Abstract: Was there gender difference on the Raven Progressive Matrices? In contrast to early studies, a series of recent researches showed that gender difference did exist in Raven Progressive Matrices. And the difference varied as children develop. Ideas about how to explain this difference fall into two types: one type said that the difference was just introduced by factors other than g, g itself has no gender difference. The other type said that the difference may be contributed partly to other factors, while there is also gender difference in g factor. And the difference resulted from primarily physical difference between boys and girls, for example, maturation speed and brain size. That’s why this difference varied with age. We discussed the potential reasons for the inconsistent conclusions on gender difference.

Key words: Raven Progressive Matrices, gender difference, the g factor