IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/plo/pone00/0260542.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Task-domain and hemisphere-asymmetry effects in cisgender and transmale individuals

Author

Listed:
  • E Darcy Burgund

Abstract

The present research examined the extent to which transmale individuals’ functional brain organization resembles that of their assigned sex or gender identity. Cisgender-female, cisgender-male, and transmale participants, who were assigned female sex but did not have a female gender identity, were compared in terms of effects that have been observed in cisgender individuals: task-domain effects, in which males perform better than females on spatial tasks and females perform better than males on verbal tasks; and hemisphere-asymmetry effects, in which males show larger differences between the left and right hemispheres than females. In addition, the present research measured participants’ intelligence in order to control for potential moderating effects. Participants performed spatial (mental rotation) and verbal (lexical decision) tasks presented to each hemisphere using a divided-visual field paradigm, and then completed an intelligence assessment. In the mental-rotation task, cismale and transmale participants performed better than cisfemale participants, however this group difference was explained by intelligence scores, with higher scores predicting better performance. In the lexical-decision task, cismale and transmale participants exhibited a greater left-hemisphere advantage than cisfemales, and this difference was not affected by intelligence scores. Taken together, results do not support task-domain effects when intelligence is accounted for; however, they do demonstrate a hemisphere-asymmetry effect in the verbal domain that is moderated by gender identity and not assigned sex.

Suggested Citation

  • E Darcy Burgund, 2021. "Task-domain and hemisphere-asymmetry effects in cisgender and transmale individuals," PLOS ONE, Public Library of Science, vol. 16(12), pages 1-19, December.
  • Handle: RePEc:plo:pone00:0260542
    DOI: 10.1371/journal.pone.0260542
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://journals.plos.org/plosone/article?id=10.1371/journal.pone.0260542
    Download Restriction: no

    File URL: https://journals.plos.org/plosone/article/file?id=10.1371/journal.pone.0260542&type=printable
    Download Restriction: no

    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1371/journal.pone.0260542?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Renata Figueiredo Anomal & Daniel Soares Brandão & Silvia Beltrame Porto & Sóstenes Silva de Oliveira & Rafaela Faustino Lacerda de Souza & José de Santana Fiel & Bruno Duarte Gomes & Izabel Augusta H, 2020. "The role of frontal and parietal cortex in the performance of gifted and average adolescents in a mental rotation task," PLOS ONE, Public Library of Science, vol. 15(5), pages 1-21, May.
    2. Varriale, Vincenzo & van der Molen, Maurits W. & De Pascalis, Vilfredo, 2018. "Mental rotation and fluid intelligence: A brain potential analysis," Intelligence, Elsevier, vol. 69(C), pages 146-157.
    3. David Reilly, 2012. "Gender, Culture, and Sex-Typed Cognitive Abilities," PLOS ONE, Public Library of Science, vol. 7(7), pages 1-16, July.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Varriale, Vincenzo & De Pascalis, Vilfredo & van der Molen, Maurits W., 2021. "Post-error slowing is associated with intelligence," Intelligence, Elsevier, vol. 89(C).
    2. Renata Figueiredo Anomal & Daniel Soares Brandão & Silvia Beltrame Porto & Sóstenes Silva de Oliveira & Rafaela Faustino Lacerda de Souza & José de Santana Fiel & Bruno Duarte Gomes & Izabel Augusta H, 2020. "The role of frontal and parietal cortex in the performance of gifted and average adolescents in a mental rotation task," PLOS ONE, Public Library of Science, vol. 15(5), pages 1-21, May.
    3. Giofrè, D. & Allen, K. & Toffalini, E. & Mammarella, I.C. & Caviola, S., 2022. "Decoding gender differences: Intellectual profiles of children with specific learning disabilities," Intelligence, Elsevier, vol. 90(C).
    4. Giannelli, Gianna Claudia & Rapallini, Chiara, 2016. "Immigrant student performance in Math: Does it matter where you come from?," Economics of Education Review, Elsevier, vol. 52(C), pages 291-304.
    5. Das, Sumit Kumar & Mishra, Udaya S. & Das, Milan & Das, Pritilata, 2022. "Perceptions of gender norms and sex-typed cognitive abilities among Indian adolescents – A study of Andhra Pradesh and Telangana," Children and Youth Services Review, Elsevier, vol. 135(C).
    6. Manol Nikolov Manolov & Ivan Kirilov Ivanov & Velislava Atanasova Chavdarova, 2023. "Gender-Role Stereotypes in the Bulgarian Family: Cross-Generational Transmission of Gender Attitudes," Societies, MDPI, vol. 13(7), pages 1-14, June.
    7. Daly, Michael & Obschonka, Martin & Stuetzer, Michael & Sutin, Angelina & Shaw-Taylor, Leigh & Satchell, Max & Robinson, Eric, 2019. "Neuroticism Mediates the Relationship Between Industrial History and Modern-Day Regional Obesity Levels," MPRA Paper 106505, University Library of Munich, Germany, revised 23 Jul 2020.
    8. Martin Asperholm & Sanket Nagar & Serhiy Dekhtyar & Agneta Herlitz, 2019. "The magnitude of sex differences in verbal episodic memory increases with social progress: Data from 54 countries across 40 years," PLOS ONE, Public Library of Science, vol. 14(4), pages 1-11, April.
    9. Mole, Joseph & Foley, Jennifer & Shallice, Tim & Cipolotti, Lisa, 2021. "The left frontal lobe is critical for the AH4 fluid intelligence test," Intelligence, Elsevier, vol. 87(C).
    10. Gijsbert Stoet & David C Geary, 2013. "Sex Differences in Mathematics and Reading Achievement Are Inversely Related: Within- and Across-Nation Assessment of 10 Years of PISA Data," PLOS ONE, Public Library of Science, vol. 8(3), pages 1-10, March.
    11. Carmen Aina & Chiara Mussida & Gabriele Lombardi, 2023. "Are Business and Economics Alike?," Italian Economic Journal: A Continuation of Rivista Italiana degli Economisti and Giornale degli Economisti, Springer;Società Italiana degli Economisti (Italian Economic Association), vol. 9(2), pages 557-585, July.
    12. Yulia V. Kuzmina, 2016. "Can Teacher Practices Reduce the Gender Gap in Mathematics Interest for Students with Different Achievements?," HSE Working papers WP BRP 35/EDU/2016, National Research University Higher School of Economics.
    13. Euler, Matthew J. & Schubert, Anna-Lena, 2021. "Recent developments, current challenges, and future directions in electrophysiological approaches to studying intelligence," Intelligence, Elsevier, vol. 88(C).
    14. Oberleiter, Sandra & Fries, Jonathan & Schock, Laura S. & Steininger, Benedikt & Pietschnig, Jakob, 2023. "Predicting cross-national sex differences in large-scale assessments of students' reading literacy, mathematics, and science achievement: Evidence from PIRLS and TIMSS," Intelligence, Elsevier, vol. 100(C).

    More about this item

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:plo:pone00:0260542. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: plosone (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://journals.plos.org/plosone/ .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.