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British chess grandmaster says women are 'hard-wired' to be worse at chess than men

By Thor Benson

LONDON, April 20 (UPI) -- A British chess grandmaster named Nigel Short believes women's brains are "hard-wired" to make them worse at chess than men.

He first made the comments in an interview with New in Chess magazine, and he followed up with Sky News after receiving some criticism.

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"Men have 10 percent larger brains. They have more grey matter - women have more white matter," he told Sky News. "Women have better verbal skills, women have all sorts of skills that are better than men. But the gap [in chess] is quite large and I believe that's down to sex differences."

He said the differences might lie in the idea that men are more aggressive or more obsessive than women. He claimed sexism may be a factor in chess, but that's not why there might be a skill difference.

A woman named Judit Polgar recently beat Short in a chess match, and he doesn't believe that one loss disproves the general idea.

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