Freedomain Radio

Shockingly, some actual science...

http://www.freedomainradio.com/Traffic_Jams/FDR_1122_Why_Males_Are_Violent.mp3

interesting, i didnt know males were more physically abused than females, although saying that my elder brother was definitely sworn at more and pushed around/hit more (physically) by my dad (more so than my mum at least) than either me or my sister. He has grown up to have a violent streak in him :(

This explains alot and I do mean alot.... this gives me a stronger understanding of the serious volatility in my family, and why I have been the way i have been. stef your like a metal detector finding the nuggets of precious truth buried beneath the rubble of our past.

Thanx BCF

VERY interesting, Stef! And terribly sad.

I just heard this one today while I was at work, and I could hardly keep it together, thinking of all of the neglected, unloved, rejected, surpressed young boys out there. It is really heartbreaking.

There is one thing, however, that I did question about the article. Everything I've read when I've studied psychology myself has said that there is no evidence that size difference in the corpus collosum leads to behavior differences among men and women. There was a popular early study that claimed that women have a thicker, more developed corpus collosum, which led to them being more adept at multi-tasking, but that was contradicted by subsequent studies. So it would appear to me that there's still a significant debate about how and if size difference in the corpus collosum affects behavior. If anyone has any studies that would support the author of the article's theory, I would be interested.

Colleen:

I just heard this one today while I was at work, and I could hardly keep it together, thinking of all of the neglected, unloved, rejected, surpressed young boys out there. It is really heartbreaking.

There is one thing, however, that I did question about the article. Everything I've read when I've studied psychology myself has said that there is no evidence that size difference in the corpus collosum leads to behavior differences among men and women. There was a popular early study that claimed that women have a thicker, more developed corpus collosum, which led to them being more adept at multi-tasking, but that was contradicted by subsequent studies. So it would appear to me that there's still a significant debate about how and if size difference in the corpus collosum affects behavior. If anyone has any studies that would support the author of the article's theory, I would be interested.

i can recall reading studies about behavior differences in men and women being due to differences in brain size of different regions of the brain, i dont remember the research atm though. I think cause and effect was definitely an issue with these studies though as it is so hard to seive out what has been caused by nature and what has been caused by nurture. Obviously men and women evolved to be capable of very different things and so i do think biology does have at least some part to play in the differences in gender behavior, it may be that in our evolutinary history for some reason it was just less important for men to have this specialised area of the brain, perhaps women needed it more so for the team work and social networking with other women necessary for pregnancy, breast feeding and child caring. This research of course though isnt referring to womens ability to multitask but rather their abilities to form close bonds and social networks with in groups of other females from a young age in comparison to boys who dont seem to do this, which is what the research i have is about (i just dont remember the full details cos i havent read the book in ages). As far as i can remember the corpus collossum has a variety of responsibilites, giving females high communication skills is supposedly one of them, ive never read about it giving females the capacity to multitask though

The main problem i think with most studies into gender differences in behavior is how hard it is to know when something has been caused by nurture and when something has been caused by nature.

The primary function of the corpus collosum is the transfer of information between the left and right hemispheres of the brain. It's the dense band of wires that connects the two, and so allows us to process information in a variety of different ways. 

It is absolutely true that there are biological brain differences between men and women, but everything I've read about the theory that was mentioned in this podcast concerning the corpus collosum is said to be unfounded.