quote: LOS ANGELES, California (Reuters) -- Sexual identity is wired into the genes, which discounts the concept that homosexuality and transgender sexuality are a choice, California researchers reported on Monday.
"Our findings may help answer an important question -- why do we feel male or female?" Dr. Eric Vilain, a genetics professor at the University of California, Los Angeles School of Medicine, said in a statement. "Sexual identity is rooted in every person's biology before birth and springs from a variation in our individual genome."
His team has identified 54 genes in mice that may explain why male and female brains look and function differently.
Since the 1970s, scientists have believed that estrogen and testosterone were wholly responsible for sexually organizing the brain. Recent evidence, however, indicates that hormones cannot explain everything about the sexual differences between male and female brains.
Published in the latest edition of the journal Molecular Brain Research, the UCLA discovery may also offer physicians an improved tool for gender assignment of babies born with ambiguous genitalia.
Mild cases of malformed genitalia occur in 1 percent of all births -- about 3 million cases. More severe cases -- where doctors can't inform parents whether they had a boy or girl -- occur in one in 3,000 births.
"If physicians could predict the gender of newborns with ambiguous genitalia at birth, we would make less mistakes in gender assignment," Vilain said.
Using two genetic testing methods, the researchers compared the production of genes in male and female brains in embryonic mice -- long before the animals developed sex organs.
They found 54 genes produced in different amounts in male and female mouse brains, prior to hormonal influence. Eighteen of the genes were produced at higher levels in the male brains; 36 were produced at higher levels in the female brains.
"We discovered that the male and female brains differed in many measurable ways, including anatomy and function." Vilain said.
For example, the two hemispheres of the brain appeared more symmetrical in females than in males. According to Vilain, the symmetry may improve communication between both sides of the brain, leading to enhanced verbal expressiveness in females.
"This anatomical difference may explain why women can sometimes articulate their feelings more easily than men," he said.
The scientists plan to conduct further studies to determine the specific role for each of the 54 genes they identified.
"Our findings may explain why we feel male or female, regardless of our actual anatomy," said Vilain. "These discoveries lend credence to the idea that being transgender --- feeling that one has been born into the body of the wrong sex -- is a state of mind."
posted
The statements of fact are far removed from what the study actually found, just based on the article and not reading the study itself.
There was also a factual mistake. Scientists have not believed it was only testosterone and estrogen that sexually organized the brain. They have known for a long time that there were many different factors involved. They haven't known what exactly has been happening, though. They really still don't. They don't know how cells know when to divide and grow something, and when to stop. They don't know how the cells know what to become. They don't even know how the two sides of the body independently develop with essentially perfect symmetry.
Indeed, this study is hardly groundbreaking. It backs up what has been known for years, that men and women are physically wired to think differently and the differences occur in the earliest stages of embryonic devolopment.
What it doesn't say is that many of these differences aren't closely related to sexuality at all. I have better spatial abilities than my husband. This is a recognized male trait. But I've never thought I was a man trapped in a woman's body. I've always very much felt like a woman.
What they don't say is that while we don't necessarily socialize our kids to be one or the other, we do still have prejudices so that a male or woman who feels different from others of the same gender may feel different enough that they feel like a 'man trapped in a woman's body', when what should be happening is an acceptance of women with male tendancies and men with feminine qualities as the gender they are.
In other words, just because the guy likes to talk and his favorite color is pink doesn't mean he is gay or a woman who is trapped in a man's body. In our culture, I think we have more of a problem with men that have feminine qualities than boyish girls. This really points to gender discrimination. Women can wear suits, but men can't wear dresses?
But like they said, the best and most use this study goes to is for those unfortunate few whose gender is ambigious at birth.
posted
I thought the "other" genes were interesting. I did realize this article was vague indetails and the reporters spin was different than the facts actually included. Being a female engineer though I wonder if I do have more of those "spatial" type genes activated than other females like you said.
posted
Probably. You are also good at math, I assume. The reason there are few female engineers is not because we've been discouraged from it, but because most women simply don't find it interesting.
