Genes and hormones have an effect on the brain: it is masculinised by testosterone and feminised by female hormones. As a result, men generally have better spatial skills than women, while women tend to develop more sensitive hearing and smell.  However, nobody has a purely male or female brain, probably because we receive different amounts of sex hormones in the womb. Some scientists believe extra testosterone before birth can make a girl more of a tomboy, but whether extra female hormones make a boy more of a 'sissy' is debated. Child of Our Time discovered that even at the age of one, children make choices about toys based on gender. By the time they're a few years old, girls tend to prefer dolls, which encourage nurturing, and boys prefer cars and trucks, which promote more adventurous play. Professor Melissa Hines, of the University of Central London, helped us with an experiment to find out whether brain sex or environment is responsible for this difference. She dressed a baby girl as a boy and a baby boy as a girl. Without revealing the true sex of the babies, we observed the way our parents interacted and played with them. Almost all the adults gave boys' toys to the child they thought was a boy and dolls to the child they thought was a girl.
 It would seem society is much tougher on boys than on girls, forcing them to conform to desired male stereotypes. Girls appear much freer to take on whatever roles they like. Can we increase a child's intelligence by exposing them to different experiences, or is it fixed by our genes? Find out more in programme 3.
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