Gender and Our Brains: How New Neuroscience Explodes the Myths of the Male and Female Minds

by Gina Rippon Narrated by Hannah Curtis

Overview

A breakthrough work in neuroscience-and an incisive corrective to a long history of damaging pseudoscience-that finally debunks the myth that there is a hardwired distinction between male and female brains
*
We live in a gendered world, where we are ceaselessly bombarded by messages about sex and gender. On a daily basis, we face deeply ingrained beliefs that sex determines our skills and preferences, from toys and colors to career choice and salaries. But what does this constant gendering mean for our thoughts, decisions and behavior? And what does it mean for our brains?

Drawing on her work as a professor of cognitive neuroimaging, Gina Rippon unpacks the stereotypes that surround us from our earliest moments and shows how these messages mold our ideas of ourselved and even shape our brains. By exploring new, cutting-edge neuroscience, Rippon urges us to move beyond a binary view of the brain and to see instead this complex organ as highly individualized, profoundly adaptable and full of unbounded potential.

Rigorous, timely and liberating, Gender and Our Brains has huge implications for women and men, for parents and children, and for how we identify ourselves.

Editorial Reviews

FEBRUARY 2020 - AudioFile

Narrator Hannah Curtis's light and airy British accent adds even more legitimacy to Rippon's dispatching of misinformation, shoddy research, and sexist assumptions relating to the myth of male and female minds. Her voice proves welcoming in its warmth and energy but is equally assertive and filled with conviction as she narrates Rippon's prose. She proves adept at communicating Rippon's arguments and sometimes ribbing commentary. Curtis fluctuates her tone actively to meet the context of the writing, making the experience feel almost conversational to the listener. Her performance seems entirely in sync with the author. Rippon's writing will rile many as she systematically dismantles the current scientific research on gender to illustrate how much of the research is flawed, limited, or intentionally ignoring evidence to the contrary. L.E. © AudioFile 2020, Portland, Maine

The New York Times Book Review - Emily Oster

Where the book really shines—not surprisingly—is in the details about the science of the brain: what we know and what we do not. Rippon's explanation of how we've studied the brain in the past, and how recent technological advances are giving us increasingly precise tools to do so, is endlessly interesting.

Publishers Weekly

05/27/2019

Neuroscientist Rippon painstakingly refutes in this exhaustive study long-held beliefs about gender’s role in the development and functioning of the brain. Rippon demonstrates how researchers’ expectations can alter a study’s findings and how false statistics become lodged in the popular imagination and repeated as facts long after they are disproven, such as the popular belief that women “on average use 20,000 words a day and men use only 7,000.” The most illuminating aspect of her account is an explanation of the “plastic” nature of the brain, particularly among infants and children. The brain’s “trajectory may not be fixed but can be diverted by tiny differences in expectations and attitudes.” Consequently, children as young as 21 months can recognize genders, and by age 5 are adhering rigidly to gender roles (centered around choice of toys, for example) based on the perceived expectations of the adults around them. This is a powerful and well-constructed argument for gender as a social construct—nurture rather than nature. Some of the harder science in the book is not layperson-friendly; Rippon’s frequently accessible contradiction of sexist myths also contains massive amounts of neuroscience data. Nevertheless, those interested in gender-related brain differences (or lack thereof) will find this riveting. (Aug.)

From the Publisher

An authoritative debunking of the notion of a gendered brain . . . Ultimately, her message is that a gendered world will produce a gendered brain. The result, unfortunately, is that boys and girls are shaped with different expectations and are often driven down career different paths. Well-crafted and thoroughly documented, this is a must-read for parents, teachers, and anyone of either sex who cares for children.”
—Kirkus, *starred review*

“Evidence of brain plasticity is key to Gina Rippon’s new book, Gender and Our Brains . . . The book is, at the core, concerned with the question of whether male and female brains are different. Where the book really shines—not surprisingly—is in the details about the science of the brain: what we know and what we do not. Rippon’s explanation of how we’ve studied the brain in the past, and how recent technological advances are giving us increasingly precise tools to do so, is endlessly interesting.”
—Emily Oster, The New York Times Book Review

“Dense with research and point of view, the book argues that science has for too long followed erroneous logic to support the notion that men and women have different brains . . . A call to rethink moldy assumptions about the importance of sex differences . . . [and] a reminder that gender messaging is never a nonissue.”
—The Washington Post
  