Here is the thing we need to realize: there is nothing wrong with that. Men and women are different, and individuals may have traits more like the other gender and it is all good.
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quote: The reason there are few female engineers is not because we've been discouraged from it, but because most women simply don't find it interesting.
Uh, Amka, not just because we've been discouraged from it. Because there is some active discouragement at all levels of women in mathematics and the "hard" sciences.
OTOH, I agree with you about this:
quote: Here is the thing we need to realize: there is nothing wrong with that. Men and women are different, and individuals may have traits more like the other gender and it is all good.
posted
But why DON'T most women find hard sciences interesting? If it isn't just societal discouragment (though I agree this plays a huge role) then is it something semi-hard wired?
Yes Caleb, I agree it shouldn't matter. To me, this study shows that gender roles are so complex in one's brain that rigid gender definintions become small minded in light of the new knowledge. But that is just me.
AJ
Incidentally I did a recent Old Testament comparison trying to figure out if "usury" was mentioned as a horrible sin more or less than fornication. I think usury comes out ahead, but my study wasn't exhaustive for all the possiblities.
posted
Rivka, since I'm neither a woman nor an engineer, I'm curious what form this discouragement takes? Is it born from an assumption that women in general wouldn't enjoy a career as an engineer? Or are you suggesting that something more sinister is going on?
Amka, I really like your point about the way gender discrimination works these days. It's no longer about "keeping one gender in its place", but about defining manliness and womanliness so specifically and narrowly that it's hard for anyone to feel like they fall completely into one category or another. [ponders]
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I moved after seventh grade, and when I got there, they put me in pre-algebra for eighth grade. Heck, I didn't know what I was doing, and no one asked what I had taken before.
As a result, it threw everything of for the rest of my math career, because I was now in the regular track instead of the honors track. Which means I didn't take calculus in high school, and passed trig with a B only after doing two months of homework the night before the test and gaining forgiveness for skipping class three days a week. I was bored.
I doubt that was organized discouraging, and I don't know if it would have been different if I had been male, but it still annoys me that I was assumed to be in the regular track, despite test scores and being in the honors track for everything else.
If I wasn't actively discouraged, I definitely wasn't encouraged. I mean, they took careful pains to place my brother - why did I fall through the cracks?
posted
I’ll give an example – when I wanted to take abstract algebra in high school my guidance counselor told me I should take interior decorating instead. He said it would be more useful to my future.
edit to add, I didn't take his advice, but I had to fight for it.
posted
I didn't experience a lot of gender first hand discrimination because I was homeschooled. My mother was adamant that I would get a good science education. Her father told her that girls should major in biology, not Chemistry which she had chosen. Being the obedient daughter she went into Biology instead and absolutely hated it. She ended up switching her major to education as a result.
This same grandfather (an engineer himself) told me that girls shouldn't be engineers. Fortunately my father (also an engineer) disagreed.
Even now, when I'm in a non-technical situation, like say a dog show this weekend, I am having a perfectly good conversation, and then they find out I'm an engineer and they look at me askance like I've suddenly grown two heads and am no longer "normal".
I actually met this really cool couple this weekend who might take one of my puppies if I breed Jake and Ciara. (CT is on my puppy list too .) He's a Reformed Church of America minister, and was telling me about this awesome sabbatical he had to England where for 20 pounds a day you get room, board, 3 meals and 2 teas and a desk in a library alcove where you can read the private collection of one of the former prime minister's first editions etc. I told him about OSC and we were getting along great. They were good enough people that finding out I was an engineer only put a momentary blip into the conversation but there was still a rough spot after they found out what I did for a living.
quote: Uh, Amka, not just because we've been discouraged from it. Because there is some active discouragement at all levels of women in mathematics and the "hard" sciences.
I am an engineer. I have seen just the opposite. Large firms will jump over one another for a chance to hire female engineers. Universities are starved of female engineering students. Most of the females at KU, where I went, were from overseas.
quote:Large firms will jump over one another for a chance to hire female engineers. Universities are starved of female engineering students.
