Wasn't the early-mid-80's when programming/computers held much of a social stigma (ie nerd, geek, etc were insults). The market followed that trend and instead

Wasn't the early-mid-80's when programming/computers held much of a social stigma (ie nerd, geek, etc were insults). The market followed that trend and instead of offering a computer as a consumer gender un-biased product, it was marketed at men.. But even then, if you look at ads from around that time for computers.. It's a computer. It's not something that you can assign a gender to in advertising very effectively. It's the social aspect surrounding computers that does that. Also I disagree with what nathan_long said regarding "Women felt they must not be "naturally good" at computers, based on how men already knew more". To me that is absurd to assume that woman would think that "men know more than us, so why try"? His third point would be nullified by the associated social stigma during their teen years.