4 ms·

I think whenever you are a "minority" in anything you run the risk of being felt left out. If your group comprises only 20% of something, then it is always goi

by socrates1998 10y ago

I think whenever you are a "minority" in anything you run the risk of being felt left out. If your group comprises only 20% of something, then it is always going to be an issue. The problem with the gender gap is that it will never go away. Prejudice against a race, ethic group, or religion is a mistake. People are generally people and we have more in common than we don't. And as time goes on, I think you will see this type of prejudice disappear. However, men and women and their differences will be around forever. There are clearly differences in how we think, act, behave and look. It's up for debate how much of this is cultural and how much is biological. So, I don't see this going away, maybe ever. Is there only 13% female engineers because men are sexist and treat them poorly? Or is it because men like math, science and engineering more than women? I was a high school math teacher. I did everything I could do encourage my strong female students to go into a STEM field. They were some of my strongest students, they worked hard, they were ambitious, but they just didn't want to do it. I have no idea why, but they didn't want to study any more math than they had to. On the opposite end, I had a few male students who weren't great (not even as good as a lot of the female students), yet they went on to study in a STEM field. Why? Because they really wanted to do it. They were drawn to it. This is all anecdotal, but there is something there when I saw the same issue play out in several of my classes. I even brought it up with my female math teachers and they saw the same problem. Girls just aren't interested in studying math and science in college at the same rate as boys.