That's because there are so few women who are both interested and qualified to become engineers or engineering students. In general, girls are not pushed to excel in science or mathematics. It's not always a sinister thing, as in, "You won't be good at it anyway," or "This is only for boys." Sometimes it's, "You probably aren't interested in this." Our society may (I don't know for sure) be completely comfortable with women being scientists, engineers, or mathematicians, but I really don't think that we do much to encourage girls to be interested in such things.
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posted
I had perfect scores in Algebra 1. That is, my homework was 100% correct and so was my work on all my tests and quizzes. It was so... reasonable. I found it enjoyable , though not 'easy', strictly speaking.
When I went from Christian school to public school, they insisted I take Geometry. For some reason, I HATED that class. It could have been that it was dull, or it could have been the creepy kid named Bill who sat diagonally behind me. He wore the SAME shirt everyday and constantly clacked his retainer at me.
I don't know. I do know that I switched classes and never took another math class until college. I excelled in all my science classes, even took more than was allowed without special permission. I don't feel deprived, though.
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posted
The jumping to hire female engineers is not always true. Sadly some of them are not as qualified as they should be and it gives the rest of us a bad name. Also now more often people with all-male work environments are afraid to bring females in because of sexual harrasment lawsuits. I guess they may risk discrimination lawsuits instead but those are a lot harder to prove.
quote:What it doesn't say is that many of these differences aren't closely related to sexuality at all. I have better spatial abilities than my husband. This is a recognized male trait. But I've never thought I was a man trapped in a woman's body. I've always very much felt like a woman.
Well put. The latest gender research (for the last decade or so) seems to mistake correlation with causality.
I'm a good communicator, I like art and music, and I'm epathetic and sensitive. I guess that makes me a woman trapped in a man's body. Posts: 1001 | Registered: Dec 2002
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posted
Finally we have an answer to give to those mice who don't complete the maze because they're too busy redecorating it.
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posted
Olivet: Geometry and Algebra are different enough that often people who like the one hate the other.
I never really experienced any discouragement because I was a girl. Of course, I majored in biology, which I guess is a 'soft' science, but I specialized in molecular biology and genetics. I don't think that is very soft. Actually, I'm usually suprised that they call biology a soft science. The process of life is very complicated. You need math and rigorous methodology as much as you need in physics and chemistry. It is less predictable because of the chaotic nature, so it is actually harder to study, I think.
If I went back now, into the sciences, I think I would choose physics. Not because I was discouraged, but because college was the first place where I got a real taste of physics, because of moving to three highschools. I even had to drop math to take a stupid requirement in HS.
Now I speak as a mom who actively encourages her kids in the sciences. I have three girls. One of them is finding out that, like me, she enjoys biology and especially heredity. My next daughter is fantastic at math and really good at patterns. But I don't see her becoming an engineer or scientist. Maybe she will, but she has other talents that she really enjoys doing. My five year old loves reading "the body book". We'll see what happens.
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posted
I have to say that I was extremely encouraged in the sciences in college. All the discouragement I encountered was in secondary school, but by the time I reached college, they were delighted with my interest. One of my closest friends is getting her PhD in biochemistry, and she found that once you firmly put your foot down and say "Yes, I'm doing this.", things were actually easier for her.
I agree with saxy. Women in math and sciences are applauded. Girls in math and sciences are looked on with suspicion.
posted
Well, as for hard and soft sciences, I think it comes down to which field involves blowing things up more.
Sure, you could blow up a frog in a biology lab if you wanted, and then go around the room identifying different body parts, but it's just not the norm.
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quote: Rivka, since I'm neither a woman nor an engineer, I'm curious what form this discouragement takes? Is it born from an assumption that women in general wouldn't enjoy a career as an engineer? Or are you suggesting that something more sinister is going on?
Well, Geoff, I'm not an engineer either, but I'll try.
