Biology textbooks now under criticism for pushing so-called "outdated" ideas on sex and gender.
A highly subjective, biased, study is garnering a ton of mainstream attention and promoting new activism talking points.
Following the much-heated debate regarding sex, gender, and the like a recently published study1 has now made biology textbooks the target of criticism.
If many readers are having similar thoughts as I, you may be wondering what the heck essentialism is. In short, essentialism suggests that certain categories are defined by certain qualities i.e. the essence of that group. In this case, an essentialist viewpoint would suggest that certain qualities and characteristics define sex and gender. It appears that this is the point of contention made by both the researchers and the mainstream press who seem to be pushing established notions of gender existing on a spectrum or the existence of intersex people somehow deconstructing the idea of sex itself being binary.
This may confuse readers even further given that this sort of seems like an obvious concept. Irrespective of the similarities held between men and women there are quite obviously clear distinctions between the two.
But given the cultural climate in which gender and sex have come under fire, one has to wonder what utility such a study as the one published above in Nature serves. Is there a legitimate point to be made with such a study, or is this a growing example of ideology dictating how scientific principles through concepts such as gender existing as part of a spectrum?
Consider the introduction to the study itself, which hammers down several points of contention and seem to be heavily biased by alluding to activist-talking points:
Three basic assumptions undergird the essentialist view of sex and gender (1): (i) there is little to no variation in traits or behaviors within a sex or gender group; (ii) differences between sexes or genders are discrete—the groups do not overlap substantially in traits; and (iii) internal factors such as genes are the best explanation for all forms of variation within and between sex or gender groups. Scientific research on sex and gender is inconsistent with these assumptions (3, 4), yet they are commonly held. For example, substantial portions of US adults (≈40 to 70%) attribute gender differences in traits and behaviors to genetic causes (5).
We can see that premise for this study itself relies on gross assumptions- for the most part, I highly doubt that many people would consider there to be little variation in traits or behaviors among people of the same gender. The concept of a tomboy and tomgirl exists for a reason- it alludes to the fact that many women may otherwise exhibit masculine traits (and vice versa), and yet many of these women are likely to categorize themselves as “woman”. Many men who exhibit effeminate traits may also otherwise consider themselves “man”. By all accounts, most people are fully aware that a high degree of variability exists among men as well as among women. These have been well-established notions that have never really needed redefining or “updating” for modern audiences because most people are well aware that variability exists among people of the same gender, but still categorize themselves as either “man” or “woman”.
This also goes against (ii) from above since most people are aware of similarities among sex and gender- it’s just for the fact that we tend to focus on differences because differences provide avenues for investigation.
Consider that growing bodies of evidence suggest that sex differences may explain differences in health outcomes between males and females. For instance, most measures of metabolism are derived from men, including drug metabolism, meaning that actual pharmacokinetics and pharmacodynamics of drugs may differ for females as compared to males, possibly leading to increased risk of overdosing or adverse events for females.2
And consider that a growing body of evidence seems to suggest that the higher prevalence of autoimmunity among females may be due to the present of an X chromosome-specific gene known as Xist (pronounced “ex-ist”). The Xist gene is associated with X-inactivation, in which one copy of the X chromosome pair is shut off in cells so that a doubling effect of X chromosome gene expression does not occur. It’s been suggested that factors associated with the Xist gene seem to be associated with autoimmunity, with one recent study suggesting that autoantibodies against Xist ribonucleoproteins seem to be a possible driver of autoimmunity, thus suggesting a sex-specific explanation for the higher prevalence of autoimmunity among females.3
It’s funny that the people who focus so much on differences with phrases such as “diversity is our strength” are so quick to hark on shared similarities. It’s the similarities that are well-acknowledged; it’s the differences that make things interesting and worth investigating.
So as of now, even before we assess the study itself we can see that the framing intentionally provides a narrow perspective of what most people may think about when it comes to sex and gender, creating a strawman through which to react against and target as being “problematic”. More importantly, the authors have chosen to construct such a narrow definition to work with that they likely can’t help but find answers that substantiate their claims of essentialism.
So how substantive is the actual body of work?
The researchers looked at 6 allegedly common biology textbooks published between the years of 2009 and 2016, narrowing down their search to chapters on genetics and examining paragraphs and sentences that refer to sex/gender in some way and seeing if a distinction is made between the two, which was quickly abandoned as most books were argued to conflate the two:
We initially attempted to make a systematic distinction between terms that pertained to sex (such as “Y chromosome”) and terms that pertained to gender (such as “men”). However, it quickly became clear that this would not be feasible. The information available in the textbooks was not sufficient to make this distinction (see SM). This blurring of the linguistic boundary between sex and gender suggests in and of itself that textbooks may conflate the two. Going forward, we use the term “sex/gender” when appropriate to describe our results.
Despite the imprecision in how sex and gender terminology was used, we were able to code whether sex and gender were explicitly differentiated in a paragraph. Of the 362 paragraphs coded, none differentiated between sex and gender in any way. Thus, textbooks inappropriately conflate between a biological phenomenon (sex) and a sociocultural phenomenon (gender).
