-
Brain sex – does it exist?
Without wishing to curtail the fun we can have taking ‘tests’ to demonstrate we have a transgender brain – the serious question remains “Is there such a thing as a female or male brain”.
Brain sex is a lovely concept – after all it leads to the prospect of a diagnosis that confirms one is gender diverse. But do we all want it to exist more than the evidence supports?
A few months back I went on an Internet search triggered by a forum post where someone asserted:
Quote:Research from the recent WPATH conference that is coming out of Amsterdam, indicates neuroscientists have proven beyond doubt the existence of two completely different organs; that being the female and male brain. Their research was not based on the actual physiological construction, but more realistically on its neurological functioning.My doubts about this “fact” lead me to this summary web page which certainly provides a challenging alternative view:
http://sexnotgender.com/brain-sex-does-not-exist/[attachment=20]1359734400000.jpg[/attachment]
The web page contains a summary/reference to a number of other sources – some of which I have extracted below to entice you into further reading.
Quote:It is hard to believe that people continue to support these antiquated “brain sex” theories without reproducible and unambigious scientific proof.http://www.smh.com.au/lifestyle/the-great-sex-swindle-20130201-2dpx5.html
There is little evidence of real differences between the male and female brains, writes Catherine Armitage.
Neuroscience is methodologically flawed. Even when an effect is objectively measurable, small sample sizes and poor statistical significance plague brain imaging studies. Most results are not replicable and, often, the alleged “findings” are not even based on human research. Extrapolating functional or behavior qualities from these studies is logically tenuous at best.Quote:When females topped the state in maths doctors were surprised. When a bloke scooped the pool in languages, they couldn’t believe their eyesIt seemed to defy not just stereotypes but brain science when girls topped the state in every mathematics course in the NSW Higher School Certificate last year, even though more boys than girls studied maths…..
Hyde, one of America’s leading academic psychologists, concluded that ”78 per cent of gender differences are small or close to zero”.”When you think of it”, says Connell, ”all the biological-essentialist ideology depends on the idea there are natural bases – hormones, brains, genes, take your pick – that produce big mental differences between men and women, and these explain the social differences.
”If it is not true that there are big psychological differences, the whole argument that there is a fixed biological basis for the social differences collapses.”
So why, if the evidence is so thin, does the idea of a biological basis for difference in male and female abilities persist? No prizes for guessing Fine’s answer: ”It helps to make the status quo seem fair, natural and inevitable. It’s comforting to be able to look around at the considerable sex inequality that still exists and blame different brains, rather than sexism, socialisation and discrimination.”
http://www.annelawrence.com/twr/brain-sex_critique.html
A Critique of the Brain-Sex Theory of Transsexualism
The brain-sex theory was never helpful in explaining clinical observations; now it has become irrelevant to explaining neuroanatomical observations. It is time to abandon the brain-sex theory of transsexualism and to adopt a more plausible and clinically relevant theory in its place.
Quote:The brain-sex theory of transsexualism has never been easy to reconcile with clinical reality: Homosexual and nonhomosexual MtF transsexualism are so different clinically that it is almost impossible to imagine that they could have the same etiology. Nevertheless, for a time the Zhou/Kruijver data gave the brain-sex theory a certain superficial plausibility. In 2002, Chung et al. reported new data that raised serious doubts about the brain-sex theory, but the authors were able to explain why the theory might still be plausible. The new data reported by Hulshoff Pol et al. in 2006 did not invalidate these explanations, but it rendered them largely irrelevant. The simplest and most plausible explanation of the Zhou/Kruijver findings is that they are attributable, completely or predominantly, to the effects of cross-sex hormone therapy administered during adulthood. There is no longer any reason to postulate anything more complicated.http://sexnotgender.files.wordpress.com/2014/02/fine_cordelia_delusions-of-gender.pdf
Delusions of Gender
Quote:Drawing on the latest research in neuroscience and psychology, Cordelia Fine debunks the myth of hardwired differences between men’s and women’s brains, unraveling the evidence behind such claims as men’s brains aren’t wired for empathy and women’s brains aren’t made to fix cars. She then goes one step further, offering a very different explanation of the dissimilarities between men’s and women’s behavior. Instead of a “male brain” and a “female brain,” Fine gives us a glimpse of plastic, mutable minds that are continuously influenced by cultural assumptions about gender.http://www.hup.harvard.edu/catalog.php?isbn=9780674057302
Brain Storm: The Flaws in the Science of Sex Differences
Quote:In this compelling book, Rebecca Jordan-Young takes on the evidence that sex differences are hardwired into the brain. Analyzing virtually all published research that supports the claims of “human brain organization theory,” Jordan-Young reveals how often these studies fail the standards of science. Even if careful researchers point out the limits of their own studies, other researchers and journalists can easily ignore them because brain organization theory just sounds so right. But if a series of methodological weaknesses, questionable assumptions, inconsistent definitions, and enormous gaps between ambiguous findings and grand conclusions have accumulated through the years, then science isn’t scientific at all.
