43 pages 1 hour read

Cordelia Fine

Delusions of Gender: How Our Minds, Society, and Neurosexism Create Difference

Nonfiction | Book | Adult | Published in 2010

A modern alternative to SparkNotes and CliffsNotes, SuperSummary offers high-quality Study Guides with detailed chapter summaries and analysis of major themes, characters, and more.

Index of Terms

fMRI (Functional Magnetic Resonance Imaging)

A method of measuring brain activity that maps statistically significant changes in blood flow to the brain as it performs a task, as compared to blood flow during a control condition. The popular understanding of how fMRI techniques work is rather different than how they actually do: fMRI scans do not provide a simple picture of brain function.

Hardwiring

The popular notion that the human brain is essentially preprogrammed for behavior at birth. Fine (and many other scientists) cast doubt upon this theory, believing behavior to be the result of complex interactions between brain, genes, and environment.

Lateralization

The concentration of brain activity in one half or the other of the brain. Neurosexist theories suggest that men’s brains lateralize their functions more than women’s do, thereby justifying stories about men’s and women’s different capacities; the evidence does not support these theories.