RodericDay 10y ago
Lawyers and Doctors seem to be faring better than Programmers. "Because they wanted/didn't want to do it" isn't where the trail of inquiry ends, btw.
- nickparker 10y ago
  >"Because they wanted/didn't want to do it" isn't where the trail of inquiry ends, btw. Absolutely this. I think a lot of educators today understand that they should encourage diverse students, but they still exhibit a variation on the old "X hours of homework isn't that bad" where they ignore that their class isn't your whole academic life. Socrates may be a fantastic ally himself, but it's very likely some of his students' other teachers aren't, so it's completely reasonable for them to fall out of STEM "despite the support."
- Nadya 10y ago
  Lawyers? Male dominated field, especially higher paying/partner fields. [0] Doctors? Depends on the field. Pediatrics, gynecology, and a few other fields are female-dominated while surgeons (especially neurosurgeons), orthopedics, and a few other fields are male-dominated. [1] With roughly 20/80 F/M ratios those fields fair about as poorly as the programming field. [0] http://www.americanbar.org/content/dam/aba/uncategorized/2011/cwp_current_glance_statistics_2011.authcheckdam.pdf http://www.americanbar.org/content/dam/aba/uncategorized/201... [1] http://www.journalacs.org/article/S1072-7515(13)01215-5/abstract http://www.journalacs.org/article/S1072-7515(13)01215-5/abst... E: Better choice of adverb: well -> poorly
  - rayiner 10y ago
    > Lawyers? Male dominated field, especially higher paying/partner fields. [0] That's a relative term. The legal profession is about 50-50 in school and at the associate (1-10 years experience) level. While the partner ranks are still heavily male, about a third of new partners are women.[1] As are a third of federal appellate judges. 20% of Fortune 500 General Counsel/CLOs are women. There is a lot of (justified) hand-wringing in the legal profession about how much work is left to do. But at every stage, the representation of women is much higher than in engineering. [1] http://dfalliance.com/research/new-partner-report/ http://dfalliance.com/research/new-partner-report/
    - Nadya 10y ago
      There is a difference between "DF Alliance firms" and "firms nationwide". I'm not sure there is data on new partners for more than that sub-sect of diversity-focused firms and 121 firms is nothing. I'm in charge of running more firm websites than that...a supermajority of them male or male dominated. >...there were 47,563 law firms serving the U.S. in the year 2000 according to the American Bar Foundation. (Google result for "how many law firms are in the US") Associates is the major exception.
      - rayiner 10y ago
        That's a fair point, but the study's sample includes the largest firms in the country, which employ a disproportionate share of private practice lawyers.
benbenolson 10y ago
Finally! Someone had to say it. These sorts of situations (low percentage of women engineers) are not issues; they're just facts, and most likely caused by, generally enough, the way that women and men think/act/desire. It's not a problem, it's just a fact of life that people, oddly enough, are having a hard time accepting.
- dbcurtis 10y ago
  In my observation, the differences are in what is found intrinsically rewarding. If I may over-generalized, men have a tendency to find the math itself, the technology itself, solving the puzzle itself, to be rewarding. Women find it more rewarding to see the impact/result of their work. There is also a difference in how they view competition/challenges. I've seen this with girls in robotics. A robot competition is more likely to get the boys excited. Reframing the task as a "challenge", ie: "Can you make a robot to solve this problem?" with the challenge being more open-ended and the result being an objective demonstration instead of a head-to-head run-off is much more motivating. So I think it is worth looking at what intrinsic rewards girls find motivating, and connecting those possibilities back into the technology is important.
- harryh 10y ago
  People have said exactly what you are saying about every single underrepresented minority in almost any field of human endeavor. Almost every single time history has proven them wrong. Maybe people are right on this one. But I doubt it.
  - socrates1998 10y ago
    Yeah, that's true, but my point was that gender differences are much more real on an individual level than differences between races. Racial differences are extraordinarily superficial and hard to define. Gender differences by comparison are massive and very real. Again, there is a very real debate on how much is culture and how much is biological. But, it's not ALL culture. The fact is girls and boys are different and will continue to be different. We don't know if their interest level in math/science is biology or culture. If I had to guess, it would be both. I think we can do more to get more female engineers for sure, but forcing people to do something they don't want to do is just as wrong.
sp332 10y ago
http://i.imgur.com/reUNxYu.png http://i.imgur.com/reUNxYu.png Other engineering fields are not having this much trouble with it.
- schwap 10y ago
  Is that the right link? There are no other engineering fields on that graph.
- bargl 10y ago
  Are physical sciences a category of Engineering? If so then your graph proves your point, if not then I don't see it. What am I missing? This is what Google told me it was. http://study.com/directory/category/Physical_Sciences.html http://study.com/directory/category/Physical_Sciences.html
- bduerst 10y ago
  I think you meant this one - http://i.imgur.com/nzEulzf.png http://i.imgur.com/nzEulzf.png It shows the growth trend as typically being positive for all fields, while computer science is the negative outlier.
  - qbrass 10y ago
    Is there a graph that shows absolute numbers instead of percentages?
- deleted 10y ago
  [deleted]
carlmcqueen 10y ago
I see a big issue is that you were encouraging STEM activity at the high school level, there was likely a multitude of years where those same girls were pushed in other directions. I believe it has to start earlier and not as a forced thing but as an acceptable and encouraged and praised choice.
- Diamons 10y ago
  That goes against the intent of the parents though. If a parent wants a child to go into some other non-STEM field, I don't see how anyone has the right to go against that by brainwashing kids into doing something else.
  - carlmcqueen 10y ago
    I agree and did not intend to say that there should be any force. Around 2005-2006 when I hadn't changed majors to computer science yet and was student teaching middle school, there were still things being said to girls like 'its just more natural for boys' from older teachers. It just didn't let them build the resilience up to work through the 'hard' aspects of math.
- socrates1998 10y ago
  I thought about that after I wrote my comment. I only had them for one year in high school, so it's possible that they were subjected to years of other conditioning. But, really, I have seen the exact opposite. Girls are actively encouraged to participate in math and science from a very early age in a lot of our schools. I don't have any numbers on hand, but there seems to a drastic change in middle school where girls stop being interested in math and science. So by the time they get to high school, it seems like the fight for their interest is already over. This is just my experience from being in education for several years.
MattGrommes 10y ago
Even if it were true that women just aren't interested in math and science, that's a different issue. Even if somehow our DNA mandated the situation that only 13% of engineers were women, there's no reason for those 13% to put up with the bullshit they're subjected to. So if you start with 13% women through some natural process, then a lot of those women have to put up with the issues the article mentions, wouldn't a lot of the them leave the industry and lower the percentage further? I think that's a big part of what's happening.
marchenko 10y ago
What is interesting about this hypothesis is that it does not require men to be especially sexist or treat women poorly. Men only have to be a bit more assertive, or better able to build coalitions among their colleagues, for this effect to occur. These factors, plus the general observation that women tend to score significantly higher than men on the Big 5 trait of Agreeableness, make this thesis plausible. I look forward to seeing it tested further. This study appears to focus on female engineers who have already passed at least some filters for aptitude/interest in engineering, so one would expect any possible effects of biological sex differences/average population differences to be less important to the results.
deleted 10y ago
[deleted]

