Misplaced Pages

Doreen Kimura FRSC (February 15, 1933 – February 27, 2013) was a Canadian psychologist who was professor at the University of Western Ontario and professor emeritus at Simon Fraser University. Kimura was recognized for her contributions to the field of neuropsychology and later, her advocacy for academic freedom. She was the founding president of the Society for Academic Freedom and Scholarship.

Biography

Kimura was born in Winnipeg, Manitoba, and grew up in the village of Neudorf, Saskatchewan. Kimura was finishing her final year of high school via correspondence while teaching in a one-room schoolhouse in Northern Manitoba when she applied to and won an entrance scholarship to McGill University in Montreal.

Kimura went on to earn bachelor's, master's, and doctoral (in 1961) degrees from McGill. Woodburn Heron supervised her master's thesis. She conducted her doctoral research at the Montreal Neurological Institute under the supervision of neuroscientist Brenda Milner (co-supervised by Donald O. Hebb).

Kimura joined the faculty at the University of Western Ontario in London, Ontario, in 1967, and remained there for the rest of her career. In 1974, she established the Neuropsychology Unit at London’s University Hospital (now London Health Sciences Centre).

She had one daughter, named Charlotte Thistle Archer. Kimura died on February 27, 2013, at age 80, in Vancouver.

Work

Kimura's early work, starting in the 1960s, assessed differences in the language and music processing capabilities of the two hemispheres of the brain. She demonstrated that right-handed subjects have a right-ear superiority for the reception of words and numbers, and left-ear superiority for the perception of melodies; she concluded that these superiorities must reflect the processing specializations of the left and right hemispheres of the brain. Kimura was among the first researchers to use dichotic listening tests in her work, a non-invasive method for studying the lateral asymmetry of auditory processing in the brain.

Kimura studied healthy individuals, as well as patients with apraxia and aphasia, to draw conclusions about the neurological underpinnings of communication. Her 1993 monograph, Neuromotor Mechanisms in Human Communication, summarized her research in this area over the prior two decades.

Kimura's later interests included the relationship between sex and cognition and promoting academic freedom. In a number of publications, including her 2000 book Sex and Cognition, she suggested that cognitive and behavioural differences between males and females can be attributed to the influence of sex hormones on brain development. This work has been met with criticism by those who assert that gender differences are better explained by the influences of society and culture. In a special issue of the journal Canadian Psychology, Kimura argued against affirmative action for women in academia, calling it "demeaning" to women.

Awards and honours

• 1985: Award for Distinguished Contributions to Canadian Psychology as a Science, Canadian Psychological Association
• 2000: Nora and Ted Sterling Prize in Support of Controversy, Simon Fraser University
• 2005: Donald O. Hebb Distinguished Contribution Award, Canadian Society for Brain, Behaviour, and Cognitive Science
• 2006: Kistler Prize, Foundation for the Future

Books

• Neuromotor mechanisms in human communication (1993), Oxford: OUP ISBN 0-19-505492-X
• Sex and Cognition (2000), Cambridge, MA: MIT Press ISBN 0-262-61164-3

References

1. "Doreen Kimura – Obituaries – London, ON – Your Life Moments". Yourlifemoments.ca. Retrieved 2013-03-14.
2. ^ "Dr. Doreen Kimura". Canadian Society for Brain, Behaviour & Cognitive Science. Archived from the original on 2019-04-21. Retrieved 2019-12-05.
3. ^ Hampson, Elizabeth; Seligman, Clive (April 2013). "Obituary - Doreen Kimura 1933-2013". Society for Academic Freedom and Scholarship. Retrieved 2019-12-05.
4. Kimura, Doreen (2006). "Recollections of an accidental contrarian". Canadian Journal of Experimental Psychology. 60 (1): 80–89. doi:10.1037/cjep2006009. ISSN 1878-7290. PMID 16615720.
5. ^ Kimura, Doreen (2011). "From ear to brain". Brain and Cognition. 76 (2): 214–217. doi:10.1016/j.bandc.2010.11.009. PMID 21236541. S2CID 43450851.
6. ^ Kimura, Doreen (1961). "Cerebral dominance and the perception of verbal stimuli". Canadian Journal of Psychology. 15 (3): 166–171. doi:10.1037/h0083219. ISSN 0008-4255.
7. ^ Kimura, Doreen (1964). "Left-right differences in the perception of melodies". Quarterly Journal of Experimental Psychology. 16 (4): 355–358. doi:10.1080/17470216408416391. ISSN 0033-555X. S2CID 145633913.
8. Kimura, D. (1982-06-25). "Left-Hemisphere Control of Oral and Brachial Movements and Their Relation to Communication". Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society B: Biological Sciences. 298 (1089): 135–149. Bibcode:1982RSPTB.298..135K. doi:10.1098/rstb.1982.0077. ISSN 0962-8436. PMID 6125966.
9. Kimura, Doreen (1976), "The Neural Basis of Language Qua Gesture**The research reported here was supported by grants to the author from the National Research Council and the Medical Research Council, Ottawa.", Studies in Neurolinguistics, Elsevier, pp. 145–156, doi:10.1016/b978-0-12-746302-5.50011-6, ISBN 978-0-12-746302-5, retrieved 2019-12-05
10. Kimura, Doreen. (1993). Neuromotor mechanisms in human communication. New York: Oxford University Press. ISBN 0-19-505492-X. OCLC 26396505.
11. Kimura, Doreen. (1999). Sex and cognition. Cambridge, Mass.: MIT Press. ISBN 0-585-08769-5. OCLC 42856228.
12. Kimura, Doreen (1996-04-01). "Sex, sexual orientation and sex hormones influence human cognitive function". Current Opinion in Neurobiology. 6 (2): 259–263. doi:10.1016/S0959-4388(96)80081-X. ISSN 0959-4388. PMID 8725969. S2CID 16623727.
13. Kimura, Doreen (2004). "Human sex differences in cognition, fact, not predicament". Sexualities, Evolution & Gender. 6 (1): 45–53. doi:10.1080/14616660410001733597. ISSN 1479-2508.
14. ^ Luckow, Diane (2000-04-06). "Kimura awarded Sterling prize". Simon Fraser University News. Retrieved 2019-12-05.
15. "kimura1". Safs.ca. Retrieved 2013-03-14.
16. "CPA Award Descriptions and Recipients". Canadian Psychological Association. 8 August 2018. Archived from the original on 2010-11-22. Retrieved 2019-12-05.
17. "Doreen Kimura Wins Kistler Prize". www.safs.ca. Retrieved 2019-12-05.

External links

• Doreen Kimura's SFU website
• Biography
• In Memoriam: Dr. Doreen Kimura

• 1933 births
• 2013 deaths
• Academic staff of the University of Western Ontario
• Academic staff of Simon Fraser University
• Canadian psychologists
• Canadian women psychologists
• McGill University alumni
• Fellows of the Royal Society of Canada
• People from Winnipeg