From: apland@mala.bc.ca
Newsgroups: sci.med
Subject: Re: women in science
Date: 26 Sep 92 13:46:34 -0700
Organization: Malaspina College

In article <16585@pitt.UUCP>, km@cs.pitt.edu (Ken Mitchum) writes:
> In article <1992Sep21.212836.261@news.wesleyan.edu> RGINZBERG@eagle.wesleyan.edu (Ruth Ginzberg) writes:
>>Another e-mail list to which I subscribe (academic women's studies) has just
>>been discussing the need for scientists to be involved in women's studies
>>programs.  This came up because of a discussion of a documentary (which I did
>>not see, BTW, I'm just reporting 2nd hand info here), called BRAIN SEX.  Many
>>who did see it complained that it misrepresented current controversies in
>>neurobiology, making it appear as though it were uncontroverted *fact* now
>>that (e.g.) prenatal exposure to fetal androgens is what makes fetuses
>>grow up into folks who like math & science (etc.). [ugh!]

Brain Sex was a three part series (3 hrs I guess) based on a book by the
same name.  A friend had lent me the book some time ago and after watching
the first and third parts (I missed the scond) I read the book.  
Unfortunately the book, like many popular books, is filled with accurate
descriptions of studies, inaccurate descriptions, and speculations.  
It is a selective review but it does provide references.  For
example there are very few references to the work of Money et al.  If you
want to know what the program presented then you can get the book and read it.

> John Money did a lot of fascinating studies of this in the early 70s,
> particularly studying people with androgenital synrome and various
> types of hermaphrodites. Needless to say, these studies became
> politically very unpopular. Behavior genetics and behavioral biology
> have always been difficult waters to enter from the research standpoint,
> because of the implications for the political and legal scenes.
> 
> There is much evidence that biology, including prenatal androgen 
> exposure, definitely effects certain aspects of behavior that have
> traditionally been gender-associated. But it is also very true that
> young girls who are good in math and science have this drummed out
> of them by the time they are in high school. It is unfortunate that
> some people would choose to use valid data from research studies as
> a reason to endorse and enforce social practices from the 19th
> century, as this only leads to clamour from the other side to
> suppress such research.
> 
Agreed, and this is exactly what I was left with after reading Brain Sex.
Somehow in all of this we have to keep a respect for the individual - all
of this data applies to groups, not individuals.  Yet, its my observation
that when someone reports research in this area (s)he is attacked from the
left because the data or interpretation is misrepresented as an attack on
the individual or the right misrepresents the data as evidence validating their
attacks on the disadvantaged.

Sandra Scarr has published a paper {I'm afraid I can't recall the reference -
probably in the American Psychologist, last 2 years}
complaining about this very thing.  I seem to remember that she stated that
there were times she was concerned about what her data would show but that
she was resolved to quit before hiding or distorting it.