ArticleEcology letters2026
There is No Consensus on Biological Sex.
Article in Ecology letters, 2026. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 10 papers.
What it found
Each row is one number read from the abstract, on the scale the paper reported it, with its interval. Left of the dashed line favours the treatment, right favours the comparator. Under each row is the sentence it came from. New to these charts? A ten-minute tutorial.
The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.
The trial behind it
Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.
Neither the registry nor the abstract names a trial number. If this is a trial report, that itself is worth knowing.
Who cites it
10 citing papers in PubMed.
- Biological Sex Is Binary and Rooted in Anisogamy.Ecology letters · 2026Review
- There is No Consensus on Biological Sex.Ecology letters · 2026Article
- Where We Go From Here: Harnessing Queer Perspectives to Advance Practice in Ecology and Evolutionary Biology.Ecology and evolution · 2026Article
- Hermaphrodite, Gonochorist, and More: Navigating the Complexities of Sex-Related Language in Biology.Integrative and comparative biology · 2026Review
- Synthesizing Sex/es Across Scales and Lineages: Centering Plants, Algae, Fungi, Protists, and Modular Metazoans.Integrative and comparative biology · 2026Article
- Evolution, Development, and the Incoherence of Sex: A Framework for Multiple Sex Concepts.Integrative and comparative biology · 2026Article
- Sexes Are Polymorphisms: Describing and Understanding Sexual Diversity as Phenotypic Variation.Integrative and comparative biology · 2026Review
- Teaching Accurate Sex-related Biology: Approaches for More Socially Just Instruction.Integrative and comparative biology · 2026Article
- Centering Biodiversity: Integrating the Complexity of Sex Into a Developmental Biology Course.Integrative and comparative biology · 2026Article
- Navigating the Semantic Labyrinth of "Sex" in the Study of Reproductive Trait Evolution.Integrative and comparative biology · 2026Article
Corrections and comments
PubMed lists nothing against this paper. Absence here is not a guarantee, only a check that was made.
Authors and funding
4 authors.
Funding
No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.
Abstract
There is ongoing scientific and societal discourse on the definition of biological sex. At this critical moment when misinformation about sex is being applied to policy globally, scientific clarification is valuable. Here, we evaluate the primary approaches to defining sex and synthesise the active discourse to conclude that there is no current consensus on a definition of sex that is free of assumptions and limitations. While there is no current consensus, we do not advocate for a single definition and contend that a lack of unanimity is not inherently problematic. No matter what definitional choices are used, we provide actionable recommendations to improve accuracy when describing sex. Most importantly, regardless of scientific debates, no biological definition of sex should be used to dictate human rights.
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Identifiers
What OpenQuestion holds
Registered trials
Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.