Most of it is subtle, as others' stories have indicated. And not usually in any way malicious, necessarily. Just the assumptions -- made by many women too -- that you'd probably rather not take that math class, be a scientist, etc. The kind of reactions AJ is talking about.
Some of it is far nastier. I had a TA in college who changed groups -- even though she had to start over with a new research project -- because the professor she was working with was hostile. Nothing easily provable. Mostly snide comments about her abilities or lack of same. And "maybe she would be happier in another field, like English." She wasn't willing to put up with it, and found another professor's (also male) group to work with.
Now, the professor was older, and has since (I think) retired. But the attitude (somewhat less blatant) exists in younger gatekeepers -- and make no mistake, research professors are gatekeepers -- as well.
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quote:The mice and frogs run away from you, don't they jehovoid?
Well, the mice run away from me, and then I give chase and end up causing injury to myself while the mouse makes an escape.
The frog, well. The frogs is a horse of a different color. This amphibious demon will break out into song and dance when I'm alone in the room with it, but as soon as I try to show it to someone, it plays dead.
Honestly, I'd rather endure the physical torture of chasing the mouse than the pyschological anguish of dealing with the frog.
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posted
Apparently Purdue graduates the most number of female engineers of any university in the country. I certainly haven't noticed any discremination here, but then again I might not have noticed since I am male... someone whould get Celia in her, she fits the qualification!
posted
A very close friend of mine just had to change planetary science professors when she was over halfway through her PhD. She was a year past passing her Oral exams when her prof called her in and said, I don't think you can make it in this PhD program. Utterly rediculous stuff.
She had been having lots of difficulty before then too. Like any grad student she needed a lot of help at first. But then once she was capable of working independently the prof never let her and ran roughshod over any independent idea she had. I don't think he was deliberately being sexist, but she had numerous examples of where he treated her very differently than the guys that were his grad students. At the same time it was nothing so extreme that it could actually be called "sexism" in a lawsuit.
Actually she was the only female grad student he had who ever made it far enough to pass her orals at all. Even then he didn't make sure she was prepared well enough the first time but basically sold her down the river to the wolves. The second time the reason she passed was because the rest of her committee rallied around to prepare her when they saw how hard she was trying to do it on her own.
posted
Harvey Mudd has always had a very high ratio of male to female students, although these days it's much lower than it has been (it was about pi when I was a freshman). During my time there the college started heavily recruiting female students, which really enraged many (though certainly a minority) of the male students. The argument I heard so many times was that the college would have to lower its admissions standards in order to successfully recruit women. If that's not a gender bias, I don't know what is.
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posted
Although I'm not an engineer I went to a school that put a heavy emphasis on it's engineering departments. There was apparently an EE prof who never gave any female students a grade higher than a C nad when one of my roommates went to his office hours to ask him a question, he basically told her, "I'm not going to bother answering your question because it would just be a waste of our time since we both know you're just here to find a husband."
Supposedly my roommate had him the last year he was allowed to teach women, but I can't verify any part of the story.
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posted
I am a female engineer and women are discouraged and channelled away from hard sciences and technical fields all the time. It's not explicit, much of the time, but because it's implicit it's even harder to combat. Girls don't necessarily even realize it's being done to them.
I had to say "no, I don't want a sales job", "no, I don't want project coordination", "yes, I want to work in the shop", "yes, I want to go on start-ups", "I'm fine here after hours, I'm in no more danger than my male colleagues would be", "I'm perfectly safe traveling to foreign countries by myself", "I'm perfectly safe on construction sites", "everyone at the mills always treats me with consideration and respect", "I don't mind getting my hands dirty", "I don't mind climbing into the conveyor pit to check chain tension", over and over again. I have to insist I want a real engineering job and not a specially tailored girl-engineer job that's softer and cleaner and less technical and, crucially, less important to the company's bottom line. If you take those jobs you don't learn much. If you take jobs like that you don't matter a whole lot to the company. You are dispensible.
