Editorial: Stop Pseudoscience of Gender Differences in Learning
I was honored to contribute a piece on gender gaps in education to the November issue ofEducational Leadership, titled "The Myth of Pink & Blue Brains." However, I am concerned that educators will be confused about seemingly contradictory statements between my article and the subsequent piece by King, Gurian, and Stevens ("Gender-friendly Schools") in the same issue.
As a neuroscientist, I am careful to base my claims on strict experimental evidence. I spent eight years researching and writing a recent book, Pink Brain, Blue Brain, upon which my article is largely based. Unfortunately, King et al. do not hold the same standards of evidence, and their claims about neurologic differences in the box, "How Boys and Girls Learn Differently (p. 41)" are frankly, bogus. Not one of their assertions about boys' and girls' brains is backed up by credible, well-accepted science, and certainly not by the studies they cite. What's more, two of the four sources they cite are from popular, highly speculative works that have been widely derided by practicing scientists.
In fact, the very notion that "boys and girls learn differently"—now sadly an article of faith among many educators—is
