Sex/gender differences in brain activity – it’s time for a biopsychosocial approach to cognitive neuroscience

ABSTRACT

There is compelling evidence that men and women differ in brain activity in long-term memory and other cognitive functions. However, until the origins of sex/gender differences in brain activity, and consequently behavior, are not fully understood, the factor sex/gender should be considered as imperfect proxy of a combination of yet unknown biological and psychosocial factors underlying these sex/gender differences. The key avenue to a full understanding of sex/gender differences in brain and behavior depends largely on cognitive neuroscience investigating sex/gender differences in brain activity within a biopsychosocial approach.

KEYWORDS:

• Gender
• biopsychosocial approach
• sex differences
• sex hormones
• interindividual differences

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author.

Notes

¹ The terms sex and gender are often used interchangeably in the academic literature, although they refer to different concepts. Sex is primarily used to categorize individuals as either male or female, based on the characteristics of their reproductive system, whereas gender is typically used to refer to social factors related to an individual’s sex, or to the individual’s personal identification of their gender. In line with a number of recent suggestions (Jäncke, 2018; Joel et al., 2015), I will use the term sex/gender throughout this commentary as since it is not always clear whether results to date are related to sex, gender, or both.