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> But it is as human-oriented as other science fields that are typically considered as more people-oriented and these fields attract a bigger proportion of wome

> But it is as human-oriented as other science fields that are typically considered as more people-oriented and these fields attract a bigger proportion of women. Bigger, sure, but not by much. STEM (presumably what you mean by "science fields") are bigger in aggregate ~25% women. Some of these are smaller (~10% of electrical engineers are men). Some are bigger, biology IIRC is about 50/50. Computer science is about 20% women. This is actually pretty close to the average of "science fields" as a whole. I agree that developers aren't special. But neither is the gender disparity among software developers. People so often forget that gender imbalances >20% is actually the norm not the exception. If you dig through the Bureau of Labor statistics, most jobs have significant gender disparities. Dog groomer have as stark a gender disparity as developers. So do driving instructors, and insurance adjusters. There's actually nothing unusual about the level of gender disparity in STEM.

cauch 2y ago
I agree with that. My comment here is about the idea that the disparity can be explained because "computer science is more thing-oriented and women are more interested in people-oriented activities". If it was true, we would not see different numbers in different STEM fields. Personally, I think that the cultural image of the field, rather than it being intrinsically thing- or people-oriented, has a bigger impact. In practice, biology and computer science are both activities where you work on your algorithm. And in practice, I would argue that computer scientists need to have more people skills than biologists, as computer scientists need to interact more between each others and with non-dev people (managers, internal teams that need to have internal tools built, external users giving feedbacks, ...). But biology has an image of "nature and animals" that is associated with women and computer science has an image of "nerd coding alone in his mancave" that is associated with men. The thing is that these images are cultural, not intrinsic to the activity in itself.
- jimbokun 2y ago
  Biology is because it’s a prerequisite for medical fields increasingly dominated by women.
  - cauch 2y ago
    We are talking about the STEM biology field. Biology students don't go to medical fields. There are more people going to medical fields from computer science, due to the need of medical software, or from physics due to radiology.
- Manuel_D 2y ago
  > My comment here is about the idea that the disparity can be explained because "computer science is more thing-oriented and women are more interested in people-oriented activities". > If it was true, we would not see different numbers in different STEM fields. No, this does not track. It could also be that some fields in STEM are more people oriented than others. Psychology is over 2/3rd female. If anything, that inconsistency in representation supports the link between things vs. people and women's representation.
  - cauch 2y ago
    > No, this does not track. It could also be that some fields in STEM are more people oriented than others. And I'm saying that I have taken that into account and I cannot see, in practice, how mathematicians, statisticians or biologists, in their day-to-day job life, are interacting more with people. Some of them are only interacting with their like-minded same-field team member, while software developers need to interact with the company business team, the finance team, the user experience team, the research team, ... plenty of teams that are not talking the same language and have different and sometimes opposite interests.
    - Manuel_D 2y ago
      First of all, most women studying mathematics in undergrad are actually studying to become math teachers. This is a much more people-oriented job. This is why there's a big drop between the share of women undergraduate math majors, and women math PhDs. The latter is 25%, roughly on par with computer science. Lots of women exit academima and start teaching after a master's or a bachelor's degree, thus depressing the representation in later degrees. My sister majored in biology, and after graduation she worked on managing clinical research trials. She'd visit people testing new medications and interview them about their experience with improved symptoms and any side effects. I'm not sure how representative this is of biology as a whole, but personally I can easily see why biology would be more people oriented than software development.
      - cauch 2y ago

cauch 2y ago

I agree with that. My comment here is about the idea that the disparity can be explained because "computer science is more thing-oriented and women are more interested in people-oriented activities". If it was true, we would not see different numbers in different STEM fields. Personally, I think that the cultural image of the field, rather than it being intrinsically thing- or people-oriented, has a bigger impact. In practice, biology and computer science are both activities where you work on your algorithm. And in practice, I would argue that computer scientists need to have more people skills than biologists, as computer scientists need to interact more between each others and with non-dev people (managers, internal teams that need to have internal tools built, external users giving feedbacks, ...). But biology has an image of "nature and animals" that is associated with women and computer science has an image of "nerd coding alone in his mancave" that is associated with men. The thing is that these images are cultural, not intrinsic to the activity in itself.

jimbokun 2y ago
Biology is because it’s a prerequisite for medical fields increasingly dominated by women.
- cauch 2y ago
  We are talking about the STEM biology field. Biology students don't go to medical fields. There are more people going to medical fields from computer science, due to the need of medical software, or from physics due to radiology.
Manuel_D 2y ago
> My comment here is about the idea that the disparity can be explained because "computer science is more thing-oriented and women are more interested in people-oriented activities". > If it was true, we would not see different numbers in different STEM fields. No, this does not track. It could also be that some fields in STEM are more people oriented than others. Psychology is over 2/3rd female. If anything, that inconsistency in representation supports the link between things vs. people and women's representation.
- cauch 2y ago
  > No, this does not track. It could also be that some fields in STEM are more people oriented than others. And I'm saying that I have taken that into account and I cannot see, in practice, how mathematicians, statisticians or biologists, in their day-to-day job life, are interacting more with people. Some of them are only interacting with their like-minded same-field team member, while software developers need to interact with the company business team, the finance team, the user experience team, the research team, ... plenty of teams that are not talking the same language and have different and sometimes opposite interests.
  - Manuel_D 2y ago
    First of all, most women studying mathematics in undergrad are actually studying to become math teachers. This is a much more people-oriented job. This is why there's a big drop between the share of women undergraduate math majors, and women math PhDs. The latter is 25%, roughly on par with computer science. Lots of women exit academima and start teaching after a master's or a bachelor's degree, thus depressing the representation in later degrees. My sister majored in biology, and after graduation she worked on managing clinical research trials. She'd visit people testing new medications and interview them about their experience with improved symptoms and any side effects. I'm not sure how representative this is of biology as a whole, but personally I can easily see why biology would be more people oriented than software development.
    - cauch 2y ago