Sex redefined

Beyond Discrete Categories: Studying Multiracial, Intersex, and Transgender Children Will Strengthen Basic Developmental Science

“…And a recent representative study of New Zealander high school students showed that 1.2% of them identified as transgender, with 94.7% identifying as nontransgender (the remainder was unsure or did not understand the question; Clark et al, 2014). Depending on the specific definition one uses of intersex, these children are also more common than many believe as they represent 0.02% to 1.7% of children (Ainsworth, 2015;Fausto-Sterling, 1993;Sax, 2002). Thus, although rare, these intersex and transgender children are at least as common as children who are blind (Foster & Gilbert, 1992) or who have Williams syndrome (Stromme, Bjomstad, & Ramstad, 2002), and both of these groups have received considerable attention in the mainstream developmental literature (e.g., Bedny & Saxe, 2012;Johnson & Carey, 1998;Landau, Gleitman, & Landau, 2009;MeyerLindenberg, Mervis, & Berman, 2006).…”

“…There are regions of the world where intersex births are especially common, as is the case with children with 5α-reductase deficiency in Papua New Guinea (Imperato- McGinley et al, 1991) and the Dominican Republic (Thigpen, Davis, Gauthier, Imperato-McGinley, & Russell, 1992). Scientific advances in genetics and human biology more broadly are also increasingly leading BEYOND DISCRETE CATEGORIES to the conclusion that a large number of people fall outside the male/female distinction (Ainsworth, 2015). Thus, experiences of gender or sex "atypicality" are occurring all over the world, yet nearly no cognitive developmental psychologists are examining these children nor are they discovering the ways in which they can contribute to our theories of gender development.…”

“…), meaning more people are becoming familiar with the existence of transgender individuals (Halloran, 2015). In addition, genetic testing is making it clear that many more people might be intersex than originally believed (Ainsworth, 2015), and these diagnoses are now being made at earlier and earlier ages, even before birth in some cases (Casey & Gomez-Lobo, 2015). We assume it is uncontroversial to insist that our theories of the kinds of people populating the social world should adequately capture the variation that characterizes that world.…”

A representação binária do cérebro “feminino” e “masculino” na ciência e nos meios de comunicação

“…Esto se debe a que factores in utero y ambientales afectan la estructura del cerebro, por lo que algunos autores proponen que más que un dirmorfismo, existe un multimorfismo (Joel, 2011). Por otro lado, algunos visualizan ese multimorfismo como un 'continuum' entre lo "masculino" y lo "femenino" (Ainsworth, 2015), mientras que otros proponen que existe un 'mosaico' heterogéneo con características cerebrales "masculinas" y "femeninas" dentro de un mismo individuo (Joel, 2011;Joel et al, 2015). ¿Nacemos pre-programados con un tipo de cerebro?…”

“…Isso ocorre porque fatores no útero e ambientais afetam a estrutura do cérebro, por isso alguns autores propõem que, mais do que um dimorfismo, há uma multimorfismo (Joel, 2011). Além disso, alguns consideram esse multimorfismo como um continuum entre o "masculino" e o "feminino" (Ainsworth, 2015), enquanto outros sugerem que há um "mosaico" heterogêneo com características cerebrais "masculinas" e "femininas" no mesmo indivíduo (Joel, 2011, Joel et al, 2015. parte da engrenagem política e social que busca conceituar de forma determinista as diferenças entre homens e mulheres.…”