TY - JOUR
AU - Money, John
AB - Devised animal experiments show conclusively that sex hormones influence the male/female dimorphism of the brain, prenatally, in four possible ways, namely, masculinizing, demasculinizing, feminizing, and defeminizing. The human counterparts of devised animal experiments are clinical intersexual (hermaphroditic) syndromes that occur spontaneously as experiments of nature. The two sources of data supplement one another. Both lead to the conclusion that prenatal hormonalization of the brain influences the subsequent sexual status or orientation as bisexual, heterosexual, or homosexual. This effect is more robot-like in subprimate than in primate species. As in subhuman primates, in the human species sexuoerotic status is dependent not only on prenatal hormonalization, but also on postnatal socialization effects. There are several different human hermaphroditic syndromes each of which makes its own specific contribution to the science of homosexology and to the understanding of genetic, prenatal-hormonal, pubertal-hormonal, and socialization determinants of being gay, straight, or bisexual. In combination, they indicate that sexual orientation is not under the direct governance of chromosomes and genes, and that, whereas it is not foreordained by prenatal brain hormonalization, it is influenced thereby, and is also strongly dependent on postnatal socialization. The latter is, like native language, programmed into the brain through the senses. Postnatal programming may become incorporated into the brain’s immutable biology.
TI - Sin, Sickness, or Status?
JF - American Psychologist
DO - 10.1037/0003-066X.42.4.384
DA - 1987-04-01
UR - https://www.deepdyve.com/lp/american-psychological-association/sin-sickness-or-status-D5PmCqeWXu
SP - 384
EP - 399
VL - 42
IS - 4
DP - DeepDyve
ER -