BRAIN STUDY PROVES 'YOU ARE BORN THAT WAY' - New York Post

Posted by feenx

I personally find this fascinating, especially as I grew up in a very strict religious environment where to this day many are at the least uncomfortable and at the most terrified of homosexuals. I never understood this, and can't help but chuckle how more discoveries are made as to the origins of humans and their behavior that for so long has been rebuked when in fact it's simple human nature.

Enjoy :)

BRAIN STUDY PROVES 'YOU ARE BORN THAT WAY' - New York Post: "BRAIN STUDY PROVES 'YOU ARE BORN THAT WAY'
Post Wire Services

June 17, 2008 -- The brains of gay men and women look like those found in straight people of the opposite sex, research suggests.

A Swedish study, published in the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, compared the size of the brain's halves in 90 adults. In gay men and straight women, each half was similar in size; the right side was bigger in lesbian women and straight men.

'In other words, the brain network which determines what sexual orientation actually 'orients' towards is similar between gay men and straight women, and between lesbian women and straight men,' Dr. Qazi Rahman of the University of London told the BBC.

'As far as I'm concerned, there is no argument any more - if you are gay, you are born gay.'

Scientists have noticed for some time that homosexuals of both sexes have differences in certain cognitive abilities, suggesting there may be subtle differences in their brain structure.

This is the first time, however, scientists have used brain scanners to try to look for the source of those differences.

The test group of gay and straight men and women was scanned by Karolinska Institute scientists to measure the volume of both sides, or hemispheres, of their brains.

When the results were collected, it was found lesbian women and straight men shared a particular "asymmetry" in their hemisphere size - but straight women and gay men had no difference between the size of the different halves.

In other words, structurally at least, gay men were more like straight women, and gay women were more like straight men.

A further experiment found that in one particular area of the brain, the amygdala, there were other significant differences.

In heterosexual men and lesbian women, there were more nerve "connections" in the right side of the amygdala, compared with the left.

The reverse was true in the case of gay men and straight women, with more neural connections in the left amygdala.


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