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Original poster

Critique of a major "brain sex" study published

48 replies

UtopiaPlanitia · 10/10/2026 17:30

Came across a new paper published recently that I thought would be of interest to FWR:

https://x.com/SwipeWright/status/2102028205183910006?

NEW: Our critique of a major "brain sex" study is now published.

@AdamRochussen @NeuroSGS and I evaluate a central premise of gender activism and medicine: that trans-identifying people have brains that are shifted away from their sex and toward their "gender identity."

The "brain sex" concept is so central because it purports to provide an empirical scientific basis for the notion that a child can be "born in the wrong body" and would therefore benefit from body-altering medical procedures to align their body with their mind/brain.

The problem is that this concept is pure pseudoscience and propped up by deeply flawed methods and badly misinterpreted data.

One of the most prominent studies is Kurth et al. (2022), published in the Journal of Clinical Medicine, which claimed that the brains of transgender women are shifted away from their sex and toward their "gender identity." The paper became one of the journal’s most accessed articles and has been cited in major media outlets, scientific papers, legal arguments, and policy discussions involving pediatric gender medicine and sports.

We point out that the paper's headline conclusion rests on a series of serious methodological problems.

Each group contained only 24 participants. The authors used poorly justified parametric methods, one-tailed post hoc tests, made no correction for multiple comparisons, and omitted important robustness checks. Once accounted for, the main finding is no longer statistically significant.

An even more glaring failure of the study was that it failed to account for sexual orientation, despite its known association with neuroanatomical variation and despite the authors having the relevant participant data needed to examine it!

We each repeatedly requested the anonymized participant-level data from the paper's lead author so we could independently evaluate the findings.

We received no response.

The evidence simply does not justify the sweeping "brain sex" conclusion for which this study has become famous.

Our full critique in Theory Society is open access. Read it at the link below, and please cite it and share it whenever you encounter the false claim that trans people have brains that more closely resemble the sex they identify than their own sex.

https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s11186-026-09747-2

Flawed methods and overstated conclusions regarding ‘Brain Sex’: a peer review of Kurth et al. (2022) - Theory and Society

Kurth et al. (2022) concluded that the brain anatomy of transgender women is shifted away from their biological sex and toward their gender identity. We evaluate whether the study’s evidence supports this conclusion by focusing on its statistical metho...

https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s11186-026-09747-2

OP posts:
Original poster
UtopiaPlanitia · 13/10/2026 18:09

This thread ended up being hidden for 3 days - so bump.

OP posts:
Igmum · 13/10/2026 18:10

Thanks Utopia and well done those authors

Original poster
UtopiaPlanitia · 13/10/2026 18:20

Igmum · 13/10/2026 18:10

Thanks Utopia and well done those authors

This is an annoyingly pervasive myth, founded on poorly conducted scans and psychobabble, that definitely needs addressing/debunking.

I thought posting the link here would make it more easily available as a resource for FWR.

OP posts:
RareGoalsVerge · 13/10/2026 18:23

Thank you. That's useful.

TwoLoonsAndASprout · 13/10/2026 18:36

Thank you @UtopiaPlanitia! Spotted this elsewhere - v good to have it linked here for different eyes.

Luckydog7 · 13/10/2026 18:49

I'm baffled why 'brain sex' even matters. We segregate single sex spaces by body type aka sex not on your brain because of known differences of behaviour between those two groups.

If there was a study that shown that all's transwomen's BEHAVIOUR eg crime and offending rates was identical or better then the sex they desired to be you might have an actual argument.

It seems however that this 'apparent' brain difference doesn't actually translate to visible behaviour difference towards the female, in fact it seems to be the opposite with an increase in sex crimes in the transwoman inmate population at least.

Original poster
UtopiaPlanitia · 13/10/2026 18:49

Luckydog7 · 13/10/2026 18:49

I'm baffled why 'brain sex' even matters. We segregate single sex spaces by body type aka sex not on your brain because of known differences of behaviour between those two groups.

If there was a study that shown that all's transwomen's BEHAVIOUR eg crime and offending rates was identical or better then the sex they desired to be you might have an actual argument.

It seems however that this 'apparent' brain difference doesn't actually translate to visible behaviour difference towards the female, in fact it seems to be the opposite with an increase in sex crimes in the transwoman inmate population at least.

I couldn't have put it better myself!

OP posts:
Awkwardisfunny · 13/10/2026 19:51

UtopiaPlanitia · 10/10/2026 17:30

Came across a new paper published recently that I thought would be of interest to FWR:

https://x.com/SwipeWright/status/2102028205183910006?

NEW: Our critique of a major "brain sex" study is now published.

@AdamRochussen @NeuroSGS and I evaluate a central premise of gender activism and medicine: that trans-identifying people have brains that are shifted away from their sex and toward their "gender identity."

The "brain sex" concept is so central because it purports to provide an empirical scientific basis for the notion that a child can be "born in the wrong body" and would therefore benefit from body-altering medical procedures to align their body with their mind/brain.

