[Neverontime]

Studies have shown that the amount of testosterone a child is exposed to in the womb affects their level of ability to empathise when they're older.
Higher pre-natal testosterone has been linked to lower abilities in skills involved in empathy.



What do you think?

[Lachesis]

I think that I missed the testosterone train in the womb.

Plus: yeah, I think the pre-natal testosterone level of the mother affects many things on the child. Somehow I remember there was a link to sexuality as well. Might remember it wrong though.

[murderegina]

It also changes your 2D-4D ratio

[FaveteLinguis]

Probably true, I know there's some pretty strong correlations between estrogen and bonding abilities with people, where testosterone tends to affect assertiveness and muscle mass.

Whether or not this has to do with being an INFP, I'm unsure.......habits being formed and how a kid has been raised is where the fuzziness comes in. I keep thinking that there might be to MBTI and Functions than meets the eye. I'm keeping a watch on neuro science to see if they come up a scheme.

[mimesis]

Studies have shown that the amount of testosterone a child is exposed to in the womb affects their level of ability to empathise when they're older.
Higher pre-natal testosterone has been linked to lower abilities in skills involved in empathy.

What do you think?

Just for Te's sake,
Are you sure there is a causal relation? A correlation is not neccesarily also a causal relation ('affects').

Correlation does not imply causation - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Eysenck did link psychoticism to testosterone, but...

"Critics of the trait have suggested that the trait is too heterogeneous to be taken as a single trait. For example, in a correlation study by Donald Johnson (reported in 1994 at the APT International Conference) Psychoticism was found to correlate with Big Five traits Conscientiousness and Agreeableness; (which in turn correlated strongly with, respectively, MBTI Judging/Perceiving, and Thinking/Feeling).Thus, Costa and McCrae believe that agreeableness and conscientiousness (both which represent low levels of psychoticism) need to be distinguished in personality models. Eysenck also argued that there might be a correlation between psychoticism and creativity"

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eysenck..._Questionnaire


Also:

"A certain amount of confusion exists about how to measure empathy. These may be rooted in another problem: deciding what is empathy and what is not"

"In the field of medicine, a measurement tool for carers is the Jefferson Scale of Physician Empathy, Health Professional Version (JSPE-HP).[92] At least one study using this tool with health sciences' students has found that levels of empathy are greater amogst females than males, and also are greater amongst older students than younger students."

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Empathy#Measurement

[Neverontime]

I'm not sure there's a causal relation. I'm just putting the idea to you all in the hopes that someone smarter/less lazy than me will look into it

They also believe pre-natal testosterone sets the brain up for how its affected by testosterone in the future. A lot before birth making the brain more sensitive to its effects as a teen/adult

The 4D 2D ratio is also still being debated and varies I believe with gender and race.