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Your argument is not logical. These were professionals in the same sphere: tech. And one could make the argument that the sample of men was also biased--toward

Your argument is not logical. These were professionals in the same sphere: tech. And one could make the argument that the sample of men was also biased--towards men who liked tech. No one claimed this was an iron clad peer reviewed scientific study--and I'd love to see some done on this in addition to those that already exist. Deborah Tannen is one of the more well known researchers in this area to uncover distinct gender patterns in speech that affect performance, for example. There are now hundreds and hundreds of data points, and anecdotes. At what point is there enough evidence to convince some people that there IS a problem, and believe those of us who have experienced this exact phenomenon? TBH this response is exactly what I thought I'd see on hacker news: attack the methodology, thus missing the forest for the trees.

vezzy-fnord 12y ago
At what point is there enough evidence to convince some people that there IS a problem, and believe those of us who have experienced this exact phenomenon? The existence of a problem is virtually undisputed, it's the nature of it that is debated. In addition, the existence of a problem does not justify misrepresenting it, even if the intention is to raise awareness.
- melindajb 12y ago
  Exactly what part here is misrepresented?
- conistonwater 12y ago
  > The existence of a problem is virtually undisputed This thread includes people's opinions that this is not a real effect, and is instead the result of poor methodology, sampling bias, and whatnot. It is really not fair to say that the problem's existence is undisputed. There are plenty of people who dispute it, and that's also a problem.
  - NotAtWork 12y ago
    Most of the comments (all of them that I've seen) say that the effect is real, but the source isn't necessarily a bias in the reviews, because of how the study was conducted (eg, there could be a hiring bias). Bringing up a different cause to explain an effect is not dismissing the effect as existing in the data, merely calling in to question the source of it.
  - hackinthebochs 12y ago
    The question is the problem vs a problem. This research uncovers a problem, it does not explicitly state what the problem is. What problem this research found is what people are questioning.
cperciva 12y ago
At what point is there enough evidence to convince some people that there IS a problem I'm not disputing the fact that there is a problem. I'm sure there are lots of problems, in fact. What I'm saying is that it's facile to observe that women in tech are more often described as being aggressive and to assume that this is a problem with how people are described; it would be equally consistent with the evidence to conclude that the problem is one of non-aggressive women never getting hired into this field.
- melindajb 12y ago
  Your logic is inconsistent. This author is applying real data to an assertion. That assertion is backed up not only by my own experiences, but to the dozens if not hundreds or thousands of women sharing this all over social media with something akin to "see, this happens to all of us." The author makes no such blanket statement as you suggest--rather she shows the results of her own study. What's facile is not her conclusions but rather the non data backed assertions you claim. You are the one asserting she extends her findings beyond her own sphere. to quote the author: "I only have the data I have. I don’t know whether women were simply more willing to submit reviews that include critical language, or whether men removed language from their review documents before submitting. But the directional indication is striking and calls for further investigation by managers and HR departments. At most mid-size or large tech companies, HR leaders supervise review scores to uncover and correct patterns of systematic bias. This is a call to action to bring the same rigor to the review language itself."
  - cperciva 12y ago
    Maybe I'm misinterpreting what the author wrote, but it seems clear to me that, having identified a statistical anomaly, she is assuming one explanation -- that there is a problem with the review process -- and ignoring other potential explanations (e.g., a bias in hiring which results in non-aggressive women never being hired and thus never being reviewed).
    - melindajb 12y ago
andrewflnr 12y ago
cperciva did not attack the methodology at all, which would be clear if you'd thoroughly read the first sentence. He didn't really say anything that disagreed with it at all, but rather put forward a hypothesis explaining the data therein. Said hypothesis implicitly acknowledges that it is harder for women to get into the workplace. But because his phrasing happened to include the phrase "sampling bias", you got angry and apparently stopped reading, missing the forest for the trees.
- melindajb 12y ago
  I find it telling that you jump right into assigning me an emotional response for countering his logic with my own. Do you often accuse women of being too emotional? Or too aggressive? I can tell you that I have a male named account on hacker news and it never, ever gets called too angry, or aggressive, or emotional. Try it sometime, as a woman. It's most instructive.
  - Dwolb 12y ago
    >I can tell you that I have a male named account on hacker news and it never, ever gets called too angry, or aggressive, or emotional. I'm not being sarcastic or facetious - this is a very enlightning statement and I almost cannot believe my own bias. To me your comments have sounded aggressive and emotional and it may just be my subconcious had seen your account name and biased my conscious assessment. So please forgive this bias, I didn't realize it ever existed! (for what it's worth I have historically thought myself to be logical, rational, and understanding of my own bias in most circumstances!)
    - melindajb 12y ago
      I respect your ability to admit that and share it with people here. Truly isn't that the way we can all get better at understanding each other, to walk in each other's shoes? hats off to you.
    - erichocean 12y ago
      I also thought the OP "sounded aggressive and emotional", and it was until she brought up the issue of a commenter's gender that I notice the OP's own gender (assuming "Melinda" is female, of course). I'm male BTW.
ipince 12y ago
>> And one could make the argument that the sample of men was also biased--towards men who liked tech. Sure. I think the implicit assumption is that "men in tech" is a more representative sample of "men" than "women in tech" is for "women".
true_religion 12y ago
Interestingly, although the op uses the term 'sampling bias' which is usually used to discredit a study, the actual content of their comment doesn't seem intended to do so. What they're talking about is not a sampling bias. If more aggressive women are hired than not, that's not a sampling bias... those women are representative of the population as it exists. It's only a sampling bias, if say the study somehow selected individuals from the population in a non-random fashion, so as to overemphasize one particular trait.
- cperciva 12y ago
  Whether it's a sampling bias or not depends on the conclusion you're trying to draw. I agree that there is no reason to think that the women considered were unrepresentative of women in tech; my point was that women in tech may not be a representative sample of the gender as a whole.
  - true_religion 12y ago
    That's true, but this is a study specifically about women in high positions in the tech field. I'm not sure its meant to be indicative of women in general, just as studies on male CEOs (e.g. the ones that claim CEOs are more sociopathic) wouldn't be meant to say anything about men in general.

