>The problem with the "???" step is that it's unrigorous handwaving. The problem with the "???" is it's not in its proper place in the chain of logic. The syll

>The problem with the "???" step is that it's unrigorous handwaving. The problem with the "???" is it's not in its proper place in the chain of logic. The syllogism instead goes: 1) Do we observe certain traits cause individuals to tend toward science, while others cause them to trend toward the humanities? Yes. Whether or not you will enter the humanities or the sciences is correlated with whether you display a higher empathizing quotient ("preferring to work with people") vs. systematizing quotient ("preferring to work with things/numbers"), regardless of your gender. 2) Do we observe these traits vary by gender? Also yes. Men generally have higher systematizing quotients, while women have higher empathizing quotients. [source for both points: http://www.somersetcanyons.com/ourpages/auto/2016/3/11/48638152/billington_et_al_2007.pdf http://www.somersetcanyons.com/ourpages/auto/2016/3/11/48638...] 3) Therefore, some amount of difference in representation logically comes from differences in these gendered traits - whatever might have caused them to become gendered in the first place. >Okay, so that's why the majority of accountants are women? That's why STEM fields that don't involve people at all (math, biology) actually have quite a lot of women, while programming doesn't have much women despite being on the social/people-oriented end of the spectrum? Women represent over 60% of all undergrad university students, so we should expect fields that require an undergrad university degree to be a majority women barring other factors. Yet math, physics, chemistry, earth science, statistics, engineering - every one of them has fewer women than it should proportionately. Even biology, which for a brief time had a higher proportion of women than 60%, recently dipped back below that point. [graph: https://www.aps.org/programs/education/statistics/upload/Degrees-Earned-Women-0802.pdf https://www.aps.org/programs/education/statistics/upload/Deg...] Conversely, here is a list of majors that have consistently had above 80% female proportions: Fashion Design, Interior Design, Education, Social Work, Nursing, Occupational Therapy, Art History The specifics of why one given STEM major is more under-represented than another is an interesting question, but it shouldn't obscure the overarching trend - whether by a little or a lot, all the STEM majors have fewer women than they should. The data does indeed support the idea women prefer people-oriented professions over thing oriented professions on average.