Study, 2006
Do men and women use different brain areas for mental rotation and word generation tasks?
Yes. During mental rotation tasks, men and women showed activation in different brain areas. Gender differences were more prominent in mental rotation tasks than in word generation tasks. Women were tested during the mid-luteal phase of their menstrual cycle.
What they did
Researchers did brain imaging scans while 12 men and 12 women completed two tasks: imagining how to rotate geometric shapes (mental rotation) and generating verbs. The women were tested during the mid-luteal phase of their menstrual cycle.
What they found
During mental rotation, men's brains showed more activation in the right frontal, precentral, and bilateral parietal areas. Women's brains showed more activation in the right temporal and frontal areas and the left fusiform region. During verb generation, men showed more activation in the left temporal and precentral areas. Gender differences were more pronounced in the mental rotation task than in the verb generation task.
What it means for you
Men and women may solve certain mental tasks using different brain regions. This study only tested women during one phase of the menstrual cycle, so we do not know if these differences change with cycle phase. The main limitations are the small sample size and that women were only tested during the mid-luteal phase.
12
male volunteers
12
female volunteers
About the study
- Original title
- Gender-specific cerebral activation during cognitive tasks using functional MRI: comparison of women in mid-luteal phase and men
- Authors
- Gizewski ER, Krause E, Wanke I et al.
- Journal
- Neuroradiology
- Year
- 2006
- Study design
- Study
- Participants
- 12
- What was tested
- Mental rotation and verb generation tasks during brain imaging
- Read the paper
- doi.org/10.1007/s00234-005-0004-9