Now in Paperback: Pink Brain Blue Brain by Lise Eliot

All new operators of tiny babies should be required to get their hands on a copy of Pink Brain Blue Brain by Dr. Lise Eliot, something that will be easier now that this spiffy paperback edition has been released by Mariner.

Eliot, is an associate professor of neuroscience at the Chicago Medical School of Rosalind Franklin University of Medicine and Science and a mother of three. It’s hard to know which of these qualified her more to write Pink Brain Blue Brain and to make the observations she passes on to us here. One can only suspect that both the mother and the scientist was called on to witness here.

The reality, judging by current research, is that the brains of boys and girls are more similar than their well-described behavioral differences would indicated.

What’s this? No more Venus and Mars? Exactly.

Just as boys’ and girls’ bodies start out more androgynous than they end up in adulthood, their brains appear to be less sexually differentiated than adult men’s and women’s.

In a nutshell, Eliot tells us that the difference between the brains of boys and girls is less important and less pronounced than what we do with them: that the infant brain is a receptive little box that clamps onto the shapes we assign them.

I paraphrase and simplify greatly, but you get the idea. Most importantly: none of this is what Eliot expected to find in her research. The results will make you scratch your head and think. And, as I said as I began here, Pink Brain Blue Brain is an absolute must for those who have babies in their care.