Happy Atheist Forum

General => Science => Topic started by: Tank on December 23, 2022, 10:12:57 AM

Title: Mental gender androgyny.
Post by: Tank on December 23, 2022, 10:12:57 AM
This is a fascinating bit of research.

The Human Brain Is Best Described as Being on a Female/Male Continuum: Evidence from a Neuroimaging Connectivity Study (https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC8107794/)

QuotePsychological androgyny has long been associated with greater cognitive flexibility, adaptive behavior, and better mental health, but whether a similar concept can be defined using neural features remains unknown. Using the neuroimaging data from 9620 participants, we found that global functional connectivity was stronger in the male brain before middle age but became weaker after that, when compared with the female brain, after systematic testing of potentially confounding effects. We defined a brain gender continuum by estimating the likelihood of an observed functional connectivity matrix to represent a male brain. We found that participants mapped at the center of this continuum had fewer internalizing symptoms compared with those at the 2 extreme ends. These findings suggest a novel hypothesis proposing that there exists a neuroimaging concept of androgyny using the brain gender continuum, which may be associated with better mental health in a similar way to psychological androgyny.
Title: Re: Mental gender androgyny.
Post by: The Magic Pudding. on December 23, 2022, 10:47:44 AM
QuoteThose who are limited by restricted approaches, stereotyped responses, and excessive internalizing in a variety of situations, including social, educational, and occupational ones, are less likely to flourish in society. It has been shown that being at the extreme end of the male continuum is disadvantageous both socially and psychologically. For example, these detrimental effects have been well-evidenced by a meta-analysis of 78 studies of about 20 000 participants, showing that conformity to typical masculine norms, for example, self-reliance and exercise of power over women, incurred social costs and psychiatric symptoms, including depression, loneliness, and substance abuse (Wong, et al. 2017). In contrast to these extreme stereotyped norms for males and females, "psychological androgyny" (Bem 1974, 1981, 1994) is the term that represents a flexibility and adaptability in sex roles and the behaviors associated with sex roles. An androgynous person possesses both masculine and feminine traits and the circumstances determine which traits (masculine or feminine) are employed (Rice 2006). Therefore, an androgynous person's behavior is not influenced by a gender schema. Many psychological studies have suggested that psychological androgyny, which allows for more flexible behavioral responses may be beneficial to mental health

I think it'd depend on the society, some would suit the brute and crush the butterfly and vice versa.
Maybe not vice versa, brutes are hard to crush.
If the tilt of the world turns adverse they'll probably raid the capital building.

Title: Re: Mental gender androgyny.
Post by: billy rubin on December 23, 2022, 04:22:10 PM
is this a surprise? its how ive always seen it as an adult

pudding is right tho, the extremists dominate the coercive societies
Title: Re: Mental gender androgyny.
Post by: Asmodean on December 27, 2022, 11:44:34 AM
Yeah, I think it is heavily culturally-predicated. Like, why is self-reliance a masculine trait? Where I live, we expect women to fend for themselves just like men.