RodericDay 10y ago

Lawyers and Doctors seem to be faring better than Programmers. "Because they wanted/didn't want to do it" isn't where the trail of inquiry ends, btw.

nickparker 10y ago
>"Because they wanted/didn't want to do it" isn't where the trail of inquiry ends, btw. Absolutely this. I think a lot of educators today understand that they should encourage diverse students, but they still exhibit a variation on the old "X hours of homework isn't that bad" where they ignore that their class isn't your whole academic life. Socrates may be a fantastic ally himself, but it's very likely some of his students' other teachers aren't, so it's completely reasonable for them to fall out of STEM "despite the support."
Nadya 10y ago
Lawyers? Male dominated field, especially higher paying/partner fields. [0] Doctors? Depends on the field. Pediatrics, gynecology, and a few other fields are female-dominated while surgeons (especially neurosurgeons), orthopedics, and a few other fields are male-dominated. [1] With roughly 20/80 F/M ratios those fields fair about as poorly as the programming field. [0] http://www.americanbar.org/content/dam/aba/uncategorized/2011/cwp_current_glance_statistics_2011.authcheckdam.pdf http://www.americanbar.org/content/dam/aba/uncategorized/201... [1] http://www.journalacs.org/article/S1072-7515(13)01215-5/abstract http://www.journalacs.org/article/S1072-7515(13)01215-5/abst... E: Better choice of adverb: well -> poorly
- rayiner 10y ago
  > Lawyers? Male dominated field, especially higher paying/partner fields. [0] That's a relative term. The legal profession is about 50-50 in school and at the associate (1-10 years experience) level. While the partner ranks are still heavily male, about a third of new partners are women.[1] As are a third of federal appellate judges. 20% of Fortune 500 General Counsel/CLOs are women. There is a lot of (justified) hand-wringing in the legal profession about how much work is left to do. But at every stage, the representation of women is much higher than in engineering. [1] http://dfalliance.com/research/new-partner-report/ http://dfalliance.com/research/new-partner-report/
  - Nadya 10y ago
    There is a difference between "DF Alliance firms" and "firms nationwide". I'm not sure there is data on new partners for more than that sub-sect of diversity-focused firms and 121 firms is nothing. I'm in charge of running more firm websites than that...a supermajority of them male or male dominated. >...there were 47,563 law firms serving the U.S. in the year 2000 according to the American Bar Foundation. (Google result for "how many law firms are in the US") Associates is the major exception.
    - rayiner 10y ago
      That's a fair point, but the study's sample includes the largest firms in the country, which employ a disproportionate share of private practice lawyers.

benbenolson 10y ago

Finally! Someone had to say it. These sorts of situations (low percentage of women engineers) are not issues; they're just facts, and most likely caused by, generally enough, the way that women and men think/act/desire. It's not a problem, it's just a fact of life that people, oddly enough, are having a hard time accepting.

