User:Ashack17/Neuroscience and sexual orientation

 Original: 

Brain structure
There are multiple areas of the brain which have been found to display differences based on sexual orientation. Several of these can be found in the hypothalamus, including the sexually dimorphic nucleus of the preoptic area (SDN-POA) present in several mammalian species. Researchers have shown that the SDN-POA aides in sex-dimorphic mating behavior in some mammals, which is representative of human sexual orientation. The human equivalent to the SDN-POA is the interstitial nucleus of the anterior hypothalamus (INAH-3), which is also sexually dimorphic and has demonstrated dissimilar sizes between sexualities. There are also other POA-like brain structures in the human brain which differ between sexual orientations, such as the suprachiasmatic nucleus and the anterior hypothalamus. Using meta-analysis of neuroimaging, researchers have concluded that these areas are linked to sexual preferences in humans, which would explain why they may differ based on sexual orientation.

 My Edit: 

Brain structure
There are multiple areas of the brain which have been found to display differences based on sexual orientation. Several of these can be found in the hypothalamus, including the nucleus of the preoptic area (SDN-POA), which is sexually dimorphic (meaning it is different between sexes), present in several mammalian species. Researchers have shown that the SDN-POA aides in sex-dimorphic mating behavior in some mammals, which is representative of human sexual orientation. The human equivalent to the SDN-POA is the interstitial nucleus of the anterior hypothalamus, which is also sexually dimorphic and has demonstrated dissimilar sizes between sexualities. There are also other POA-like brain structures in the human brain which differ between sexual orientations, such as the suprachiasmatic nucleus and the anterior hypothalamus. Using meta-analysis of neuroimaging, researchers have concluded that these areas are linked to sexual preferences in humans, which would explain why they may differ based on sexual orientation.

Another area of the brain which demonstrates sexual orientation differentiation is the thalamus, which is a structure involved in sexual arousal and reward. The thalamus of heterosexual individuals was found to be bigger than that of homosexual individuals. Researchers found these differences included volume of the region and its connectivity with some other parts of the brain (such as the right cuneus -involved in sight- and lingual gyrus -involved with word recognition) between homosexual and heterosexual men. Additionally, the basal nucleus of the stria terminalis (BNST), which also is involved in mating behavior, is not the same between sexual orientations. The central part of the BNST was found to be statistically larger in homosexual men than heterosexual men and women. The placement of connections in the amygdala (which is involved with emotion response) have been demonstrated to differ between heterosexual and homosexual individuals. The posterior cingulate cortex, a part of the occipital lobe (the region of the brain that processes visual information), has also been demonstrated to have differences based on sexual orientation.

Research has shown that a couple of the areas of connection between the hemispheres of the brain have differences in their size depending on sexual orientation. The front commissure was found to be wider in homosexual men than heterosexual men and the corpus colosseum was found to be larger in homosexual men than heterosexual men.

Some areas of the brain which researchers looked at but did not find differences in structure between sexualities are the temporal cortex (which mostly deals with processing sound), hippocampus (area of the brain involved with learning and memory) and putamen (which helps with movement and learning).

Peer Review [Neil] - I really like the fact that you re-wrote and built on something that was there initially. The added detail is relevant and gives a better overall understanding of the topics in question. It's surprising that such an important topic had so little initially so I hope your research and writing gets published on the page!