4. Understand what the overall research says.
The scope of the research on this topic is pretty staggering, and overall it points in one direction—whether one is looking at neuroscience, linguistics, physiology, pharmacology, endocrinology, cognitive science, anthropology, psychology, or a dozen other fields, having either XY or XX chromosomes does create certain biological male-female differences that play out strongly in common gender differences.
Of course, as I make a point to say on every podcast and at every marriage event, that does not mean that all men are the same and all women are the same. As humans, after all, we are more similar than we are different. Further, everyone is an individual. Millions of the glorious differences in brain wiring, hormones, upbringing, and personality create billions of unique individuals.
However. The research is also clear that some sex/gender-based patterns are really stark. An example is found in certain patterns of brain wiring. Yes, any of us might have neurobiological characteristics that are more common to the opposite sex (such as a man who is most comfortable processing verbally rather than internally, or a woman who has a particularly high sexual drive). But the exceptions don’t create a rule.
For example, one study out last year from Stanford (discussed below) found that male and female brains are consistently wired so differently, that AI models could almost always look at a particular brain scan and tell whether the subject was a man or a woman.
Just as XY and XX chromosomes guide mutually exclusive developmental pathways, they also shape those distinct and consistent male-female wiring patterns.
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