The reference to coding is important, as the coding used by researchers helped to categorize the different paragraphs/sentences based on descriptions that may be associated with conflating sex and gender along three axes:
Variation within sex/gender groups
Variation between sex/gender groups
Explanations for variations in sex/gender groups
What’s strange here is that some of the examples of so-called essentialist viewpoints seem to rely on pedantic language, or things that would otherwise be a non-problem.
For instance, one provided example for essentialist viewpoints is the following:
So rolling your tongue exists on a spectrum? By all accounts, those who can roll their tongues, irrespective of the degree, are likely to be counted as “tongue rollers”. The problem with this point of contention is that it tries to provide a distinction without a difference- what use is arguing that there are people with varying degrees of tongue-rolling? Maybe it’s the fault of the book author for using that example, but it really serves no purpose to elaborate on such a trivial detail.
But there’s also the problem with the second half of the “scientifically accurate explanation” that is an issue.
There is the reality of intersex people. However, intersex people serve as exceptions to the rule, and therefore do not dictate how the rules are applied. That is, intersex people by default don’t call into question the binary categorization of males or females, and it certainly doesn’t open the door to suggesting that sex exists on some sort of spectrum. Both realities can simultaneously exist.
And that may be one of the biggest problems with this study in particular, in which things that are generally implied within a culture are made to be explicit, but made explicit through overcomplication and sophistry. Things that are exceptions don’t by default alter the prevailing notions of sex and gender. Intersex people exist but they don’t change our general perceptions of sex. We as a society are likely to have a high degree of variability among men and women, but that doesn’t mean that we ascribe variability to some third categorization of “other” or gender non-conforming.
Readers can examining the study deeper to see what findings the authors come to, but in my opinion this all seems like a futile exercise in pushing for ideological thoughts on sex and gender and uprooting actual scientific assumptions.
Note that the authors themselves point out that the intention of their research is to reduce discrimination and push for activism, as mentioned in a Newsweek article:
The researchers fear that teaching kids and teenagers these essentialist assumptions may have several negative consequences for both gender-conforming people and gender-non-conforming people alike, ranging from gender stereotyping and misogyny to transphobia.
"The findings serve as a call to action—it is important that the high school biology curriculum is revised so that it reflects accurate scientific knowledge rather than misguided assumptions that may foster gender stereotyping and discrimination," paper co-author Andrei Cimpian, a professor in the Department in the Psychology at New York University, said in the statement.
And this may make sense given the fact that many of the authors are part of BSCS Science Learning, a non-profit focused on changing science education, and don’t appear to be active science researchers.4 Their webpage makes mention of equity and social justice as well, so it’s not like this study isn’t intended to push a certain narrative.
And consider that the primary author, Brian Donovan, has the following in his bio:
Brian M. Donovan is a research scientist at BSCS Science Learning. He holds a B.A. in biology from Colorado College, a M.A. in teaching from the University of San Francisco, and a M.S. in biology and Ph.D. in science education from Stanford University. His research explores how genetics education interacts with social-cognitive biases to influence how students make sense of complex biological and social phenomena. By translating this research into frameworks that inform science instruction, curriculum development, and teacher education, Brian hopes to create a generation of researchers, teachers, and curriculum writers who know how to teach about human difference in a more socially responsible manner.
So here we have groups of researchers focused on education and social sciences rather than the natural/physical sciences dictating what should go in our biology books.
Apologies for not expounding upon this study more (my laptop is unfortunately being slow), as well as the problems with the current gender/sex craze, but it seems as if most of these complaints are a non-issue made to be more pronounced by people who appear to be pushing for people wishing to push an agenda.
But for a better examination of this topic (but not this study) I think Bret and Heather put it well within their podcast when addressing Eric Weinstein’s complaints:
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Brian M. Donovan et al., Sex and gender essentialism in textbooks. Science383,822-825(2024).DOI:10.1126/science.adi1188
Soldin, O. P., & Mattison, D. R. (2009). Sex differences in pharmacokinetics and pharmacodynamics. Clinical pharmacokinetics, 48(3), 143–157. https://doi.org/10.2165/00003088-200948030-00001
Dou, D. R., Zhao, Y., Belk, J. A., Zhao, Y., Casey, K. M., Chen, D. C., Li, R., Yu, B., Srinivasan, S., Abe, B. T., Kraft, K., Hellström, C., Sjöberg, R., Chang, S., Feng, A., Goldman, D. W., Shah, A. A., Petri, M., Chung, L. S., Fiorentino, D. F., … Chang, H. Y. (2024). Xist ribonucleoproteins promote female sex-biased autoimmunity. Cell, 187(3), 733–749.e16. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.cell.2023.12.037
Three of the authors not part of BSCS Science Learning appear to be associated with psychology/education departments, so again social science fields dictating natural sciences.
I am thankful that I kept some old text books