This post is in my public blog if you want to share it outside TgR
http://adrian.tgr.net.au/blog/archives/18-Brain-Sex-does-it-exist.html -
5 Replies
-
With so much conflicting information (misinformation?) it is hard to come to any conclusions at all. Nevertheless, I enjoyed doing the various little tests that “confirmed” that at least part of my brain was female; they seemed to give some credence to what I already knew deep down was true. The best one for me was the BBC Brain Gender Test (now no longer available) which seemed quite comprehensive in exploring one’s tendencies to think in male or female ways. I asked my wife to do it and her result was 100% female which I thought was interesting – I could never describe her thinking as anything but female.
I suggest that we should leave the brain research to the scientists for the time being, at least until they come up with something more definitive. In the meantime, I am happy to continue to do the brain gender tests even if it is dismissed as frivolous fun. We should not take ourselves so seriously, that we cannot have a bit of fun along the way.
-
Certainly for for thought, but people will always look for patterns and traits in every person and all gender differences persist. Like women can’t reverse park or read a map without turning it around whereas males are inbuilt to open a box from Ikea and build the thing without reading the instructions or using the Allen key!
I have difficulty with reverse parking but can read maps without needing to rotate them and can always tell you true north without needing the sun. I’d have been great in pioneering days, these days it’s a skill that is virtually useless. After many years as a child making model planes and boats etc I can open the Ikea box fairly confidently. Of course there are always exceptions to the rules and people often get their panties in a knot over it. Look at how many male nurses there are for instance, I am one, and the myth persists that they, we must be gay or have some overly feminine traits. Well, I can’t really be objective in that but there are also some very masculine women who nurse.
I think there possibly there are differences that may be remnants from way back when man was the hunter/gatherer and women the home builder/nurturer. I wonder did they have cross dressing cave men? -
After watching the SBS program “Is Your Brain Male or Female?” 27/04/15. I was left with the overwhelming impression that the title should have been “Is male or female behaviour driven by inherent features of your brain?” with the answer being “Not sure”.
One element that pricked my attention was the claim that adult male and female brains have a different pattern of connections, Male with connections from front to back dominant and Female with better connections between left and right hemispheres. This differentiation doesn’t arise though until ages 13-18.
That is the age at which I became aware of my TG nature, probably just a coincidence, others have earlier or later self recognition. -
I found the program somewhat inconclusive and disappointing. The researchers themselves seemed to suffer from their own mindsets about what constitutes male and female and made no mention of the third gender. Not very useful at all.
-
The implication made on the program that it is difficult to differentiate whether gendering as a child, practice of measurable manual skills and gender role expectations affect brain differences ( as slight as they appear to be) was interesting for me. How can one measure these effects on ourselves while we are all subject to the same effects . We cannot step aside from our own experiences and be ” true” in seeing ourselves. Like trying to lift ourselves up by our own bootlaces.
Gendering is so pervasive ( for christ’s sake even the notice of a birth lists the gender ” it’s a boy!”) we cannot escape its affect. Many studies have shown that baby girls are more likely to treated passively, boys more likely to be stimulated and made to be active, this affects the way the brain develops and it is no wonder that slight differences may occur. The fact that brain structure difference is indistinguishable until puberty may merely point to a time when there is real, intense pressure, parental and peer , to choose ways to act that are socially acceptable for one’s given gender . Activity, again affects the brain structure.
My thought is that brain difference is a nice idea to latch onto to comfort ourselves ( a bit like Heaven!)that ” shows” that we are ” normal” after all and ” we can’t help ourselves ” and so we are valid in expressing our gender variance.
I say we should just face up to it, we ARE this way , we can now choose whether to express it openly or not, pay the price it requires to be US and get on with it.
