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  • Item type:Publication,
    Reducing STEM gender bias with VIDS (video interventions for diversity in STEM). Open PDF 
    (2018)
    Moss-Racusin, Corinne A.
    ;
    Pietri, Evava S.
    ;
    Hennes, Erin P.
    ;
    Dovidio, John F.
    ;
    Brescoll, Victoria L.
    Gender biases contribute to the underrepresentation of women in STEM. In response, the scientific community has called for methods to reduce bias, but few validated interventions exist. Thus, an interdisciplinary group of researchers and filmmakers partnered to create VIDS (Video Interventions for Diversity in STEM), which are short videos that expose participants to empirical findings from published gender bias research in 1 of 3 conditions. One condition illustrated findings using narratives (compelling stories), and the second condition presented the same results using expert interviews (straightforward facts). A hybrid condition included both narrative and expert interview videos. Results of two experiments revealed that relative to controls, VIDS successfully reduced gender bias and increased awareness of gender bias, positive attitudes toward women in STEM, anger, empathy, and intentions to engage in behaviors that promote gender parity in STEM. The narratives were particularly impactful for emotions, while the expert interviews most strongly impacted awareness and attitudes. The hybrid condition reflected the strengths of both the narratives and expert interviews (though effects were sometimes slightly weaker than the other conditions). VIDS produced substantial immediate effects among both men and women in the general population and STEM faculty, and effects largely persisted at follow-up. (PsycINFO Database Record
  • Item type:Publication,
    A “scientific diversity” intervention to reduce gender bias in a sample of life scientists Open PDF 
    (American Society for Cell Biology, 2016)
    Moss-Racusin, C.A.
    ;
    van der Toorn, J.
    ;
    Dovidio, J.F.
    ;
    Brescoll, V.L.
    ;
    Graham, M.J.
    Mounting experimental evidence suggests that subtle gender biases favoring men contribute to the underrepresentation of women in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM), including many subfields of the life sciences. However, there are relatively few evaluations of diversity interventions designed to reduce gender biases within the STEM community. Because gender biases distort the meritocratic evaluation and advancement of students, interventions targeting instructors’ biases are particularly needed. We evaluated one such intervention, a workshop called “Scientific Diversity” that was consistent with an established framework guiding the development of diversity interventions designed to reduce biases and was administered to a sample of life science instructors (N=126) at several sessions of the National Academies Summer Institute for Undergraduate Education held nationwide. Evidence emerged indicating the efficacy of the “Scientific Diversity” work-shop, such that participants were more aware of gender bias, expressed less gender bias, and were more willing to engage in actions to reduce gender bias 2 weeks after participating in the intervention compared with 2 weeks before the intervention. Implications for diversity interventions aimed at reducing gender bias and broadening the participation of women in the life sciences are discussed. © 2016 C. A. Moss-Racusin et al. CBE—Life Sciences Education.
  • Item type:Publication,
    Academic Productivity Differences by Gender and Child Age in Science, Technology, Engineering, Mathematics, and Medicine Faculty During the COVID-19 Pandemic Open PDF 
    (2021)
    Krukowski, Rebecca A.
    ;
    Jagsi, Reshma
    ;
    Cardel, Michelle I.
    Background: Due to the COVID-19 pandemic, most faculty in science, technology, engineering, mathematics, and medicine (STEMM) began working from home, including many who were simultaneously caring for children. The objective was to assess associations of gender and parental status with self-reported academic productivity before (i.e., mid-January to mid-March 2020) and during the pandemic (i.e., mid-March to mid-May 2020). Materials and Methods: STEMM faculty in the United States (N = 284, 67.6% women, 57.0% with children younger than the age of 18 years living at home) completed a survey about the number of hours worked and the frequency of academic productivity activities. Results: There was no significant difference in the hours worked per week by gender (men, M [standard deviation, SD] = 45.8 [16.7], women = 43.1 [16.3]). Faculty with 0-5-year-old children reported significantly fewer work hours (33.7 [13.9]) compared to all other groups (No children = 49.2 [14.9], 6-11 years old = 48.3 [13.9], and 12-17 years old = 49.5 [13.9], p < 0.0001). Women's self-reported first/corresponding author's and coauthor's article submissions decreased significantly between the two time periods; men's productivity metrics did not change. Faculty with 0-5-year-old children completed significantly fewer peer review assignments, attended fewer funding panel meetings, and submitted fewer first authors' articles during the pandemic compared to the previous period. Those with children aged 6 years or older at home or without children at home reported significant increases or stable productivity. Conclusions: Overall, significant disparities were observed in academic productivity by gender and child age during the pandemic and if confirmed by further research, should be considered by academic institutions and funding agencies when making decisions regarding funding and hiring as well as promotion and tenure.
