I love studying about the differences between the female and male brain. When I understand why my husband behaves the way he does, I have so much more patience AND I don’t jump to quick (and usually very wrong) conclusions about him. In this article, Dr. Louann Brizendine, author of The Male Brain talks about her book on CNN:
edition.cnn.com/2010/OPINION/03/23/brizendine.male.brain/index.html
Best quote of the article:
“Perhaps the biggest difference between the male and female brain is that men have a sexual pursuit area that is 2.5 times larger than the one in the female brain. Not only that, but beginning in their teens, they produce 20 to 25-fold more testosterone than they did during pre-adolescence.
If testosterone were beer, a 9-year-old boy would be getting the equivalent of a cup a day. But a 15-year-old would be getting the equivalent of nearly two gallons a day. This fuels their sexual engines and makes it impossible for them to stop thinking about female body parts and sex.”
3 Responses to The Male Brain
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As much as I like her female brain book, the scientific community has pretty universally panned both books. For example, no one has any idea what the “sexual pursuit area” of the brain is – it seems to be something she made up, and did not explain. I’d take what is in her books with several grains of salt.
Paul
Thanks for the input Paul. I appreciate perspective from everyone – that’s what keeps conversation moving! According to a couple of sources I’ve seen, the “sexual pursuit area” is the medial preoptic area. But I am not a neuroscientist, so I can’t defend that position – only regurgitate what I’ve been told. I think the overall point of the article is that there are emotional and cognitive differences between genders and there are correlations between the two based upon different hormonal variations and brain activity. Nothing special – nothing new. But remembering how we as men and women are similar and different (especially in cognitive functioning) is always fascinating.