Gender-Heterogeneous Working Groups Produce Higher Quality Science
Publication type
journal article
Publication date
2013
Author(s)
Campbell, Lesley G.
Mehtani, Siya
Dozier, Mary E.
Rinehart, Janice
Publisher
Public Library of Science
Language
English
Discipline(s)
Abstract
Here we present the first empirical evidence to support the hypothesis that a gender-heterogeneous problem-solving team generally produced journal articles perceived to be higher quality by peers than a team comprised of highly-performing individuals of the same gender. Although women were historically underrepresented as principal investigators of working groups, their frequency as PIs at the National Center for Ecological Analysis and Synthesis is now comparable to the national frequencies in biology and they are now equally qualified, in terms of their impact on the accumulation of ecological knowledge (as measured by the h-index). While women continue to be underrepresented as working group participants, peer-reviewed publications with gender-heterogeneous authorship teams received 34% more citations than publications produced by gender-uniform authorship teams. This suggests that peers citing these publications perceive publications that also happen to have gender-heterogeneous authorship teams as higher quality than publications with gender uniform authorship teams. Promoting diversity not only promotes representation and fairness but may lead to higher quality science.
Journal
PLOS ONE
ISSN
1932-6203
Volume
8
Issue
10
Pagination
e79147