  • Item type:Publication,
    A Cultural Psychological Model of Cross-National Variation in Gender Gaps in STEM Participation Open PDF 
    (SAGE publications Inc, 2020)
    Soylu Yalcinkaya, N.
    ;
    Adams, G.
    Gender gaps in Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics (STEM) participation are larger in societies where women have greater freedom of choice. We provide a cultural psychological model to explain this pattern. We consider how individualistic/post-materialistic cultural patterns in WEIRD (Western, Educated, Industrial, Rich, and Democratic) settings foster a self-expressive construction of academic choice, whereby affirming femininity/masculinity and ensuring identity fit become primary goals. Striving to fulfill these goals can lead men toward, and women away from, STEM pursuit, resulting in a large gender gap. In Majority World settings, on the contrary, collectivistic/materialistic cultural patterns foster a security-oriented construction, whereby achieving financial security and fulfilling relational expectations become primary goals of academic choice. These goals can lead both women and men toward secure and lucrative fields like STEM, resulting in a smaller gender gap. Finally, gender gaps in STEM participation feed back into the STEM=male stereotype. We discuss the implications of our model for research and theory, and intervention and policy. © 2020 by the Society for Personality and Social Psychology, Inc.
  • Item type:Publication,
    Making it to the PhD: Gender and student performance in sub-Saharan Africa Open PDF 
    (2020)
    Fisher, Monica
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    Nyabaro, Violet
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    Mendum, Ruth
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    Osiru, Moses
    Women's underrepresentation in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) impedes progress in solving Africa's complex development problems. As in other regions, women's participation in STEM drops progressively moving up the education and career ladder, with women currently constituting 30% of Africa's STEM researchers. This study elucidates gender-based differences in PhD performance using new survey data from 227 alumni of STEM PhD programs in 17 African countries. We find that, compared to their male counterparts, sampled women had about one less paper accepted for publication during their doctoral studies and took about half a year longer to finish their PhD training. Negative binomial regression models provide insights on the observed differences in women's and men's PhD performance. Results indicate that the correlates of publication productivity and time to PhD completion are very similar for women and men, but some gender-based differences are observed. For publication output, we find that good supervision had a stronger impact for men than women; and getting married during the PhD reduced women's publication productivity but increased that of men. Becoming a parent during the PhD training was a key reason that women took longer to complete the PhD, according to our results. Findings suggest that having a female supervisor, attending an institution with gender policies in place, and pursuing the PhD in a department where sexual harassment by faculty was perceived as uncommon were enabling factors for women's timely completion of their doctoral studies. Two priority interventions emerge from this study: (1) family-friendly policies and facilities that are supportive of women's roles as wives and mothers and (2) fostering broader linkages and networks for women in STEM, including ensuring mentoring and supervisory support that is tailored to their specific needs and circumstances.
  • Item type:Publication,
    Gender productivity gap among star performers in STEM and other scientific fields. Open PDF 
    (2018)
    Aguinis, Herman
    ;
    Ji, Young Hun
    ;
    Joo, Harry
    We examined the gender productivity gap in science, technology, engineering, mathematics, and other scientific fields (i.e., applied psychology, mathematical psychology), specifically among star performers. Study 1 included 3,853 researchers who published 3,161 articles in mathematics. Study 2 included 45,007 researchers who published 7,746 articles in genetics. Study 3 included 4,081 researchers who published 2,807 articles in applied psychology and 6,337 researchers who published 3,796 articles in mathematical psychology. Results showed that (a) the power law with exponential cutoff is the best-fitting distribution of research productivity across fields and gender groups and (b) there is a considerable gender productivity gap among stars in favor of men across fields. Specifically, the underrepresentation of women is more extreme as we consider more elite ranges of performance (i.e., top 10%, 5%, and 1% of performers). Conceptually, results suggest that individuals vary in research productivity predominantly because of the generative mechanism of incremental differentiation, which is the mechanism that produces power laws with exponential cutoffs. Also, results suggest that incremental differentiation occurs to a greater degree among men and certain forms of discrimination may disproportionately constrain women's output increments. Practically, results suggest that women may have to accumulate more scientific knowledge, resources, and social capital to achieve the same level of increase in total outputs as their male counterparts. Finally, we offer recommendations on interventions aimed at reducing constraints for incremental differentiation among women that could be useful for narrowing the gender productivity gap specifically among star performers. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2018 APA, all rights reserved).