I have to speak very clearly and forcefully sometimes for my word to be heard among new colleagues who do not know me. Once people have gotten to know me and learned that I understand the technical aspects of the job better than all but a few, I get total respect and attention. After all, everyone wants the job to get done quickly and for the machine to work. Before that happens, however, I do often have to deal with head patting and there-there-little-lady-ing and why don't you get the project engineer to call me about that. Ahem, I'm him.
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quote: During my time there the college started heavily recruiting female students, which really enraged many (though certainly a minority) of the male students.
Oh! That reminds me about something that is both the funniest and saddest commentary on this issue that I have personal knowledge of.
When I was senior in HS, I got all kinds of brochures and such from various colleges -- often multiple ones from the same school, touting different benefits, or targeting specific audiences. These came because I had filled out the part of the PSAT and SAT that asked if I wanted such info. For example, since I had indicated that I wanted to be a chem major, I got brochures about the wonders of various chem programs.
Well, one of the brochures I got from Caltech was about as expected. The California Institute of Technology is one of the top scientific universities in the country, and the brochure was full of details about the wonder that is Caltech. Actually, it was very amusing, because the blackboard full of mathematical equations that graced its cover looked like my dad's handwriting. (My dad is a professor at Caltech.) We never were able to confirm that it was his, but it was at least a close match.
When the next Caltech brochure came, I was primed to be curious and amused. As I read it, however, I went from amused to disbelieving to dumbfounded to very annoyed. This one did not focus on the facilities, or student teacher ratios, or any of the other wonderful things about Caltech. Those were merely mentioned in passing.
No, this brochure was targeting potential female applicants. And touted the large male to female ratio.
I showed it to my father, who was mostly amused, but agreed that this was inappropriate and ridiculous. He made a small stink about it, and I believe that may have been the end of that charming brochure.
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posted
Today, two guys who work here who have known me for 2 years both expressed surprise that I could read a tape measure. <laughs> One said, "I don't know any women who can read a tape measure but I guess if you're an engineer..." (These are guys who work in the shop.) I laughed and said there was nothing on the Y chromosome that conferred an ability to read a ruler. Then I asked him if he would please take it back to the workbench for me because I understood guys were good for carrying things. He did get the joke then and laughed.
[ October 22, 2003, 06:23 PM: Message edited by: ana kata ]
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posted
I heard something on NPR a few years ago about a small garage that was run by a woman. She was also the primary mechanic there. Customers often were very dismissive of her, refusing to talk to her about technical stuff, assuming that she wouldn't be able to understand. She had a male employee who was a good sport, so she used him as a decoy. Customers would direct their questions to him, and he would either give them wrong answers, which she would then correct, or just say "Hmmm, I don't know," turn to the woman, and ask her. She'd respond and the guy would relay the answer back to the customer. She said, in the interview, that it was the most effective way she'd come up with to get the customers to talk directly to her about the problem; within a minute or two they'd be ignoring the guy and addressing their questions to her.
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posted
As the third woman engineering, I can confirm what both Anne Kate and BannaOj have said. I remember in the 6th grade when I first had the chance to sign up for the honors math classes, being ashamed to tell my girl friends I liked math. I remember all the guys in college who turned and ran as soon as they found out I was an engineering student. Some of my male friends still don't think of me as a "real" girl. I have women friends who are shocked to find out that I like to sew and cook. I am frequently made to feel that I am some how a freak of nature because I am a woman and an engineer.
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posted
You're a freak of nature because you're an engineer. That you're a woman has nothing to do with it. Posts: 4534 | Registered: Jan 2003
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.) He's a Reformed Church of America minister, and was telling me about this awesome sabbatical he had to England where for 20 pounds a day you get room, board, 3 meals and 2 teas and a desk in a library alcove where you can read the private collection of one of the former prime minister's first editions etc. I told him about OSC and we were getting along great. They were good enough people that finding out I was an engineer only put a momentary blip into the conversation but there was still a rough spot after they found out what I did for a living.![[Dont Know]](graemlins/dontknow.gif)
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