Sexual orientation and neurocognitive ability: A meta-analysis in men and women

Xu, Yin; Norton, Sam; Rahman, Qazi

doi:10.1016/j.neubiorev.2017.06.014

Cited by 31 publications

(23 citation statements)

References 52 publications

(63 reference statements)

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“…The magnitude of the effect sizes revealed in the current multivariate meta-analysis was similar to that of our prior univariate meta-analysis. Once again, we found that homosexual men showed a cross-sex shift in male-and femalefavoring spatial tasks, which is consistent with our prior demonstration that effect size was the highest for spatial tasks in men (Xu et al, 2017). The results for women were also consistent with previous work, suggesting that homosexual women are by and large sex-typical in most cognitive domains.…”

Section: Discussionsupporting

confidence: 91%

“…The details of our methods used to select eligible articles, code moderating variables and compute effect size are described in our prior meta-analysis (Xu et al, 2017). When studies used multiple tests for the same cognitive performance type, we selected the most commonly used test across studies to compute effect size since these studies did not provide the correlations among outcomes.…”

Section: Methodsmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Recently, we conducted a meta-analysis to test the relationship between sexual orientation and cognitive performance on tasks that show normative sex differences (Xu, Norton, & Rahman, 2017). This was motivated by the cross-sex shift model of sexual orientation differences which predicts that homosexual men should behave more like heterosexual women than heterosexual men do, and homosexual women behave more like heterosexual men than heterosexual women do, in sex differentiated domains such as cognitive ability.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Sexual Orientation and Cognitive Ability: A Multivariate Meta-Analytic Follow-Up

Norton

Rahman

2020

Arch Sex Behav

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A cross-sex shift model of human sexual orientation differences predicts that homosexual men should perform or score in the direction of heterosexual women, and homosexual women in the direction of heterosexual men, in behavioral domains such as cognition and personality. In order to test whether homosexual men and women's cognitive performance was closer to that of heterosexual men or that of heterosexual women (i.e., sex-atypical for their sex and closer to that of the opposite-sex), we conducted a multivariate meta-analysis based on data from our previous meta-analysis (Xu, Norton, & Rahman, 2017). A subset of this data was used and comprised 30 articles (and 2 unpublished datasets) and 244,434 participants. The multivariate meta-analysis revealed that homosexual men were sex-atypical in mental rotation (Hedges' g = −0.36) and the water level test (Hedges' g = −0.55). In mental rotation, homosexual men were in-between heterosexual men and women. There was no significant group difference on spatial location memory. Homosexual men were also sex-atypical on male-favoring spatialrelated tasks (Hedges' g = −0.54), and female-favoring spatial-related tasks (Hedges' g = 0.38). Homosexual women tended to be sex-typical (similar to heterosexual women). There were no significant group differences on male-favoring "other" tasks or female-favoring verbal-related tasks. Heterosexual men and women differed significantly on female-favoring "other" tasks. These results support the cross-sex shift hypothesis which predicts that homosexual men perform in the direction of heterosexual women in sex differentiated cognitive domains. However, the type of task and cognitive domain tested is critical.

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Section: Discussionsupporting

confidence: 91%

Section: Methodsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Sexual Orientation and Cognitive Ability: A Multivariate Meta-Analytic Follow-Up

Norton

Rahman

2020

Arch Sex Behav

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“…Fifth and finally, a large meta-analysis by Xu et al (2017;N = 254,231) concluded that gay men tend to have spatial and linguistic abilities comparable to those of straight women, whereas lesbians tend to have spatial abilities comparable to those of straight men (but female-typical linguistic abilities). These findings are difficult to explain on the assumption that social forces alone create the usual pattern of sex differences.…”

Section: The Nature and Nurture Of Sex Differences In Cognitive Aptitmentioning

confidence: 99%

Men, Women, and STEM: Why the Differences and What Should Be Done?

