Smart and Sexy: the evolutionary origins and biological underpinnings of cognitive differences between the sexes

Forum notes
Please feel welcome to apply for membership to comment or participate in our diverse multi topic discussion forums.
Post Reply
User avatar
Swordsmyth
Posts: 42709
Joined: Tue Feb 25, 2020 12:47 pm

Smart and Sexy: the evolutionary origins and biological underpinnings of cognitive differences between the sexes

Post by Swordsmyth »

Smart and Sexy: the evolutionary origins and biological underpinnings of cognitive differences between the sexes

By Roderick Kaine

Smart and sexy is the definitive book on sex differences in intelligence. With over 300 citations of peer reviewed scientific articles, it describes the latest science on cognitive differences in the sexes without being hampered by political correctness or feminism.

Excerpts:

Pseudo-Science and Bias in the Academic Establishment
“Saying that the academic community has a large progressive bias is a very strong claim and such an extraordinary claim requires extraordinary evidence. So what is known about the “scientists” who publish “research” in politically charged areas? Diederick Stapel was previously a highly regarded and influential Dutch social psychologist who did a lot of work on stereotype threat until it came to light that he “routinely falsified data and made up entire experiments.” Another example of his politically biased work was a “scientific” article which sanctimoniously claimed to find that meat eaters were more selfish and less agreeable than vegans. Unfortunately, it is impossible to be surprised by outspoken priggishness from vegans and their sympathizers.”
“I have a great respect for science generally and see it as the best method so far developed by humans to separate truth from fiction, at least when the core principles of scientific philosophy are actually followed. But the scientific establishment is still a human institution and therefore fallible. The community at times moves unacceptably far away from its core principles and this usually happens when research topics might have strong implications for an over-arching political ideology.”
More at: https://altright.com/2016/10/29/pseudo- ... blishment/


Autism and the Extreme Male Brain
“Cambridge University autism researcher Simon Baron-Cohen, the cousin of comedian Sacha Baron-Cohen, advances the idea that Autism Spectrum Conditions (ASC) including Asperger’s syndrome can be at least partially explained as being the expression of an “extreme male brain” (EMB) that results from unusually high concentrations of testosterone during fetal development.

Increased fetal testosterone affects brain morphology, which results in increasing sexual dimorphism in a variety of brain regions. Excessive testosterone triggers super-normal male-typical development of the brain. This hypothesis is consistent with the fact that ASCs have a heavy male bias. It is theoretically easier to transition from normal male testosterone levels to excessive levels than it is to go from normally low levels in females to excessive levels. Further evidence for this theory includes recent research showing that women with Polycystic Ovary Syndrome, a condition which leads to elevated levels of Androgens in the fetal environment, have a 59% increase in the risk of having children with an ASC.i In support of this idea, in traditional autism, the gender disparity ranges from 4:1 to 8:1 male to female sufferers depending on the study. For Asperger’s specifically, the ratio may be as high as 11:1.

Morphological evidence offers persuasive support of EMB theory. In cases where there is sexual dimorphism in brain structure, individuals with Autism tend to have a more extreme expression of the male typical phenotype. For example, male brains in infants are on average larger than female brains, and autistic children tend to have even larger brains than the male average. In normal males, larger brain size is mostly a function of increased growth of white matter and to the extent that an autist’s brain is larger than the male average it is also a function of increased white matter growth. Specific brain regions which are normally sexually dimorphic demonstrate the same trend where autists tend to be exaggerated from the male average. For example, the amygdala is larger in males than females, and larger still in autists than developmentally normal males. Given that fetal testosterone has been robustly implicated in driving male typical dimorphisms, it is quite probable that an excess of the hormone during development accounts for the exaggerated male typical phenotypes found in autists.”

“As might be expected from an exaggerated male brain structure, autists tend to have an exaggerated male typical cognitive profile. In other words, they have a “spiky” profile on intelligence test batteries. They tend to perform much more poorly on the sub-tests that require verbal skills and language processing and have ability peaks on sub-tests which emphasize spatial reasoning.ii, iv For example, in the highly visuospatial block design task (BDT) of the Wechsler test battery, 47% of autists have a peak compared to only 2% of the general population. The peak is typically between 1-3 standard deviations above the performance you would expect based on how they did on other tests (i.e., their baseline). In addition, about 50% of neurotypical individuals perform under their baseline IQ on this task, but less than 10% of autists perform under baseline.v Perhaps coincidentally, like autists, high intelligence individuals who aren’t diagnosed with autism also tend to display intellectual profiles with specific ability peaks.”
More at: http://atavisionary.com/autism-and-the- ... ale-brain/


More Reviews, Excerpts and Interviews: https://atavisionary.com/smart-and-sexy-links-post/


Book available at: https://atavisionary.com/free-book-smar ... the-sexes/
Post Reply