Mechanisms of entanglement: how a gendered world makes a gendered brain

Abstract

Abstract. Contemporary understanding of key neural processes has advanced the study of the dynamic, iterative influences between the brain and external events, contributing to a growing evidence base concerning the entanglement between human brain structure and function and socio-cultural contextual factors, with consequent behavioural implications. This is particularly relevant to any understanding of differences in apparently sex-linked human behavioural phenotypes and the role of external factors in producing such differences. Relevant insights are provided not only by the relatively well-established concept of experience-based neuroplasticity, but also by research into the brain-changing effects of social context, which can include gendered attitudes and expectations. The developing study of the socially embedded brain offers a powerful organising framework to inform both methodological and theoretical approaches to an understanding of the brain-based mechanisms of biology/society interactions. Additionally, the emerging application of models of predictive coding processes in the brain to human social behaviour potentially offers wide-ranging insights into the role of rule-based, socio-culturally determined, lived experiences in shaping brain development and function and tracking. This paper aims to demonstrate how this framework could be harnessed in neuroscience research into the dynamic entanglement between sex-related brain processes and social contextual influences such as gender.