“Rippon’s sarcasm is surely the most savory . . . Rippon writes like a scientist, not a psychologist or philosopher. She makes an irascible but very down-to-earth guide through the thickets of such statistical properties as effect sizes and how they have been manipulated or ignored. And while she certainly deplores the likelihood that stereotypes about women’s deficiencies in “systematic” thinking will steer many possibly gifted scholars away from STEM fields, Rippon is no solemn moralizer weeping over the sufferings of the downtrodden. (It’s a relief, for a change, not to have those particular heartstrings plucked yet again.) Instead, she is exasperated and impatient at how steadfastly so many of her colleagues have pursued a point so fine it nearly vanishes from sight, how blind they are to the evident biases in their own ideas and work, and how very deeply invested they are in the status quo.”
—Laura Miller, Slate
 
“Add[s] both breadth and depth to previous discussions and provides a little more ballast to the argument that nature and nurture are not so easily divisible but in dynamic interaction.”
—New York Journal of Books
 
“Rippon has spent decades questioning ideas that the brains of men and women are somehow fundamentally different—work that she compellingly presents in her new book . . . Rippon’s writing bristles with frustration that this argument still needs to be stated.”
—BBC.com

“It’s a highly accessible book. It’s also an important one . . . it has the power to do vastly more for gender equality than any number of feminist ‘manifestos.’”
—Rachel Cooke, Observer

“Excellent . . . This book will confront your own prejudices, biases, and beliefs.”
—The Sunday Times (London)

“One of those books that should be essential reading before anyone is allowed to be a teacher, or buy a child a present, or comment on anything on Twitter, ever again . . . All systemizing brains out there owe it to themselves to read this calm and logical collection of evidence and science, and all empathizers will understand its importance.”
—Katy Guest, The Guardian

“The history of sex-difference research is rife with innumeracy [and] misinterpretation . . . Rippon, a leading voice against the bad neuroscience of sex difference, uncovers so many examples in this ambitious book that she uses a whack-a-mole metaphor to evoke the eternal cycle . . . a juicy history . . . [and] the book accomplishes its goal of debunking the concept of a gendered brain.” 
—Lise Eliot, Nature

“A treasure trove of information and good humor, Gender and Our Brains offers thought-provoking perspectives on the latest debates about sex, gender, and the brain.”
—Cordelia Fine, author of Testosterone Rex: Myths of Sex, Science, and Society

“A clever study into flawed research and gender-based misconceptions of the mind . . . Takes a scalpel to the research surrounding sex differences in the brain with precision and humour, exposing everything from flawed research and ‘bias in, bias out’ experiments to the damage inflicted by centuries of incorrect assumptions and interpretations. Rippon rightly includes the impact of misleading media reporting and the effects of living in a society that assumes all girls like pink and women can’t read maps.”
—Financial Times 

“A smart and witty addition to the literature on sex differences. Gina Rippon is one of the most outspoken scientists in this area, and she debunks a whole host of sexist stereotypes in her new book.”
—Angela Saini, author of Inferior: How Science Got Women Wrong—and the New Research That's Rewriting the Story

“A brilliant and thorough debunking of the popular myths around sex differences in brains and behavior.”
—Dr. Emily Grossman, broadcaster

“A fresh and much-needed perspective on the gender debate.”
—Dr. Anne-Marie Imafidon, founder of Stemettes 
 
“Rippon takes aim at the flimsy science behind the idea of essential differences in men’s and women’s brains.”
—The Boston Globe

“I can’t come to a conclusion on the whole nature-nurture debate—so I keep reading.”
—Jeanette Winterson, The New York Times Book Review, By the Book
 

FEBRUARY 2020 - AudioFile

Narrator Hannah Curtis's light and airy British accent adds even more legitimacy to Rippon's dispatching of misinformation, shoddy research, and sexist assumptions relating to the myth of male and female minds. Her voice proves welcoming in its warmth and energy but is equally assertive and filled with conviction as she narrates Rippon's prose. She proves adept at communicating Rippon's arguments and sometimes ribbing commentary. Curtis fluctuates her tone actively to meet the context of the writing, making the experience feel almost conversational to the listener. Her performance seems entirely in sync with the author. Rippon's writing will rile many as she systematically dismantles the current scientific research on gender to illustrate how much of the research is flawed, limited, or intentionally ignoring evidence to the contrary. L.E. © AudioFile 2020, Portland, Maine

Kirkus Reviews

★ 2019-05-26
An authoritative debunking of the notion of a gendered brain.

