Different Behaviors, Different Brains? HOME VARIATION PATHOLOGY GENDER & SEXUAL ORIENTATION

GENDER & SEXUAL ORIENT- ATION A Brief Gendered History Structure, Hormones, & Something Else? Individual Variation Pathology Bibliography & Links

Gender Differences When you think of a source of differences between men and women what word first pops into your mind? Testosterone Estradiol Progesterone Most people tend to think of hormones. We hear words like testosterone and estrogen tossed around a lot and often we may not necessarily think about their actual effects. We saw earlier that testosterone has an effect on songbirds. What do hormones do in humans? In the womb, as the brain develops, steroids produced by the gonads exert permanent organizational effects on the brain. Similarly, these same hormones exert phasic activational effects. It is important to remember, however, that organizational changes resulting from prenatal hormones are not always permanent because the brain is susceptible to the activational effects of certain hormones in adult life. What does that mean, you ask?? Essentially, males and females tend to be exposed to different levels of hormones while in the womb, as developing children, and as adults. This causes different patterns of organization in the brain and also, some suggest, different patterns of behavior. Hmmm. . . let's look at some examples HOME || VARIATION || PATHOLOGY || GENDER & SEXUAL ORIENTATION || BIBLIOGRAPHY