Girls. Some prefer tutus and tiaras, others prefer dirty overalls and playing with the boys. Either way, all girls are biologically the same and in this month’s newsletter we’re going to dive into the beauty that makes them who they are. Much like boys, we will highlight key differences that uniquely make a girl, well…a girl! First, in utero, female sex hormones are believed to highly influence not just their brain development, but their emotional processing pathways. Remember too, they can be exposed to higher prenatal testosterone, which results in increased levels of physical activity and reduced empathy. (However, this isn’t the case for all!)
Second, and probably most notably, is the way little girls play and how they prefer to interact with one another. More often than not, you may observe them engaging in more imaginative play, often in the kitchen center, where they pretend to be a mommy taking care of their baby. They enjoy establishing a common goal in play and then working cohesively to achieve it. While boys tend to take more physical risks, as we described in our last blog, girls prefer more social risk-taking amongst their peers. They naturally are more responsive to human voices and faces and establish stronger attachments with those around them.
It should also be noted that girls score higher in speaking, reading, writing and spelling. They also are slightly more skilled at memorizing and reciting lists of words, quick thinking and being successful in completing tasks that require finger dexterity.
Third, the corpus callosum is larger in the brains of females. This connects the two hemispheres of the brain, which may explain why girls develop earlier in verbal and multitasking skills. Scientists believe this could mean that girls have the ability to use both sides of their brains to solve problems. Also, they have a greater and more expansive vocabulary, and tend to speak earlier than their male counterparts. Additionally, girls demonstrate a higher level of empathy from an earlier age, and have a keen ability to notice and pick up on subtle emotional cues from others. This allows them to have a better understanding in how to respond to the needs of others, as well as, being more comfortable in expressing their own emotions and feelings. However, girls can be more emotionally and mentally aggressive, comparably, to boys.
While there are distinct differences between both boys and girls, which should be kept in mind, each child first and foremost, is their own individual. What we know scientifically and biologically, is a guide into how a child’s brain develops depending on their sex, but only paints a small portion of the larger picture. There is much more that goes into the whole development of any child.
