Man vs. Woman: The Brain

What makes a man a man and a woman a woman? This question has become increasingly important in today’s day and age, particularly because researchers are beginning to map the differences between men and women’s brains. The Chicago Tribune recently released an article summarizing the findings of a study conducted by the University of Pennsylvania’s Perelman School of Medicine in which almost 1000 brain images were taken of adolescent males and females. The brain images identified that male adolescents had more connectivity within the hemispheres near the upper part of the brain while female adolescents had more connectivity near the sides of the brain. This supported previous research in which women performed better on tests of cognition, attention, and word and face memory while men performed better on tests of sensorimotor speed, spatial processing, and motor skills.

In her book Pink Brain, Blue Brain, author and researcher Lise Elliot, PhD took a far more thorough approach in identifying and explaining the differences between male and female adolescent brains. For example, the reason behind men’s higher performance on spatial ability tasks is due to interaction between biology and the environment. Recent studies have been conducted to show that baby boys (between the ages of 3 to 5 months) can outperform baby girls on a mental rotation task, which identifies spatial ability. This shows researchers that boys are innately better at spatial processing than girls to begin with. As boys grow older into preschool, elementary school, and into adolescence, they partake in activities that improve their spatial processing, such as playing with trucks, throwing a ball in a game of catch, and playing video games that involve driving or shooting. Thus, there is an interaction between the innate biology that baby boys show researchers and environmental activities that creates the large discrepancy between spatial processing in male and female adolescents. This isn't to say that women can't learn these spatial skills, because they certainly can. However, men ultimately have a higher advantage at performing better than a woman on spatial ability. 

These small differences in the brain's connectivity provide an explanation for the differences between men and women's behavior and ultimately gender stereotypes. 

Cited:

Eliot, Lise. (2009). Pink Brain, Blue Brain: How Small Differences Grow into Troublesome Gaps - and What We Can Do About It. New York, NY: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.

Mohan, Geoffrey. (2013, December 3). Brains of women and men show strong hard-wired differences. The Chicago Tribune.