The Female Brain has seven chapters, each one of which is dedicated to a specific part of a woman's life, such as
puberty, motherhood, and
menopause, or a specific dimension of a women's emotional life, such as feelings,
love and
trust, and
sex. The book also includes three appendices on
hormone therapy,
postpartum depression, and
sexual orientation.
Reception
The book sold well but received mixed reviews because a number of journalists, popular science writers, and scientists questioned the validity of some of the content.
Some of the authors that supported the content of the book include:
Deborah Tannen, of The Washington Post[1] Tannen writes, "Throughout the book, I recognized biological accounts for social behaviors I had observed and written about." In a similar vein, she adds, "Anthropologists and linguists who have studied children at play have noted that girls form bonds by telling secrets. Here, too, Brizendine finds 'a biological reason.'" Her ultimate position is one of cautionary endorsement: "Ideally, readers will sift through the case studies, research findings and scientific conjectures gathered in this non-technical book and be intrigued by some while questioning others, bearing in mind the caution that hormones and brain structure play a role in gender differences but are not the whole story."
Mark Liberman in a series of articles via his Language Log blog.[7]
Brizendine was given the tongue-in-cheek 2006
Becky Award, for "outstanding contributions to linguistic misinformation".[8] The award cited errors in The Female Brain, including one sentence (removed from subsequent printings) which contrasted the number of words used by men and women in one day. The numbers had been taken from a book by a self-help guru and were incorrect.[9]
The Female Brain was loosely adapted as a romantic comedy movie of the same name in 2017. Brizendine served as the inspiration for the film's main character.[10]
Evan Balaban and Rebecca M. Young called The Female Brain a "melodrama" "riddled with scientific errors" and "fail[ing] to meet even the most basic standards of scientific accuracy and balance" and that "human sex differences are elevated almost to the point of creating different species, yet virtually all differences in brain structure, and most differences in behaviour, are characterized by small average differences and a great deal of male–female overlap at the individual level".