Article Post #6: Is the Female Brain Innately Inferior?

http://gender.stanford.edu/news/2011/is-female-brain-innately-inferior

Is the female brain innately inferior?

In this Website article, Susan Fisk, a graduate student in the Sociology Department at Stanford, looks at some common assumptions about the impact of gender on the human brain. In this article she interviews Josef Parvizi, an Assistant Professor of Neurology and Neurological Sciences at Stanford University Medical Center. These Stanford scholars bust some myths about the human brain. Susan calls them Gender Brain myths.

1. Brain size matters - Women are not less intelligent than men because they have smaller brains. Brain size depends mostly on your body size. Proportionately, men have the same size brains as women. And size does not dictate intelligence.

2. Women and men have different brains due to estrogen and testosterone – Some people believe that different hormones can cause men to be better leaders and thinkers. However, men and women have both of these hormones. In fact the male brain needs estrogen for normal brain development and function. Dr. Parvizi stated “even if estrogen and testosterone did shape the brain in different ways, it is an unsubstantiated and illogical leap to conclude that such differences cause men to occupy top academic positions in the sciences and engineering or top positions of political or social power, while women are hopelessly ill-equipped for such offices."

3. Men are naturally better at math – Research on differences in math and verbal scores on standardized tests from men to women is not direct evidence of biological differences in the brains of women and men. Other research reveals that these test scores are affected by social factors. People can be influenced by stereotypes about a group to which they belong. A great example was how Asian women scored higher on math tests when they were reminded that they were Asian as opposed to the group that was reminded they were women.

Dr. Parvizi explained “what we know about the neural basis of learning, one can argue that the map of associations in the brain is sculpted by our experience throughout our life. Even if the hard wiring of the brain remains unchanged, the function of the hardware is constantly altered by experience.”

I think this article makes sense. The human brain is very complex and we don’t know everything about it. What influences a person’s thoughts and behavior is much more than the brain they are born with. What they will choose to learn about and excel in is more likely based on both their innate intelligence and as well as their learned experience. How people are treated from the time they are born is a big factor. Consider how girls have been conditioned into believing that math and science are studies for men. Girls were not encouraged to pursue careers let alone these areas of study that open up more doors. They were told that they won’t have time to spend in the amount of school it would take to be able to use math in a big way like becoming an inventor. And the reason why is because they were told their job is taking care of a family. That is how it has been taught to the majority of girls since the beginning of intelligent thought. Now in this age more girls are taught the importance of math and science and that they can achieve anything a man can. They try harder and take difficult classes knowing they have just as good a chance as men to excel in these areas and do whatever they want in their lives. They also realize that many high paying jobs these days are technical and require a math background and aptitude. Same goes for men. They are just as able and likely to gravitate towards fine arts, literature, music and other creative pursuits. They have never been discouraged in these areas so they have not been conditioned into believing their brains can’t handle being creative and making the world a more beautiful place. Girls can do any of the above mentioned skills as well as men. They too can be the future great inventors or masters of industry and still appreciate a work of art. I connected this with feminism because many people have the perception that men are smarter and better at certain subjects than women. These studies clearly demonstrate the equality between men and women on the basis of intelligence and the 'ability to learn on both sides of the brain'.