The problem is that this concept is pure pseudoscience and propped up by deeply flawed methods and badly misinterpreted data.

One of the most prominent studies is Kurth et al. (2022), published in the Journal of Clinical Medicine, which claimed that the brains of transgender women are shifted away from their sex and toward their "gender identity." The paper became one of the journal’s most accessed articles and has been cited in major media outlets, scientific papers, legal arguments, and policy discussions involving pediatric gender medicine and sports.

We point out that the paper's headline conclusion rests on a series of serious methodological problems.

Each group contained only 24 participants. The authors used poorly justified parametric methods, one-tailed post hoc tests, made no correction for multiple comparisons, and omitted important robustness checks. Once accounted for, the main finding is no longer statistically significant.

An even more glaring failure of the study was that it failed to account for sexual orientation, despite its known association with neuroanatomical variation and despite the authors having the relevant participant data needed to examine it!

We each repeatedly requested the anonymized participant-level data from the paper's lead author so we could independently evaluate the findings.

We received no response.

The evidence simply does not justify the sweeping "brain sex" conclusion for which this study has become famous.

Our full critique in Theory Society is open access. Read it at the link below, and please cite it and share it whenever you encounter the false claim that trans people have brains that more closely resemble the sex they identify than their own sex.

https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s11186-026-09747-2

All I know is.. I was born female and have never once "felt" female. I'm just "me". A ball of intangible thoughts and personality wrapped in a casing of meat, bones and liquids. And other stuff.

I don't know what it means to "feel" female. I didn't even think about genitals until we went through sex education and puberty hit.

I only know I'm different to men when they treat me differently. Until then, I'm just "a person" inside my brain. So all this "I feel like a woman/man" just sounds... like some people have intrusive and/or compulsive thoughts. Like when you desperately need a pair of dark-blue knee boots with brown heels and won't stop until you find them and will spend hundreds if necessary...

I don't doubt these people suffer and I don't doubt that they need compassion - they have my empathy and if I know and trust them, I have no issue using whatever pronouns make them feel comfortable.

But strangers? No. And the law needs to ensure we can protect ourselves from strangers, as well as absurd situations like actual men who actually intend harm being alone with women in private spaces.

It doesn't matter how you feel, because you can't prove it and you definitely can't prove it to a stranger.

KindLemonSquid · 13/10/2026 20:03

Awkwardisfunny · 13/10/2026 19:51

All I know is.. I was born female and have never once "felt" female. I'm just "me". A ball of intangible thoughts and personality wrapped in a casing of meat, bones and liquids. And other stuff.

I don't know what it means to "feel" female. I didn't even think about genitals until we went through sex education and puberty hit.

I only know I'm different to men when they treat me differently. Until then, I'm just "a person" inside my brain. So all this "I feel like a woman/man" just sounds... like some people have intrusive and/or compulsive thoughts. Like when you desperately need a pair of dark-blue knee boots with brown heels and won't stop until you find them and will spend hundreds if necessary...

I don't doubt these people suffer and I don't doubt that they need compassion - they have my empathy and if I know and trust them, I have no issue using whatever pronouns make them feel comfortable.

But strangers? No. And the law needs to ensure we can protect ourselves from strangers, as well as absurd situations like actual men who actually intend harm being alone with women in private spaces.

It doesn't matter how you feel, because you can't prove it and you definitely can't prove it to a stranger.

Show quote history

Could not have put it better myself. Never once felt like a woman, I just am one.

Also keen to know where they might be dark blue knee high boots with brown heels, because they sound lovely.

Helleofabore · 13/10/2026 20:35

The flaws in this study have been discussed on FWR since activists have tried to push it as definitive proof of brains of male people being 'closer to' female brains.

What is quite heartening, is that the authors pointed to the flaws that we have been also pointing out on threads every time this study gets rolled out as some kind of gotcha.

Awkwardisfunny · 13/10/2026 20:36

KindLemonSquid · 13/10/2026 20:03

Could not have put it better myself. Never once felt like a woman, I just am one.

Also keen to know where they might be dark blue knee high boots with brown heels, because they sound lovely.

Show quote history

Found some in a charity shop but they didn't fit!! And now I'm scouring Vinted all day, every day(!)

*Between working

Original poster
UtopiaPlanitia · 14/10/2026 00:15

Awkwardisfunny · 13/10/2026 19:51

All I know is.. I was born female and have never once "felt" female. I'm just "me". A ball of intangible thoughts and personality wrapped in a casing of meat, bones and liquids. And other stuff.

I don't know what it means to "feel" female. I didn't even think about genitals until we went through sex education and puberty hit.

I only know I'm different to men when they treat me differently. Until then, I'm just "a person" inside my brain. So all this "I feel like a woman/man" just sounds... like some people have intrusive and/or compulsive thoughts. Like when you desperately need a pair of dark-blue knee boots with brown heels and won't stop until you find them and will spend hundreds if necessary...

