Trans brains matching “acquired” gender

[DorotheaDiamond]

Dd had a psychology day at school where the guy they brought in said that trans brain scans match the acquired gender not the birth sex scans - I know this has been thoroughly debunked if you control for sexuality …does anyone happen to have the references handy?

Anyway we don't need to worry about self-id then, as we can tell who's trans and who's just pretending by brain scan.

Oddly enough the TRAs do not want to put their money where their mouths are on this.

Quite,it would be interesting to know whether or not the brain of a bloke who's had his little nudger flayed and inverted is different from the brain of a bloke who hasn't taken this nonsense any further than trying on his granny's drawers.

I wonder if he was thinking of brains that are affected by puberty blockers. Male and female puberty develop the brain in different ways which continues until about age 23. Decision making area of the brain for example, well puberty plays a huge part in the maturation of this region.

From what I remember from various arguments on twitter on this topic, I think there was a study (possibly the one the OP references) that said something like if you measure brain structures in a certain specific way, you can roughly predict whether a brain is male or female although there is a lot of overlap. And if you take a lot of TW brains and average out their "sex values", those values are very slightly more "female" than the average non trans male. BUT the point the TRAs missed when citing this study, was that the TW brains were still far closer to the male average than the female average.

It's like saying average male brains are in Brighton, and average female brains are in Edinburgh, and then finding that a TW brain is in Croydon and attempting to use that to assert that they have a female brain.

Helen Joyce's book 'trans' is well worth the tenner.
Use it as a reference book for all the upcoming questions.

Buy a spare copy to hand on to someone else.

I suppose it is theoretically possible that, like taxi drivers developing the part of the brain concerned with "The Knowledge", exposure to female activities, like cleaning the loo, vacuuming, laundry, etc, might build up the parts of the brain associated with those activities. But since there are accounts of men once transitioned avoiding such things, it seems unlikely.

Do you have a link about how "Male and female puberty develop the brain in different ways"? I'd be interested to read about that.

The thing of relevance to neurosurgeons is if you are left or right handed. For example, that does make a big difference for taking parts out related to language. And there’s a bit in the brain that, when stimulated, gives ‘religious’ experiences. Which is why some people ‘seeing God’ could actually be having epileptic activity.
These facts are from speaking to neurologists not some random psychologist coming into schools and spouting dangerous pseudoscience.

Cordelia Fine (daughter of Anne Fine) is good on how sexism is embedded in neuroscience and psychology. Delusions of Gender is a very accessible book.

I think when people come out with stuff like this they need to be challenged on exactly how men and women's brains are different. They won't be able to do it without sounding like one of those big, beardy blokes who wanted to horsewhip suffragettes.

I mean firstly what do they mean by brain scans?What do they mean by matches female? Are we talking size? Colour? Likes pink?

What are we determining as trans? Someone who's taken hormones? How long do they have to be "trans" to be included in the study? Hav

You cant just scan a brain and determine whether it's male or female and determine someone's entire personality. You can look at say volume of certain parts of the brain and see if they change is size based on someone's sex, just thay still doesn't make it a female brain.

And regardless even if their brain is a bit female the rest of their body and actions are not.

Ugggh why do they teach such unscientific twaddle in schools. They shouldn't be allowed to do this.

Who was this 'guy they brought in'?

I'd be lodging a complaint.

Schools are supposed to teach not brainwash.

I think 'born with a willy' is going to be rather better correlated with being male than 'hint of displacement in average activity of bit of brain'.

So, OP - are you going to contact the school about this? It's pernicious nonsense and about as scientifically well-founded as phrenology. But not all kids exposed to it will have told their parents or been fortunate enough to have a parent who will tell them it's nonsense like your dd.

And if it's not prying, have you told your daughter it's rubbish and how did that go? Schools propagating crap like this has to be stopped. It's genuinely harmful.

Thanks all…yes I did tell it was rubbish and have sent her the transgender trend link…now I have to take it up with school…I need to find out who the speaker was first. But as dd has the delight of gendered intelligence coming in soon (in a slight giggle they described the trans man coming to speak as an alumna of the school…misgendering in Latin no less) I don’t imagine I’ll get anywhere!

trans brain scans match the acquired gender not the birth sex scans

Do female brain scans glow with pink florals and male brain scans pulse with chrome and matt black?

What are the unequivocal definitive differences between a female brain and a male one?

Exactly. If there was a brain type that 99% of females had (and 99% of males didn't), and vice versa, there would be sonething interesting in trans (/vegetarian/ Virgo/ short) people having brains of the opposite type.

But if it's 64% of women have type A and 68% of men have type B, there isn't anything remarkable in any woman having type B. Unless there is a common factor in every one of those 36%, I suppose....

Please keep us updated. Tell the school that if they are hoping any of their pupils will be future neurosurgeons they need to stop with this nonsense.

Gendered Intelligence are two words that don't compliment each other well.

I read it on here, a linked study a few years ago now. It showed how the part of the brain that controls impulse control for example is matured during puberty. I don't think it was a thread about puberty blockers per se , I'm fairly sure it was on AIBU. I'll have a pooch about for it.

It wasn't about the brains in males and females being different but how the rates of maturation in different areas differed. Like female impulse control tended to be more developed at 15 than a males one at 15. Not by huge margins but it was an interesting read, especially on how puberty is essential to it.