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Joanna Parga '07 is studying gender identity in collaboration with researcher Melissa Hines at City University in London, England.

June 30 | July 17 | July 30

Most Recent Entry

July 30, 2006

I think I should start this entry by describing the condition Congenital Adrenal Hyperplasia (CAH) that I am studying. I'm not sure with all of my travels that I have done my research justice. CAH is a disorder where females are exposed to excess testosterone when they are developing inside of their mothers. When I was running interviews for our pilot study in the lab this week the very astute nine year old I was interviewing asked me if we injected hormones into individuals to study them . . . I assure you this is not the case.  

CAH is brought on by a deficiency of an enzyme which converts testosterone to cortisol, a hormone that the body uses for things like coping with stress. So along with being an intersex condition it can also be life threatening without treatment. The predominant way that a person gets CAH is from their genes, both parents have to be carries for the disorder. When both parents know they carry the gene, which usually occurs when they have a child with CAH, they can get treatment for their next child if she is a girl so that she is not masculineized at birth and affected by the testosterone. The problem with this is that the girl could wind up having severe brain damage - it's hard for many parents to decide what is better: an atypical gender association or a below average intelligence - would you be able to make the choice?

This past week I visited a CAH clinic that is held at Great Ormond Street Hospital in London every two weeks. It was fascinating because I got to sit in a room with CAH girls and boys and their parents and listen to how they were progressing on their medications. After a consultation with the doctor, my co-worker and I recruited them for our study on behavior. Most of the families were happy to participate, always wanting to know more about how their child's development will be affected by the hormonal imbalance they were born with.  

We are interviewing at least one pilot child a day to perfect the measures we will be using on the girls with CAH. The battery of tests is exhausting for the children, but as I become more familiar with administering it I try to make it more fun and give the children more breaks. It is amazing how different each child is in intelligence and beliefs. You learn a lot about how children think after you spend four hours asking them questions.  

The most interesting thing I've learned is probably that children do not have gender consistency until they are over five years old. So if you ask a little girl "If I shave your head right now, will you be a boy," she will probably answer yes. Or if you ask any child under four years old "If a boy puts in hair clips, wears make up, and goes shopping, will they still be a boy?" the answer is inevitably no. Not only does that highlight the fluidity of gender at a young age, but also how sex-stereotyped children are. Pretty fascinating stuff. I did go to Cambridge and sight seeing this weekend and included some pictures. Even a full time worker needs to have a little fun.