Brains don’t have sex?
According to brainscientist Daphne Joel brains do not have a particular sex.
She claims instead of speaking about the diffrence in sex, it is better to speak about the diffrence in form only. As she has shown that some parts of the brain change from the female form to the male form and the other way around after only 15 minutes of stress.
On the left side of the image above we can clearly see a big difference between the male and the female brain. Without stress a female Axon is densly covered with dendrites and a male axon not so much. An Axon is the tale of a neuron (Read more .. ) .The dendrites on the axon are all possibilities for the axon to connect to another neuron for assiociation and communication.
After engaging both brains in only 15 minutes of stress the density of the dendrites increases on the male axon and the density of the female axon decreases. Looking at the picture it seems like they unrecognisable switched places. Daphne Joel concludes as their forms are dynamic over time there is no use to diffrentiated them according to sex.
Taking a closer look at the content of this interaction I strongly disagree
The increase of dendrites on a male axon during stress opens up the neuron to more associative connections, it gives the normally rigid problemsolving male mind the opportunity to think outside the box during stress. The female stress-related decrease of dendrites on the other hand might portrait the change in prioritizing focus on the most effective and efficient way.
There are on averageover one hundred differences in brainstructure between men and women. For example female brains are on avarage smaller, have a thicker cortex, have a higher proportion of gray matter (the neuronheads), have a lower proportion of white matter (the axons) and have smaller ventricles (the big airholes in the middle of the brain). According to Daphne Joel the higher proportion of neurons with the larger ventricles compensates for the diffrence in total size and results in not so much diffrence in the end.
Again I disagree, as I believe the difference in total build up and how the brain is wired is more important than the amount of neurons.
The popular view “Men come from Mars and Women come from Venus” in which Men’s behaviour is build around pursuing sex and agression; and Women’s behaviour is build around emotion and communication, is largly exaggerated and opposite with scientific results. It has been repeatedly shown that there is no significant sexdifference in intelect, cognitive and emotional functioning, no significant differences in personality, interest and attitudes. The only significant difference we found between men and women are in aggression and compassion, and these diffrences are very small and large variation within the sexes.
