Brain Differences - MTF/FTM and CIS

[Stochastic]

Yet another study on brains. This one includes FTM and MTF individuals and is an open source publication. From what I have read and understood, birth gender of transgendered individuals have areas of grey matter that are similar to CIS individuals sharing the same gender identity, but they are not similar to CIS of the same birth gender. For example, areas of FTM brains are similar to CIS males, and are different from CIS females. Also interesting, it reads as if transgendered individuals have structural differences compared to CIS regardless of gender. As with many studies, the sample size in this study is small. Hopefully others can replicate this study to strengthen the idea of brain differences.

Regional Grey Matter Structure Differences between Transsexuals and Healthy Controls—A Voxel Based Morphometry Study
http://www.plosone.org/article/info%3Adoi%2F10.1371%2Fjournal.pone.0083947
Author: L. Simon et al.
Published: December 31, 2013
Journal: PLoS ONE

[helen2010]

Stochastic
Encouraging research. Personally I am more comfortable with a nature rather than a nurture explanation of tg. Seems to feel right that there is more to this than a sociological explanation of ->-bleeped-<-.
From what I understand current studies suffer from small sample size, difficulty in finding sufficient pre hrt brains for scanning pre mortem or analysis post mortem.
Perhaps this will depend on access to much improved scanning technology, larger scale studies or folk like me to accept that tg arises from nature or brain structure and nurture.

[Northern Jane]

Not to say that everyone is the same but certainly, in my own case, nurture could not have had anything to do with my gender identity since my identity was strong from earliest childhood and every effort to 'correct it' was completely unsuccessful. Inducement didn't work, cajoling didn't work, threats didn't work and even, in the end, banishment and being disowned didn't work. Nothing including imminent death could sway my identity.

[Paige]

Also interesting, it reads as if transgendered individuals have structural differences compared to CIS regardless of gender.

Hey maybe this explains why the military years ago told me I had abnormal brain waves when I was trying to be a pilot.   

[Jamie D]

Our findings support the notion that structural differences exist between subjects with GID and controls from the same biological gender. We found that transsexual subjects did not differ significantly from controls sharing their gender identity but were different from those sharing their biological gender in their regional GM volume of several brain areas, including the left and right precentral gyri, the left postcentral gyrus (including the somatosensory cortex and the primary motor cortex), the left posterior cingulate, precueneus and calcarinus, the right cuneus, the right fusiform, lingual, middle and inferior occipital, and inferior temporal gyri. Additionaly, we also found areas in the cerebellum and in the left angular gyrus and left inferior parietal lobule that showed significant structural difference between transgender subjects and controls, independent from their biological gender.