Table of Contents
The Female Brain Summary
The Female Brain by Louann Brizendine is about how female brains differ from male brains. Studies around the world showed that women are more likely to be depressed than men are by a ratio of 2:1. As a medical student, Brizendine thought this was because of the patriarchal oppression of women, but then she noticed that up until puberty, the rates of depression between boys and girls are the same. She wondered what role hormones played in making girls more depressed.
The controversy around this subject has only compounded with time, and in this book, Brizendine does not shy away from being controversial. She provides anecdotal evidence to back up her claims, she makes sweeping statements about both genders, and she substitutes the use of scientific facts for flowery language. But this does not mean that there is nothing to take away from the book.
Neurological Differences
Men and women share more than 99% of their genetic coding. But the few genetic differences that do exist (out of the 30,000 genes in the human genome) account for many differences in our bodies, from nerves that register pain and pleasure to the neurons that transmit perception, thoughts, and emotions. The different exposures of men and women to sex hormones makes them see the same world differently.
Women process emotions more strongly than men, while men process thoughts about sex more strongly than women. This explains why most 20 to 30-year-old men think about sex every 52 seconds, while women think about it once a day, making social interactions between the sexes very interesting.
The male brain is around 9 percent bigger than the female. This fact was once seen as proof that men were smarter than women. But men and women have the same number of brain cells – in women, the brain cells are more tightly packed in the skull.
When it comes to language and hearing, women have 11 percent more neurons than men, and in the hippocampus (responsible for memory), the hippocampus is larger in women. Women also have a larger circuitry than men when it comes to observing emotions on faces. In these interpersonal dimensions, women are endowed with higher natural abilities than men.
But men have more processors in the amygdala (regulates fear and aggression), this may explain why men are more prone than women to responding with violence, when faced with threats. Men are on average 20 times more aggressive than women. Men are also more visual; they have more activity in visual processing areas, hence why they are more likely to fall in love at first sight than women.
The brain of a woman evolved to handle life threatening situations differently. She experiences more stress than men over the same event, and the stress includes the possible risks to her family. But women have a bigger pre-frontal cortex, they can better control that anger. In fact, when it comes to relationships, women override their anger response with conflict aversion and fear of retaliation to maintain the relationship.
Brain scans show us which regions of the brain light up when we experience different mental states. It turns out that women use different circuits than men do to accomplish the same tasks, including language processing and problem solving. As for why men think about sex every 52 seconds, while women do so perhaps once a day or slightly more, it looks like the part of the brain that is responsible for sexual thought and behavior is around two and half times larger in the male. Unsurprising.
The Development of the Female
A female baby is hardwired to pay more attention to human relationships, and they are more sensitive to their mother’s nervous system, that is why it is important for a female child to not have a stressed-out mother. A teen girl’s brain at puberty is flooded with estrogen (feel food hormones), progesterone (valium of the brain), cortisol (stress hormone), and oxytocin (urge to connect with others), and dopamine (stimulates pleasure centers of the brain). These chemicals compel a teenage girl to engage in gossip, shop, and exchange secrets with her friends.
Teenage girls are constantly on the phone because communication is imperative for reducing stress. The excitement (dopamine and oxytocin rush) that they experience when seeing their friends is the next best thing to an orgasm. Men need to be touched 2 to 3 times more to maintain the same level of oxytocin as women.
During that time, women become obsessed with the attention of males. During puberty, they shift their focus to being more sexually desirable and attractive. These years also bring out higher competition among women for male attention and they undermine their rivals in subtle ways. The movie Mean Girls is given as an example.
Brizendine thinks that girls around this age feel that losing a friendship is so catastrophic because they have entered a child rearing age, and in evolutionary terms, she needs a close-knit group for protection. She can’t run away or fight like a man, when she is caring for a child. The “fight or flight” in response to danger is more a description of men rather than women.
Close social bonds change the female brain for the better, and a loss of relationships triggers hormonal changes that aggravate the intensity of abandonment. The time of the month also influences how girls deal with stress. The most brash and aggressive girls have higher androgen levels. At normal levels, fluctuations in androgens can cause a girl to be more focused on power, whether over boys or in her peer group.
For boys, hormonal changes are significant factors in their behavior too. Teenage boys become brooding and monosyllabic because testosterone drives them to not only experience intense masturbatory frenzies but reduces their desire to socialize unless girls or sports are involved.
During the teen years, males and females move in different directions. Boys gain self-esteem when they gain independence from the group, while females gain it by forming close connections with others.
The Lawrence Summers Controversy
The president of Harvard university speculated that women and men differ in their mathematical and scientific abilities because of brain differences and was expelled. Brizendine did not entirely disagree with Summers. She thought that until puberty, boys and girls are the same in science and math. But since testosterone makes the male brain very competitive, they are more willing to spend countless hours in front of a computer screen or studying alone.
In contrast, a teenage girl’s estrogen makes her more interested in spending time forming social bonds, and less likely to spend long hours solving abstract problems by herself. This behavior does not change when she becomes an adult. So it is not a lack of aptitude that explains the differences in mathematical and scientific interest, but life habits driven by differences in brain chemistry.
Lies & Cheating
Women evolved to detect lies better than men. Some speculate that women have higher emotional intelligence. The argument is that men who were good liars were better at reproducing and women with more emotional intelligence were better at not falling for these lies.
Women want to settle down with a nurturing man. But once the house has been secured, they will have a biological urge to look for other men who have the best genes. But these theories are based on bird behavior and its application to humans should be considered with caution.
Another theory is that a women who cheats on her man has less orgasms with him, she is not helping him fertilize her. That is why men care so much if their woman reaches orgasm – it is a sign that she is being faithful.