As a doctor of historical sciences, she was a specialist in the field of religion of Oceania.
From 1938 to 1942, she was a student of the Department of Ethnography of the Faculty of Philology of the Leningrad State University.
From September 1941 to February 1942, she worked in a military hospital during the Siege of Leningrad.
In 1951, she took part in the creation of a permanent exhibition at the Museum of Anthropology and Ethnography entitled "Peoples of Australia and Oceania".
In 1975, Butinova defended her doctoral dissertation on the topic "Missionaryism and Colonialism (based on materials from the peoples of Oceania).