Perceptions of gender differences in cognitive abilities date back to ancient Greece, when the early physician Hippocrates dubbed the term 'hysteria' or 'wandering womb' to account for emotional instability and mental illness in women.
[1] Prominent physicians of this era, including neurologist Sigmund Freud, argued that women were biologically suited to homemaking and housework, as they did not have enough blood to power both the brain and the uterus.
[10] This is supported by data that gauges learning ability in terms of word lists and the development of strategies that improve the ability to learn new things and impede interference;[10] however, there is also data that indicates that men are better at short-term memory tasks than women when visual stimuli is a factor, but this research lacks consistency.
While research on the subject has not always been consistent,[clarification needed] it's clear that men and women experience significantly different rates of memory decline throughout their life.
It was once decided that the difference in memory decline between genders was due to the typically longer lifespan of a woman,[citation needed] however, this has since been disproven.
The difference between the lifespan of a male and female is not great enough to explain the additional onset of memory decline from disease that woman experience.
[13][better source needed] Research into the disease is ongoing, but there appears to be evidence supporting the claim that Alzheimer's manifests differently between the sexes.
In addition, it has been found that men are more likely to have coronary artery disease which has been known to damage the blood brain barrier (BBB) by causing micro vascular lesions.