -- nothing helpful for fathoming what the girlfriend's got swirling around in her head when she suddenly goes all funeralface. Typically, women believe "If he loved me, he'd figure it out." Um, no. Not here in realityland. Assume most heterosexual men are sucky at emotional tea leaf reading. When you're in boohooville (or on your way), tell a man what you're feeling and how he could help -- for example, by just listening and rubbing your back. In time, this may help him avoid reacting to the welling of that very first tear by diving behind the couch and yelling, "Incoming! One o'clock! Alpha team, flank left!"