I don't doubt these people suffer and I don't doubt that they need compassion - they have my empathy and if I know and trust them, I have no issue using whatever pronouns make them feel comfortable.

But strangers? No. And the law needs to ensure we can protect ourselves from strangers, as well as absurd situations like actual men who actually intend harm being alone with women in private spaces.

It doesn't matter how you feel, because you can't prove it and you definitely can't prove it to a stranger.

Show quote history

A fantastic description of the perfectly normal state of being a person who just also happens to be female.

Having spent years of seeing various types of men posting about the euphoria of experiencing their idea of 'being a woman', e.g. oestrogen has made me stupid and giggly, oestrogen made me start to drive badly, oestrogen means I get period cramps now, oestrogen makes me 'girl horny' all the time - it's made me realise that crap studies like this this have nothing to do with really examining human brains and all too much to do with validating and providing cover for male fetishes.

OP posts:
Memoryhole · 14/10/2026 07:56

The key point of that graph is that even with subjects taking cross sex hormones, and the fact they didn’t control for sexuality, all the trans subjects fitted within the distribution of the ordinary male subjects. Even the outliers. It superficially looks impressive. But it isn’t.

and there is a fuck if big overlap between ordinary male and female brains which explains why you can’t correctly sex people from their brains anything like as well as from their gonads.

Rightsraptor · 14/10/2026 08:12

Thanks for sharing this.

I've never understood the 'feels like a woman' thing either. Maybe some women do and I'd like to talk to them & find out what they mean by that, because I just don't feel it.

I remember someone once saying to a group I was doing something with saying 'you want to know what it feels like to be the queen? Close your eyes. That's what it feels like'. And that's how I view this nonsense.

booksnbaking · 14/10/2026 09:30

Quite aside from the welcome findings - and thanks to all pp for the clear explanations - the choice of graphic representation was … interesting.

(Now, what were you saying about those boots?)

BinturongsSmellOfPopcorn · 14/10/2026 10:01

UtopiaPlanitia · 13/10/2026 18:09

This thread ended up being hidden for 3 days - so bump.

WTF? Did MN send you any message about that?

DeanElderberry · 14/10/2026 10:02

The graphic is hilarious, transwomen's brains are in exactly the same place as the other men's, just not as stretched towards the top. But no nearer the women's.

Original poster
UtopiaPlanitia · 14/10/2026 15:54

BinturongsSmellOfPopcorn · 14/10/2026 10:01

WTF? Did MN send you any message about that?

Show quote history

No, no message.

When the post was hidden, I left it to sit over the weekend, in case MN didn't have a full set of Mods examining all hidden posts etc, but by Monday evening when nothing had happened I decided to email MN and ask for an ETA for when the thread would be unhidden. It was unhidden the next day and they emailed to let me know.

OP posts:
Original poster
UtopiaPlanitia · 14/10/2026 15:57

booksnbaking · 14/10/2026 09:30

Quite aside from the welcome findings - and thanks to all pp for the clear explanations - the choice of graphic representation was … interesting.

(Now, what were you saying about those boots?)

Yup, I have to admit the shapes in the graph did make me laugh a little when I first saw them 😈

OP posts:
booksnbaking · 14/10/2026 16:03

fanOfBen · 14/10/2026 10:07

These any good to you? (I do not do style, sorry if obviously not.) https://share.google/7W9Oxth4T0aiswPew

Your gold-plated TT copy/paste skills more than make up for that 😄

BinturongsSmellOfPopcorn · 14/10/2026 17:15

UtopiaPlanitia · 14/10/2026 15:57

Yup, I have to admit the shapes in the graph did make me laugh a little when I first saw them 😈

Show quote history

Hmm. Bit rude.

I can understand if they perhaps have an auto filter on 'sex'. And just about understand if the weekend team couldn't deal (although that's fairly shoddy in itself). But the lack of explanation or apology is very poor.

BinturongsSmellOfPopcorn · 14/10/2026 17:19

Wrong quote, but I'm sure you can work it out.

solerolover · 14/10/2026 17:59

Great post, OP! It definitely mirrors the critiques of the study that many of the wonderful, intelligent posters have discussed on FWR, I find myself learning so much from then.

And anyway, even if the studies did show that trans-identified men have "lady brains," what the hell does that have to do with women again? Female people still exist as a discrete sex class. The physical, social and historical consequences of being female still exist and always will. Whatever luxury belief a man has about himself, has nothing to do with the material, biological reality of the female half of the planet.

Awkwardisfunny · 14/10/2026 18:53

fanOfBen · 14/10/2026 10:07

These any good to you? (I do not do style, sorry if obviously not.) https://share.google/7W9Oxth4T0aiswPew

Sorry no haha not blue (enough if at all) and I do want a chic / fashionable mid heel - like I could wear them to work or for cocktails 😆 (so nothing you'd wear to ride horses or to fit in with cowboys) x