John Money was a doctor.
He studied how people act. He had many big ideas. Some of his ideas were hard. People still talk about him today. Do you like to learn about doctors?
John Money was a doctor.
He studied how people act. He had many big ideas about how we grow up.
He used new words to talk about how people feel. He helped start a special clinic for adults. He also worked with medicine to help people.
Some of his ideas were not right. He tried to change how a boy named David lived. He thought he could teach a child to be a girl.
This did not work for David. It caused much sadness for the boy and his family. Many people later said the doctor was wrong.
People still study his work today. They want to learn how to help everyone better.
John Money was a psychologist from New Zealand.
He became a professor at Johns Hopkins University. Money studied how people act and feel. He created new terms like gender role. This term describes how people act based on being male or female. He also used the term sexual orientation. This describes who a person is attracted to.
Money had many big ideas. He believed that a person's gender could be changed by how they were raised. He thought children could learn to be a different gender in their first two years of life. Because of this, he supported surgeries for intersex infants. Intersex is a term for people born with body parts that do not fit typical male or female patterns.
One of his cases was very famous and sad. He worked with a boy named David Reimer. After a medical accident, Money advised the parents to raise David as a girl. This did not work. David felt like a boy and later lived as a man. Many people now criticize Money for this. They say his ideas caused great harm to David and others. [Caption: John Money with a colleague.]
John William Money was a famous psychologist and sexologist.
He was born in Morrinsville, New Zealand, in 1921. Money later moved to the United States to study more. He earned his PhD from Harvard University in 1952. For many years, he worked as a professor at Johns Hopkins University. He wrote about 2,000 articles and books during his career. He also received about 65 different awards and honors. Money is remembered for his many ideas about human behavior.
Money created new ways to talk about how people feel. He coined the term gender role to describe how people act. He also introduced the term sexual orientation. He used this term instead of "sexual preference." He believed that attraction was not always a simple choice. Money also studied paraphilia, which is a term for specific sexual interests. He even worked on using drugs to treat sex offenders. He started using these treatments at Johns Hopkins in 1966.
One of Money's biggest ideas was about how children grow up. He believed that gender was malleable during the first two years of life. Malleable means something can be changed or shaped easily. Because of this, he supported surgeries for intersex infants. Intersex describes babies born with body parts that do not fit typical male or female patterns. He thought raising children outside of the male-female binary could be harmful. He wanted to use surgery to help these babies fit into standard roles.
This way of thinking led to a very difficult case with David Reimer. In 1966, a medical accident left baby David without a penis. Money told the parents that raising David as a girl was best. David was given the name Brenda and given hormone treatments. Money wrote papers saying this plan was a great success. However, David did not feel like a girl at all. He struggled a lot and eventually chose to live as a man. This case became a major part of why people criticize Money today.
Many people now look at Money's work with great care. Transgender activists and doctors study his methods to learn from his mistakes. They look at how his ideas affected intersex people and transgender people. Money also helped start the Gender Identity Clinic in 1965. This clinic was the first in the United States to help with medical transitions. While his work changed how we talk about gender, it also caused much sadness. His life and his ideas continue to be a subject of study in schools.
John William Money was a prominent New Zealand American psychologist and sexologist.
He spent much of his career as a professor at Johns Hopkins University. Money focused his research on human sexual behavior and the concept of gender. He was a very prolific writer throughout his life. He produced approximately 2,000 articles, books, and reviews. His work earned him about 65 different honors, awards, and degrees. While his influence was vast, his methods and theories remain highly controversial among modern scholars.
Money was a pioneer in creating new scientific terminology. He coined the term gender role to describe how people act within society. He also introduced the term sexual orientation. He used this term to replace the older phrase "sexual preference." Money argued that attraction was not always a matter of free choice. He also popularized the term paraphilia, which refers to specific sexual interests. This term eventually appeared in the DSM-III, a major medical manual. Additionally, he pioneered using drug treatments, such as Depo-Provera, to reduce the libido of sex offenders. This practice began at Johns Hopkins in 1966 and later spread across Europe and the United States.
One of Money's most significant theories involved the development of gender. He believed that gender was malleable, or easily shaped, during the first two years of life. This led him to advocate for the surgical normalization of intersex infants. Intersex describes children born with biological traits that do not fit typical male or female patterns. Money believed that raising children outside the male-female binary could be harmful. He supported using surgery to assign a specific gender to these infants. He hoped this would help them fit into standard social roles.
This belief led to the widely criticized case of David Reimer. In 1966, a botched circumcision left eight-month-old Reimer without a penis. Money advised the parents that sex reassignment surgery was in the infant's best interest. At 22 months old, Reimer underwent an orchiectomy to remove his testicles. He was reassigned as a girl and given the name Brenda. Money also recommended hormone treatments for the child. Money published several papers claiming this reassignment was a successful case. He used this case to support the idea that gender is socially constructed.
However, the reality of Reimer's life was very different from Money's reports. Reimer did not identify as a girl and struggled with his identity. He was often bullied by peers and did not feel comfortable in female roles. At age 14, Reimer learned the truth about his medical history. He chose to live as a male and underwent surgeries to revert his body. The truth of the case became public in 1997 through academic and media reports. This revelation showed that Money's reports of success were not accurate. The case remains a central point of study for ethicists and intersex rights activists.
Money also had specific views regarding transgender people and gender dysphoria. He believed that transgender people experienced an idée fixe, which is a fixed idea or obsession. In 1965, he co-established the Gender Identity Clinic at Johns Hopkins. This was the first clinic in the United States to perform sexual reassignment surgery. Money required adult patients to undergo two years of screening before medical transition. He also believed that de-stereotyping sex roles could prevent people from wanting to transition. He argued that if women were not forced into strict roles, they might not seek reassignment.
Today, the legacy of John Money is viewed through a lens of intense scrutiny. His work is studied by psychologists, ethicists, and transgender scholars. Many critics point to the harm caused by his theories on intersex infants. Intersex activists note that his methods influenced the surgical treatment of thousands of children. While he helped establish the language used in sexology, his clinical applications are heavily debated. His life and his controversial experiments continue to shape how we understand the relationship between biology and identity.
Where will your curiosity go next?
🖼️ Images & Media (1)
More to explore
✨ What else?
Related topics you might enjoy
🪜 Step back
Simpler topics to build understanding
What is Nepedia?
A free, ad-free encyclopedia for children. Every article is written at five reading levels, so the same page works for a five-year-old and a fifteen-year-old — use the level switcher above to see this one change. No account needed to read.