Stewart‐Williams¹,

Halsey²

2018

Preprint

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It is a well-known and widely lamented fact that men outnumber women in a number of fields in STEM, including physics, mathematics, and computer science. The most commonly discussed explanations for the gender gaps are discrimination and socialization, and the most common policy prescriptions are targeted at those ostensible causes. However, a great deal of evidence in the behavioral sciences suggests that discrimination and socialization are only part of the story. The purpose of this paper is to highlight other aspects of the story: aspects that are commonly overlooked or downplayed. More precisely, the paper has two main aims. The first is to examine the evidence that factors other than workplace discrimination make a significant contribution to the gender gaps in STEM. These factors include relatively large average sex differences in career and lifestyle preferences, and relatively small average differences in cognitive aptitudessome favoring males, others favoring femaleswhich are associated with progressively larger differences the further above the average one looks. The second aim is to evaluate the evidence suggesting that these sex differences are not purely a product of social factors but also have a substantial biological (or "innate") component. A more complete picture of the many causes of the unequal sex ratios in STEM may productively inform policy debates, and is likely to improve women's situation across the STEM fields. Men, Women, and ScienceWhy the Differences and What Should Be Done?Never has the issue of gender disparities been as widely discussed, or as bitterly contested, as it has been in recent years. From the Oscars to the political podium, from TV shows to the workplace, disparities are identified and debate inevitably ensues. In the occupational realm, one of the primary focuses of this debate has been the differential representation of men and women in STEM (science, technology, engineering, and math). 1 This was epitomized by the infamous "Google memo," in which then-Google employee James Damore (2017) questioned the extent to which observed gender disparities in STEM are a product of workplace discrimination. The memo, and Damore's subsequent dismissal from Google, provoked a great deal of discussion and debate about the causes of STEM disparities and the origins of human sex differences. Unfortunately, much of this debate was decidedly inaccurate in its presentation of the research on the topic. A great deal was said about bias and discrimination, but relatively little about other factors contributing to STEM gender gaps (e.g., Chachra, 2017). Furthermore, to the extent that other factors were mentionedfactors such as average sex differences in academic interests these were typically attributed to socialization, rather than to biology or to a 1 Strictly speaking, the issue is not STEM per se, but rather STEM fields that focus on the non-living world, or that have a strong spatial or mathematical component. According to Ceci et al. (2014), the STEM fields should be divided into GE...

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“…Sexual orientation has been associated with structural and functional cerebral characteristics (Abé, Johansson, Allzen, & Savic, ; Berglund, Lindstrom, & Savic, ; Hu et al., ; Kranz & Ishai, ; Ponseti et al., , ; Rahman, ; Savic & Lindström, ; Zuloaga, Puts, Jordan, & Breedlove, ) believed to result from genetic and/or sex hormone effects similar to those involved in brain sexual dimorphism (Bao & Swaab, ; Langstrom, Rahman, Carlstrom, & Lichtenstein, ; Rahman, ; Sanders et al., ). Homosexual men and women appear to show a “cross‐sex shift” of brain structure and function; homosexual men being more female‐typical and homosexual women being more male‐typical (Rahman, ; Xu, Norton, & Rahman, ). Findings supportive of this include volumetric patterns of brain asymmetry (Savic & Lindström, ), gray matter volumes in the perirhinal cortex (Ponseti et al., ), and cortical thickness in orbitofrontal and visual areas (Abé et al., ).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Cortical brain structure and sexual orientation in adult females with bipolar disorder or attention deficit hyperactivity disorder

et al. 2018

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BackgroundNonheterosexual individuals have higher risk of psychiatric morbidity. Together with growing evidence for sexual orientation‐related brain differences, this raises the concern that sexual orientation may be an important factor to control for in neuroimaging studies of neuropsychiatric disorders.MethodsWe studied sexual orientation in adult psychiatric patients with bipolar disorder (BD) or ADHD in a large clinical cohort (N = 154). We compared cortical brain structure in exclusively heterosexual women (HEW, n = 29) with that of nonexclusively heterosexual women (nHEW, n = 37) using surface‐based reconstruction techniques provided by FreeSurfer.ResultsThe prevalence of nonheterosexual sexual orientation was tentatively higher than reported in general population samples. Consistent with previously reported cross‐sex shifted brain patterns among homosexual individuals, nHEW patients showed significantly larger cortical volumes than HEW in medial occipital brain regions.ConclusionWe found evidence for a sex‐reversed difference in cortical volume among nonheterosexual female patients, which provides insights into the neurobiology of sexual orientation, and may provide the first clues toward a better neurobiological understanding of the association between sexual orientation and mental health. We also suggest that sexual orientation is an important factor to consider in future neuroimaging studies of populations with certain mental health disorders.

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Sexual orientation and neurocognitive ability: A meta-analysis in men and women

Cited by 31 publications

References 52 publications

Sexual Orientation and Cognitive Ability: A Multivariate Meta-Analytic Follow-Up

Sexual Orientation and Cognitive Ability: A Multivariate Meta-Analytic Follow-Up

Men, Women, and STEM: Why the Differences and What Should Be Done?

Cortical brain structure and sexual orientation in adult females with bipolar disorder or attention deficit hyperactivity disorder

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