[Salon] The Gendered Brain with Gina Rippon

Be among the first to hear a new scientific idea so startling that it has been compared in significance to the moment when Copernicus posited the outrageous notion of the Earth orbiting the sun.

In the gendered world we live in, we are unconsciously bombarded with messages about sex and gender. On a daily basis we face deeply ingrained beliefs that our sex determines our skills and preferences, from toys and colours to career choice and salaries. But what does this constant gendering mean for our thoughts, decisions and behaviours? “Stereotypes could be straitjacketing our flexible, plastic brains”, says Professor of Cognitive Neuroimaging Gina Rippon, "so yes, challenging them does matter!" A gendered world produces a gendered brain.

Prof Rippon turns centuries-old ‘neurosexism’ and media distortions on their head, explores new cutting-edge neuroscience and unpacks the stereotypes that bombard us from our earliest moments, showing how they mould our ideas of ourselves and even our brains.

______________________________________________________________

ABOUT

Gina Rippon is Professor of Cognitive Neuroimaging at the Aston Brain Centre, Aston University, in Birmingham, UK. She has also sat on the editorial board of the International Journal of Psychophysiology. Her research involves the application of brain imaging techniques, using cognitive neuroscience paradigms on studies of normal and abnormal cognitive processes. This work has been applied to the study of Autistic Spectrum Disorders and developmental dyslexia. Her latest book is the groundbreaking The Gendered Brain. As a watershed in the history of science, Rippon considers her findings comparable to "the idea of the Earth circling around the sun".