Neuroscience
Like a sand-castle crumbling away in the rising tide, the once-popular idea that there are innate gender differences in science and maths aptitude is being undermined by a succession of new research findings.
Earlier this year, for example, Stephen Ceci and colleagues sifted through more than 400 relevant journal articles and concluded that far from there being any evidence for a sex-linked difference in science aptitude, the principal factor affecting the relative absence of women in science is their life choices, especially in relation to having children.
Now a new study, by Brian Nosek and colleagues, has looked at the number of people in different countries who hold implicit gender-science stereotypes, and compared this with gender differences in international school science test scores. The researchers' finding is that the two are mutually reinforcing - a culture's implicit belief that females are not associated with science can actually harm girls' and women's science performance, they argue.
To recap, if something about being female really does predispose a person to be weaker at science, then across the world, girls should under-perform, on average, relative to boys. However, whilst this is true in some countries, other countries actually show the opposite pattern, with girls outperforming boys.
Inspired by such observations, Nosek's team wondered whether cultural beliefs about gender and science might negatively affect girls' science performance. They used a version of the implicit association test, hosted on a website, to record implicit beliefs about gender and science among more than half a million people from 34 countries. By allocating categories (e.g. "male-related words" and "science-related words") to either the same or different response keys, the test shows how easily people associate those categories in their mind. Around the world, 70 per cent of participants exhibited an implicit stereotype - associating science with males more than females.
The researchers then looked at international science test scores recorded in 1999 and 2003 for children aged about 12 years. They found a correlation with the implicit stereotype scores, so that in those countries where more people held stereotyped beliefs about gender and science, girls tended to under-perform at science relative to boys.
Taken in the context of previous research showing that awareness of gender stereotypes can harm people's performance (e.g. girls perform worse at maths after being reminded of the stereotype that females are inferior at maths), the researchers said their correlational findings support the idea that a culture's implicit beliefs about science stereotypes can affect girls' science performance in a mutually reinforcing fashion.
"National policy initiatives addressing both factors simultaneously stand the best chance to maximise national scientific achievement," they said. "Education campaigns attempting to bolster women's participation and performance must overcome the pervasive implicit stereotypes that are already embodied in individual minds."
_________________________________
Nosek, B., Smyth, F., Sriram, N., Lindner, N., Devos, T., Ayala, A., Bar-Anan, Y., Bergh, R., Cai, H., Gonsalkorale, K., Kesebir, S., Maliszewski, N., Neto, F., Olli, E., Park, J., Schnabel, K., Shiomura, K., Tulbure, B., Wiers, R., Somogyi, M., Akrami, N., Ekehammar, B., Vianello, M., Banaji, M., & Greenwald, A. (2009). National differences in gender-science stereotypes predict national sex differences in science and math achievement. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, 106 (26), 10593-10597 DOI: 10.1073/pnas.0809921106
Link to earlier, related Digest item.
Link to another, earlier related Digest item.
Link to one further related Digest item.
Post written by Christian Jarrett (@psych_writer) for the BPS Research Digest.
- Are Women's Career Choices Influenced By Hormones In The Womb?
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Plenty of research has shown that some stereotypes are not only offensive, they can also have a detrimental effect on people's behaviour. For example, women's maths performance suffers after they are reminded of the stereotype that men are better...
- Investigating The Role Of Genes In Boys' And Girls' Science Ability
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- Hey Girls: Science Helps People!
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- Hey Girl, You're Really Bad At Math!
Right? Girls are bad at math, aren't they? Former Harvard president Larry Summers seem to think so... According to Wikipedia, Stereotype threat is the fear that one's behavior will confirm an existing stereotype of a group with which one identifies....
Neuroscience
Understanding why girls underperform at science
Like a sand-castle crumbling away in the rising tide, the once-popular idea that there are innate gender differences in science and maths aptitude is being undermined by a succession of new research findings.Earlier this year, for example, Stephen Ceci and colleagues sifted through more than 400 relevant journal articles and concluded that far from there being any evidence for a sex-linked difference in science aptitude, the principal factor affecting the relative absence of women in science is their life choices, especially in relation to having children.
