On the Fluidity of Gender as “Normal”– A Case Against Traditional Gender Categories in Psychology and Neuroscience Research

Psychology and neuroscience have always been concerned with anomalies. Whether this means studying a small population with a rare disease, or teasing apart seemingly trivial differences in behavior, human experience that deviates from accepted norms is rife with potential for scientific understanding and progress. This notion is relevant in psychological and neuroscientific pursuits of gendered differences in behavior and brain function. The terms gender and sex have been used interchangeably in much scientific literature. In reality, the two mean quite different things: The term sex indicates an assignment of male or female at birth, based on biological norms and expectations. The term gender, on the other hand, is distinctive from sex in that it does not necessitate congruence with sex. Gender is the identity which one feels or claims, often male or female, and exists independently from biological, assigned sex.

Historically, the gender binary has been comprised of male and female. These two categories have often been presented as exclusive and opposing. In the fields of psychology and neuroscience, much research has relied on the categories of male and female as separate and distinct. Even when sex and gender are recognized as separate, as in the case of transgender persons, for example, people are categorized as either men or women. Study participants have largely been classified as either male or female with no alternative or expanded option. This mimics the norm of the gender binary in western society today. Society allots little room for deviance from the gender binary and expectations of masculinity and femininity that accompany it. Gender nonconformity is regularly treated as an abnormality affecting a very small minority of the population. Psychology and neuroscience research that relies on the gender binary for interpretation and meaning of scientific findings would need to be reassessed if, perhaps, the gender binary is not as solid as society would like it to be.

Research conducted by Joel et al. (2013) supports the deconstruction of the gender binary based on their findings that point to a more fluid and elastic experience of gender than the male/female binary allows for. Importantly, their research challenges the myth that gender nonconformance is a rare occurrence in typical populations. Joel et al. (2013) developed a novel questionnaire that measures multiple facets of gender identity in ways which prior psychology research had not. As illustrated in Figure 1 below, there was extensive overlap in the experiences of male and female identified participants in regards to their gender and whether or not they felt “as a man” or “as a woman” (Joel et al. 2013). It is key to note that participants in normative male and female categories showed a wide spread of responses as to whether or not they felt as a man or as a woman.

These findings do indeed indicate that gender is much more fluid than the male/female binary allows. Thus, Psychology and Neuroscience need to account for that fluidity both in future research but also in reassessing the soundness of prior research that relied on the male/female dichotomy for meaning. Furthermore, it is important for research to expressly solicit information on gender identity and gender sentiment versus relying on stereotypical external cues to gather the gender of a participant based on researchers’ assumptions. This is particularly important when it comes to research on transgender persons. The research from Joel et al. (2013) also challenges the distance felt from trans* related research based on the conceptions that transgender experience is a seemingly distant “ism” and that gender nonconformity supposedly only affects a small percentage of the population. “Stable” gender categories are, in reality, not very stable. Given the findings from Joel et al. (2013), it is also interesting to consider how gendered findings from animal research in psychology and neuroscience should be interpreted. One last point – this piece is not meant to question the validity of anyone’s gender identity, rather it is meant to question the commonly accepted and propagated notions of male and female as separate and exclusive categories.

 References

Joel, D., Tarrasch, R., Berman, Z., Mukamel, M., & Ziv, E. (2013). 

Queering gender: Studying gender identity in ‘normative’ individuals. Psychology & Sexuality, 5:4, 291-321.