The Female Brain
by Louann Brizendine · first published 2006
55% recommend18% neutral27% critical
Why HN recommends it
An accessible popular-science overview of how hormones shift across a woman's life and how they shape behavior. It serves as a good starting point for anyone curious about sex differences in the brain.
Common criticism: Critics call its claims hyperbolic and its cited research shaky, with some statistics disputed.
Summarised by Claude from recommending comments
While doing research as a medical student at Yale and then as a resident and faculty member at Harvard, Dr. Brizendine discovered that almost all of the clinical data on neurology, psychology, and neurobiology focused exclusively on males. In response to the need for information on the female mind, Brizendine established the first clinic in the country to study and treat women's brain function. At the same time, The National Institute of Health began including female subjects in almost all of its studies for the first time. The result has been an explosion of new data. Here, Brizendine distill
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…treated. IMHO, men and women perceive and react to the world differently, and treating them the same is foolish and counter-productive. Damore was simply pointing out those differences. I found The Female Brain a good book on this topic: * https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Female_Brain_(book)
on “James Damore and three others end Google suit” ↗…going to change. It will be fine, but be prepared to see a new side of her that she likely won't know herself. Evolution has prepared her, too, and in even more impactful ways. I'd suggest reading 'The Female Brain' by Louanne Brizendine. It's research and science based and will help explain a lot of what's coming. - Fatherhood is the 'meaning of life' for men. Preparing your children to be successful human adults…
on “Ask HN: Advice for a Soon to Be Father” ↗…untold millions quit earlier or never start. The irony is that women would be great in these fields if the environment was more conducive. This book will shed some light on it. http://www.amazon.com/Female-Brain-Louann-Brizendine/dp/0767... A more effective solution would be to create a more nurturing CS/engineering environment to draw young women in. For instance; female only programs so girls can be girls…
on “Tracking the reasons many girls avoid science and math” ↗Check out The Female Brain by Louann Brizendine. Covers a lot of things you mention.
on “The biological basis for sex differences in autoimmune diseases” ↗For those that haven't read it, "The Female Brain" is a fantastic book about human nature and discusses how male and female hormonal levels fluctuate throughout life and how that influences behavior. A man's and woman's oxytocin levels are elevated…
on “Why Finnish babies sleep in cardboard boxes (2013)” ↗Wandering in a Barnes and Noble in 2007, stumbled into The Female Brain and read it cover to cover. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Female_Brain_(book) It’s a simple concept but extremely illuminating. Mostly because of natural hormone specifics, females through different…
on “Sex differences in attention are present at birth” ↗…biological constraints, constraints that are obvious upon a cursory skim of the relevant literature. We are just not blank slates to be blasted clean and remade by ideology. [1] http://www.amazon.com/Female-Brain-Louann-Brizendine-M-D/dp/... [2] http://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2009-10/uu-spb102309.... [3] http://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2008-12/uoi-sdo121708...
on “Notes from UPenn's Forum on Brogramming and Sexism in Computer Science” ↗…realities of molecular biology. Why not lean in to a publication on behavioral neuroendocrinology, for a change? [1]: http://www2.nau.edu/~bio372-c/class/behavior/sexdif1.htm [2]: http://www.amazon.com/Female-Brain-Louann-Brizendine/dp/0767... [3]: http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2003/02/0214_030214_... [4]: http://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/the-how-and-why-sex-diff...
on “Philip Greenspun Reviews “Lean In”” ↗I have a question about: "Gender and Our Brains: How New Neuroscience Explodes the Myths of the Male and Female Minds" I read "The Female Brain" by Louann Brizendine and all it makes sense to me but I am beginning to think that I (and this book) are wrong. ¿How is it possible that two opposing theses could be maintained in something like neuroscience?…
on “Science Books of 2019” ↗About 4 years ago (when this article was written), a book called The Female Brain, by Louaan Brizendine, was published that caused a couple of media outlets to blindly parrot he book's numerous claims of female stereotypes having a scientific basis. The links title is a reference to…
on “Men Speak 20K Words Per Day and Females 7K - Fact Checking "The Female Brain"” ↗Dr. Brizendine's books are hyperbolic pseudoscience. I stopped taking "The Female Brain" seriously when I read the stuff about how young men think about sex once a minute and young women think about it once every couple of days. Both those numbers are pretty ridiculous :^) And indeed, none…
on “New approaches shed light on the magnitude of sex differences in personality” ↗…designated holes on a board. A graphic accompanies the full article: http://www2.nau.edu/~bio372-c/images/00018E9D-879D-1D06-8E49... Here is Louann Brizendine of UCSF: http://www.amazon.com/The-Female-Brain-Louann-Brizendine/dp/... Review 1: Louann Brizendine, a neuropsychiatrist at the University of California, San Francisco, explores groundbreaking issues in brain science...Brizendine graduated…
on “Paul Graham Isn't Keeping Women out of Tech” ↗…general principle, see Mark Liberman's <a href="http://www.boston.com/news/globe/ideas/articles/2006/09/24/s... use 20,000 words a day, men only 7,000 - or so says a new bestseller. Fact-checking ``The Female Brain."</a>.
on “Sex at Dawn -- evolutionary biology misused” ↗…this general principle, see Mark Liberman's http://www.boston.com/news/globe/ideas/articles/2006/09/24/s... Women use 20,000 words a day, men only 7,000 - or so says a new bestseller. Fact-checking ``The Female Brain."</a>.
on “Sex at Dawn -- evolutionary biology misused” ↗