vezzy-fnord 12y ago

At what point is there enough evidence to convince some people that there IS a problem, and believe those of us who have experienced this exact phenomenon? The existence of a problem is virtually undisputed, it's the nature of it that is debated. In addition, the existence of a problem does not justify misrepresenting it, even if the intention is to raise awareness.

melindajb 12y ago
Exactly what part here is misrepresented?
conistonwater 12y ago
> The existence of a problem is virtually undisputed This thread includes people's opinions that this is not a real effect, and is instead the result of poor methodology, sampling bias, and whatnot. It is really not fair to say that the problem's existence is undisputed. There are plenty of people who dispute it, and that's also a problem.
- NotAtWork 12y ago
  Most of the comments (all of them that I've seen) say that the effect is real, but the source isn't necessarily a bias in the reviews, because of how the study was conducted (eg, there could be a hiring bias). Bringing up a different cause to explain an effect is not dismissing the effect as existing in the data, merely calling in to question the source of it.
- hackinthebochs 12y ago
  The question is the problem vs a problem. This research uncovers a problem, it does not explicitly state what the problem is. What problem this research found is what people are questioning.

cperciva 12y ago

At what point is there enough evidence to convince some people that there IS a problem I'm not disputing the fact that there is a problem. I'm sure there are lots of problems, in fact. What I'm saying is that it's facile to observe that women in tech are more often described as being aggressive and to assume that this is a problem with how people are described; it would be equally consistent with the evidence to conclude that the problem is one of non-aggressive women never getting hired into this field.

melindajb 12y ago
Your logic is inconsistent. This author is applying real data to an assertion. That assertion is backed up not only by my own experiences, but to the dozens if not hundreds or thousands of women sharing this all over social media with something akin to "see, this happens to all of us." The author makes no such blanket statement as you suggest--rather she shows the results of her own study. What's facile is not her conclusions but rather the non data backed assertions you claim. You are the one asserting she extends her findings beyond her own sphere. to quote the author: "I only have the data I have. I don’t know whether women were simply more willing to submit reviews that include critical language, or whether men removed language from their review documents before submitting. But the directional indication is striking and calls for further investigation by managers and HR departments. At most mid-size or large tech companies, HR leaders supervise review scores to uncover and correct patterns of systematic bias. This is a call to action to bring the same rigor to the review language itself."
- cperciva 12y ago
  Maybe I'm misinterpreting what the author wrote, but it seems clear to me that, having identified a statistical anomaly, she is assuming one explanation -- that there is a problem with the review process -- and ignoring other potential explanations (e.g., a bias in hiring which results in non-aggressive women never being hired and thus never being reviewed).
  - melindajb 12y ago

andrewflnr 12y ago

cperciva did not attack the methodology at all, which would be clear if you'd thoroughly read the first sentence. He didn't really say anything that disagreed with it at all, but rather put forward a hypothesis explaining the data therein. Said hypothesis implicitly acknowledges that it is harder for women to get into the workplace. But because his phrasing happened to include the phrase "sampling bias", you got angry and apparently stopped reading, missing the forest for the trees.

melindajb 12y ago
I find it telling that you jump right into assigning me an emotional response for countering his logic with my own. Do you often accuse women of being too emotional? Or too aggressive? I can tell you that I have a male named account on hacker news and it never, ever gets called too angry, or aggressive, or emotional. Try it sometime, as a woman. It's most instructive.
- Dwolb 12y ago
  >I can tell you that I have a male named account on hacker news and it never, ever gets called too angry, or aggressive, or emotional. I'm not being sarcastic or facetious - this is a very enlightning statement and I almost cannot believe my own bias. To me your comments have sounded aggressive and emotional and it may just be my subconcious had seen your account name and biased my conscious assessment. So please forgive this bias, I didn't realize it ever existed! (for what it's worth I have historically thought myself to be logical, rational, and understanding of my own bias in most circumstances!)
  - melindajb 12y ago
    I respect your ability to admit that and share it with people here. Truly isn't that the way we can all get better at understanding each other, to walk in each other's shoes? hats off to you.
  - erichocean 12y ago
    I also thought the OP "sounded aggressive and emotional", and it was until she brought up the issue of a commenter's gender that I notice the OP's own gender (assuming "Melinda" is female, of course). I'm male BTW.

ipince 12y ago

>> And one could make the argument that the sample of men was also biased--towards men who liked tech. Sure. I think the implicit assumption is that "men in tech" is a more representative sample of "men" than "women in tech" is for "women".

true_religion 12y ago

Interestingly, although the op uses the term 'sampling bias' which is usually used to discredit a study, the actual content of their comment doesn't seem intended to do so. What they're talking about is not a sampling bias. If more aggressive women are hired than not, that's not a sampling bias... those women are representative of the population as it exists. It's only a sampling bias, if say the study somehow selected individuals from the population in a non-random fashion, so as to overemphasize one particular trait.

cperciva 12y ago
Whether it's a sampling bias or not depends on the conclusion you're trying to draw. I agree that there is no reason to think that the women considered were unrepresentative of women in tech; my point was that women in tech may not be a representative sample of the gender as a whole.
- true_religion 12y ago
  That's true, but this is a study specifically about women in high positions in the tech field. I'm not sure its meant to be indicative of women in general, just as studies on male CEOs (e.g. the ones that claim CEOs are more sociopathic) wouldn't be meant to say anything about men in general.