In her debut book, Rippon (Cognitive Neuroimaging/Aston Univ., Birmingham) examines sex-difference research and finds a dismaying history of bad science and an abundance of design flaws, inadequate controls, and innumeracy. Neurosexism abounds, she asserts, citing studies and naming names with assurance and a touch of acerbity. She calls misconceptions about gender differences "whac-a-mole" myths: Mistaken assumptions, she writes, have "been variously whacked over the years but can still be found in self-help manuals, how-to guides and even in twenty-first-century arguments about the utility or futility of diversity agendas." Further, research findings are often misinterpreted by the press, creating in the public imagination an inaccurate picture of the so-called "male" or "female" brain. Rippon notes that the view of a gendered brain, which has a long history, is stubbornly persistent today. She cites both social psychologist Gustave Le Bon's 1895 declaration that women "represent the most inferior forms of human evolution" and Google engineer James Damore's 2017 blog about the biological causes for the absence of women in technology. Looking at numerous scientific studies, the author sees surprisingly little evidence for brain sex differences in newborns. Rather, she argues, the differences in behavior and interests between boys and girls, and men and women, can be explained by the impact of a gendered world on the human brain. As she notes, gender clues surround children from birth. Attitudes and unexamined assumptions can be toxic, and toys, sports, clothing, and colors have a powerful impact. Young children, writes Rippon, are social sponges, especially attuned to social rules, and their experiences in a pink-vs.-blue world can change the way their brains form. Ultimately, her message is that a gendered world will produce a gendered brain. The result, unfortunately, is that boys and girls are shaped with different expectations and are often driven down career different paths.

Well-crafted and thoroughly documented, this is a must-read for parents, teachers, and anyone of either sex who cares for children.

Product Details

BN ID:	2940171791940
Publisher:	Penguin Random House
Publication date:	08/27/2019
Edition description:	Unabridged

Read an Excerpt

[from] Chapter 1: Inside Her Pretty Little Head—the Hunt Begins
Women . . . represent the most inferior forms of human evolution and . . . are closer to children and savages than to an adult, civilized man. —Gustave Le Bon, 1895
 
For centuries, women’s brains have been weighed and measured and found wanting. Part of women’s allegedly inferior, deficient or fragile biology, their brains were at the heart of any explanation as to why they were lower down any scale, from the evolutionary to the social and the intellectual. The inferior nature of women’s brains was used as the rationale for frequently proffered advice that the fairer sex should focus on their reproductive gifts and leave education, power, politics, science and any other business of the world to men.
 
While views about women’s capabilities and their role in society varied somewhat over the centuries, a consistent theme throughout was “essentialism,” the idea that differences between female and male brains were part of their “essence,” and that these brains’ structures and functions were fixed and innate. Gender roles were determined by these essences. It would be going against nature to overturn this natural order of things.
 
An early version of this story starts, but unfortunately does not end, with a seventeenth-century philosopher, François Poullain de la Barre, bravely questioning the alleged inequality of the sexes. Poullain was determined to have a clear-eyed look at the evidence behind the assertion that women were inferior to men, and was careful not to accept anything as true just because it was how things had always been (or because some appropriate explanation could be found in the Bible).
 
His two publications, On the Equality of the Two Sexes: A Physical and Moral Discourse in Which Is Seen the Importance of Undoing Prejudice in Oneself (1673) and On the Education of Women, to Guide the Mind in Sciences and Manners (1674), show a startlingly modern approach to issues of differences between the sexes. Poullain even tries to show how women’s skills can be equated with those of men; there’s a charming section in his treatise on sexual equality where he muses that the skills required of embroidery and needlework are as demanding as those required to learn physics.
 
Based on his studies of findings from the then new science of anatomy, he made a startlingly prescient observation: “Our most accurate anatomical investigations do not uncover any difference between men and women in this part of the body [the head]. The brain of women is exactly like ours.” His close examination of the different skills and dispositions of men and women, boys and girls, drew him to the conclusion that, given the opportunity, women would be just as capable of benefiting from the privileges which were then only offered to men, such as education and training. For Poullain, there was no evidence that women’s inferior position in the world was due to some biological deficit. “L’esprit n’a point de sexe,” he declared: the mind has no sex.
 
Poullain’s conclusions were strongly against the prevailing ethos; at the time of his writing, the patriarchal system was firmly entrenched. The “separate spheres” ideology, with men fit for public roles and women for private, domestic ones, determined a woman’s inferiority, necessarily subordinate to her father and then to her husband, and physically and mentally weaker than any man.
 
It was downhill all the way after that. Poullain’s views were largely, to his disappointment, ignored when they were first published (at least in France), and had little impact on the established view that women were essentially inferior to men, and would be unable to benefit from educational or political opportunities (which was, of course, a self-fulfilling prophecy, as they were not, with notable exceptions, given access to education or political opportunities). This remained the prevailing view throughout the eighteenth century, with little attention to it as a matter worthy of debate.

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