Implications of immediate-early gene induction in the brain following sexual stimulation of female and male rodents
You'll have to explain to me what this has to do with transgendered humans.
Sexual dimorphism in the preoptic area of the rat
Sexual dimorphism in rat eyes has what to do with transgendered humans?
Estrogen receptor function as revealed by knockout studies: neuroendocrine and behavioral aspects
More studies on mice, still no obvious connection to transgendered humans.
The differential projections of the olfactory bulb and accessory olfactory bulb in mammals
::sigh:: Sensing a real pattern here. More animal studies with no apparent connection to what you are trying to prove.
I'm just going to skip to the second to last citation...
Sex differences in sex chromosome gene expression in mouse brain
Goddammit.
A sex difference in the human brain and its relation to transsexuality
Finally! And of course it's the Zhou et al. (1995) study that everyone always cites. Demonstrating a female-typical BSTc region in transsexual men is hardly proof of the claim that "They are, in fact, women, as determined by brain structure."
Especially when there is evidence that male transsexual brains also differ from female brains in other ways, in which they more closely resemble male brains[1], and that hormone doping affects the brain[2].
[1]Regional gray matter variation in male-to-female transsexualism
"We analyzed MRI data of 24 male-to-female (MTF) transsexuals not yet treated with cross-sex hormones in order to determine whether gray matter volumes in MTF transsexuals more closely resemble people who share their biological sex (30 control men), or people who share their gender identity (30 control women). Results revealed that regional gray matter variation in MTF transsexuals is more similar to the pattern found in men than in women."
"Compared with controls, anti-androgenCestrogen treatment decreased brain volumes of male-to-female subjects towards female proportions, while androgen treatment in female-to-male subjects increased total brain and hypothalamus volumes towards male proportions...The findings suggest that, throughout life, gonadal hormones remain essential for maintaining aspects of sex-specific differences in the human brain."
An honest assessment of the relevant data does tentatively support the claim that transsexualism is a product of brain morphology, but not the claim that male transsexuals have female typical brains. It would be more accurate to say that transsexual males have transsexual male typical brains.
Furthermore, the jury is still out on how many of these differences are a result of inherent genetic difference, environmental factors, or the use of hormones in transitioning.