dbcurtis 10y ago
In my observation, the differences are in what is found intrinsically rewarding. If I may over-generalized, men have a tendency to find the math itself, the technology itself, solving the puzzle itself, to be rewarding. Women find it more rewarding to see the impact/result of their work. There is also a difference in how they view competition/challenges. I've seen this with girls in robotics. A robot competition is more likely to get the boys excited. Reframing the task as a "challenge", ie: "Can you make a robot to solve this problem?" with the challenge being more open-ended and the result being an objective demonstration instead of a head-to-head run-off is much more motivating. So I think it is worth looking at what intrinsic rewards girls find motivating, and connecting those possibilities back into the technology is important.
harryh 10y ago
People have said exactly what you are saying about every single underrepresented minority in almost any field of human endeavor. Almost every single time history has proven them wrong. Maybe people are right on this one. But I doubt it.
- socrates1998 10y ago
  Yeah, that's true, but my point was that gender differences are much more real on an individual level than differences between races. Racial differences are extraordinarily superficial and hard to define. Gender differences by comparison are massive and very real. Again, there is a very real debate on how much is culture and how much is biological. But, it's not ALL culture. The fact is girls and boys are different and will continue to be different. We don't know if their interest level in math/science is biology or culture. If I had to guess, it would be both. I think we can do more to get more female engineers for sure, but forcing people to do something they don't want to do is just as wrong.

sp332 10y ago

http://i.imgur.com/reUNxYu.png http://i.imgur.com/reUNxYu.png Other engineering fields are not having this much trouble with it.

schwap 10y ago
Is that the right link? There are no other engineering fields on that graph.
bargl 10y ago
Are physical sciences a category of Engineering? If so then your graph proves your point, if not then I don't see it. What am I missing? This is what Google told me it was. http://study.com/directory/category/Physical_Sciences.html http://study.com/directory/category/Physical_Sciences.html
bduerst 10y ago
I think you meant this one - http://i.imgur.com/nzEulzf.png http://i.imgur.com/nzEulzf.png It shows the growth trend as typically being positive for all fields, while computer science is the negative outlier.
- qbrass 10y ago
  Is there a graph that shows absolute numbers instead of percentages?
deleted 10y ago
[deleted]

carlmcqueen 10y ago

I see a big issue is that you were encouraging STEM activity at the high school level, there was likely a multitude of years where those same girls were pushed in other directions. I believe it has to start earlier and not as a forced thing but as an acceptable and encouraged and praised choice.

Diamons 10y ago
That goes against the intent of the parents though. If a parent wants a child to go into some other non-STEM field, I don't see how anyone has the right to go against that by brainwashing kids into doing something else.
- carlmcqueen 10y ago
  I agree and did not intend to say that there should be any force. Around 2005-2006 when I hadn't changed majors to computer science yet and was student teaching middle school, there were still things being said to girls like 'its just more natural for boys' from older teachers. It just didn't let them build the resilience up to work through the 'hard' aspects of math.
socrates1998 10y ago
I thought about that after I wrote my comment. I only had them for one year in high school, so it's possible that they were subjected to years of other conditioning. But, really, I have seen the exact opposite. Girls are actively encouraged to participate in math and science from a very early age in a lot of our schools. I don't have any numbers on hand, but there seems to a drastic change in middle school where girls stop being interested in math and science. So by the time they get to high school, it seems like the fight for their interest is already over. This is just my experience from being in education for several years.

MattGrommes 10y ago

Even if it were true that women just aren't interested in math and science, that's a different issue. Even if somehow our DNA mandated the situation that only 13% of engineers were women, there's no reason for those 13% to put up with the bullshit they're subjected to. So if you start with 13% women through some natural process, then a lot of those women have to put up with the issues the article mentions, wouldn't a lot of the them leave the industry and lower the percentage further? I think that's a big part of what's happening.

marchenko 10y ago

What is interesting about this hypothesis is that it does not require men to be especially sexist or treat women poorly. Men only have to be a bit more assertive, or better able to build coalitions among their colleagues, for this effect to occur. These factors, plus the general observation that women tend to score significantly higher than men on the Big 5 trait of Agreeableness, make this thesis plausible. I look forward to seeing it tested further. This study appears to focus on female engineers who have already passed at least some filters for aptitude/interest in engineering, so one would expect any possible effects of biological sex differences/average population differences to be less important to the results.

deleted 10y ago

[deleted]