Now a new study, by Brian Nosek and colleagues, has looked at the number of people in different countries who hold implicit gender-science stereotypes, and compared this with gender differences in international school science test scores. The researchers' finding is that the two are mutually reinforcing - a culture's implicit belief that females are not associated with science can actually harm girls' and women's science performance, they argue.
To recap, if something about being female really does predispose a person to be weaker at science, then across the world, girls should under-perform, on average, relative to boys. However, whilst this is true in some countries, other countries actually show the opposite pattern, with girls outperforming boys.
Inspired by such observations, Nosek's team wondered whether cultural beliefs about gender and science might negatively affect girls' science performance. They used a version of the implicit association test, hosted on a website, to record implicit beliefs about gender and science among more than half a million people from 34 countries. By allocating categories (e.g. "male-related words" and "science-related words") to either the same or different response keys, the test shows how easily people associate those categories in their mind. Around the world, 70 per cent of participants exhibited an implicit stereotype - associating science with males more than females.
The researchers then looked at international science test scores recorded in 1999 and 2003 for children aged about 12 years. They found a correlation with the implicit stereotype scores, so that in those countries where more people held stereotyped beliefs about gender and science, girls tended to under-perform at science relative to boys.
Taken in the context of previous research showing that awareness of gender stereotypes can harm people's performance (e.g. girls perform worse at maths after being reminded of the stereotype that females are inferior at maths), the researchers said their correlational findings support the idea that a culture's implicit beliefs about science stereotypes can affect girls' science performance in a mutually reinforcing fashion.
"National policy initiatives addressing both factors simultaneously stand the best chance to maximise national scientific achievement," they said. "Education campaigns attempting to bolster women's participation and performance must overcome the pervasive implicit stereotypes that are already embodied in individual minds."
_________________________________
Nosek, B., Smyth, F., Sriram, N., Lindner, N., Devos, T., Ayala, A., Bar-Anan, Y., Bergh, R., Cai, H., Gonsalkorale, K., Kesebir, S., Maliszewski, N., Neto, F., Olli, E., Park, J., Schnabel, K., Shiomura, K., Tulbure, B., Wiers, R., Somogyi, M., Akrami, N., Ekehammar, B., Vianello, M., Banaji, M., & Greenwald, A. (2009). National differences in gender-science stereotypes predict national sex differences in science and math achievement. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, 106 (26), 10593-10597 DOI: 10.1073/pnas.0809921106Link to earlier, related Digest item.
Link to another, earlier related Digest item.
Link to one further related Digest item.
Post written by Christian Jarrett (@psych_writer) for the BPS Research Digest.
- Are Women's Career Choices Influenced By Hormones In The Womb?
The paucity of women in science, technology, engineering and maths (STEM) professions continues to cause concern and controversy. There are no doubt social reasons for the situation: in many cultures, girls are brought up with the expectation that they...
- Gender Stereotypes Can Distort Our Memories
Plenty of research has shown that some stereotypes are not only offensive, they can also have a detrimental effect on people's behaviour. For example, women's maths performance suffers after they are reminded of the stereotype that men are better...
- Investigating The Role Of Genes In Boys' And Girls' Science Ability
Former Harvard president Larry Summers caused a storm in 2005 when he suggested part of the reason women are under-represented in science is because of innate, biological differences between the sexes. Now, for the first time, researchers in London have...
- Hey Girls: Science Helps People!
The story of women’s under representation in science begins at school where fewer girls than boys choose to pursue science, especially physics. According to Erica Weisgram and Rebecca Bigler, the secret to enticing more girls into science could be to...
- Hey Girl, You're Really Bad At Math!
Right? Girls are bad at math, aren't they? Former Harvard president Larry Summers seem to think so... According to Wikipedia, Stereotype threat is the fear that one's behavior will confirm an existing stereotype of a group with which one identifies....