The social construction of sex categories as problematic to biomedical research: cancer as a case in point

Abstract

This chapter uses a feminist social construction argument to question the use of sex categories in biomedical research. It is argued that dichotomous sex categories reflect social pressures to categorize and create difference, gender, as much or more than physical sex characteristics in bodies. Because a dichotomous categorization scheme is overlayed on a continuous physical phenomenon contradictions appear when sexual artifacts like hormones, genitalia, sexuality, sexual activity, and reproduction are attributed with causal status either in causing/curing, increasing/decreasing risk. The implications of this argument are illustrated using a content analysis of medical writing about cancer since 1900. Implications for definition of women's health and pan-sex biomedical research are discussed.

Citation

Hanson, B. (2000), "The social construction of sex categories as problematic to biomedical research: cancer as a case in point", Jacobs Kronenfeld, J. (Ed.) Health, Illness, and use of Care: The Impact of Social Factors (Research in the Sociology of Health Care, Vol. 18), Emerald Group Publishing Limited, Leeds, pp. 53-68. https://doi.org/10.1016/S0275-4959(00)80022-8