Dynamist Blog

Biological Differences

As far as I know, there's been no social-constructionist outcry against this interesting LAT feature on the significant biological differences between men and women--including some brain structures. Why not? Because of how the article is framed. It's a health article, with no sociological context other than the assumption that readers are female. Here's a bit:

For example, functional magnetic imaging of women's brains after strokes have revealed that one reason women recover the use of language after a stroke in their left hemisphere is because women's language centers appear to exist on both sides of the brain, whereas in men, they are concentrated on the left side.

But why does this difference in brains exist at all? The answer to this question, and to the questions of the susceptibility of women to lung cancer, to increased sensitivity to pain, even to certain medicines, may well be revealed as the X chromosome is more fully explored.

From chromosomes to cells, from hearts to brains, from livers to intestines and from skin to blood, the vast and fascinating realms--and the elegant details--of the differences between the two sexes are slowly being understood.

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