The More Things Change, the More They Stay the Same? Prior Achievement Fails to Explain Gender Inequality in Entry Into STEM College Majors Over Time

Riegle‐Crumb, Catherine; King, Barbara; Grodsky, Eric; Muller, Chandra

doi:10.3102/0002831211435229

Cited by 243 publications

(220 citation statements)

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“…Our results suggest that essentialism indeed segregates women and men mostly through internalization. Consistent with previous studies (Xie and Shauman, 2003;Hyde et al, 2008;Riegle-Crumb et al, 2012;Mann and DiPrete, 2013;Morgan et al 2013), gender differences in academic performance almost entirely fail to explain differences in major choices.…”

Section: Multivariate Resultssupporting

confidence: 85%

“…In this manner, by the time of transition into college essentialist stereotypes have manifested into divergent relative advantages in ability that drive boys towards math-intensive fields, and girls towards less formalized 'people-oriented' disciplines (Jonsson, 1999;Wang et al 2013). Studies that have scrutinized this argument, however, show that differences in math ability can play at best a very partial role in the explanation of sex segregation in college (Jonsson, 1999;Xie and Shauman, 2003;Hyde et al, 2008;Lörz et al, 2011;Ma, 2011;Riegle-Crumb et al, 2012;Mann and DiPrete, 2013;Morgan et al 2013;Zafar, 2013;Legewie and DiPrete, 2014b; but see Turner and Bowen, 1999).…”

Section: Essentialist Preferences and Abilitiesmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Preferences, constraints, and the process of sex segregation in college majors: A choice analysis

Ochsenfeld

2016

Social Science Research

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The persistence of horizontal sex segregation in higher education continues to puzzle social scientists. To help resolve this puzzle, we analyze a sample of college entrants in Germany with a discrete choice design that allows for social learning from the experiences of others. We make at least two contributions to the state of research. First, we test whether essentialist gender stereotypes affect major selection mostly through internalization or rather as external constraints that high school graduates adapt their behavior to. Empirically, we find that internalized vocational interests better explain gendered major choices than conformance with friends' and parents' expectations does. Second, we scrutinize whether segregation results from women's anticipation of gendered family roles or from their anticipation of sex-based discrimination, but we find no evidence for either of these hypotheses. As in most previous studies, differences in mathematics achievement fail to explain gendered patterns of selection into college majors.

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Section: Multivariate Resultssupporting

confidence: 85%

Section: Essentialist Preferences and Abilitiesmentioning

confidence: 99%

Preferences, constraints, and the process of sex segregation in college majors: A choice analysis

Ochsenfeld

2016

Social Science Research

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“…The "measured ability" variant of the selection argument can only help us understand gender segregation in doctoral education if observed indicators of academic ability and the unobserved indicators with which they are correlated differ systematically by gender. In this regard, studies of high school students typically find modest gender differences in test scores at the mean but nontrivial gender differences in the distributions: on tests of math and scientific reasoning, young men outnumber women at the top of the distribution but also at the bottom (i.e., greater male variance); on tests of verbal reasoning and writing ability, young women outnumber young men at the top of the distribution, although to a lesser extent (Penner and Paret 2008;Riegle-Crumb et al 2012;Makel et al 2016). Among GRE test takers in research fields, men's average and 75th percentile scores are approximately 20 points higher than women's average and 75th percentile scores on the verbal test and a much more substantial 60 points higher than women's average and 75th percentile scores on the quantitative test (ETS 2008).…”

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confidence: 99%

Degrees of Difference: Gender Segregation of U.S. Doctorates by Field and Program Prestige

Weeden¹,

Thébaud²,

Gelbgiser³

2017

SocScience

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Women earn nearly half of doctoral degrees in research fields, yet doctoral education in the United States remains deeply segregated by gender. We argue that in addition to the oft-noted segregation of men and women by field of study, men and women may also be segregated across programs that differ in their prestige. Using data on all doctorates awarded in the United States from 2003 to 2014, field-specific program rankings, and field-level measures of math and verbal skills, we show that (1) "net" field segregation is very high and strongly associated with field-level math skills; (2) "net" prestige segregation is weaker than field segregation but still a nontrivial form of segregation in doctoral education; (3) women are underrepresented among graduates of the highest-and to a lesser extent, the lowest-prestige programs; and (4) the strength and pattern of prestige segregation varies substantially across fields, but little of this variation is associated with field skills.Keywords: gender segregation; prestige segregation; field segregation; gender inequality; higher education; women in STEM W OMEN earn 60 percent of baccalaureate degrees and 46 percent of doctoral degrees in research fields (National Science Foundation [NSF] 2015a), yet higher education in the United States remains deeply segregated by gender. To date, the literature on educational segregation has focused on the distribution of men and women across fields of study, how this distribution varies over time and space, and its consequences for gender inequality in career outcomes Bradley 2002, 2009;England and Li 2006;England et al. 2007;Barone 2011;Bobbitt-Zeher 2007; DiPrete 2013, 2016; NSF 2015b;Ransom 1990). We extend this line of research by offering a multidimensional analysis of segregation in doctoral education across fields of study and across PhD-granting programs that differ in their prestige.Our interest in prestige segregation stems from four sources. At the most basic level, prestige segregation, like field segregation, is an indicator of the extent to which men and women's educational outcomes are equal. However, the two types of segregation are conceptually and empirically distinct. Even in a hypothetical world in which every field graduates the same proportions of men and women, men may be overrepresented among degree recipients from the highest ranked programs and women among degree recipients from the lowest ranked programs. In this world, gender integration exists with respect to field, but not with respect to program prestige.Second, field and prestige segregation represent two qualitatively different forms of gender inequality in higher education. Prestige segregation is inherently vertical, meaning that segregation occurs across categories that are ordered from 123 Weeden, Thébaud, and Gelbgiser Degrees of Difference high to low. Field segregation, by contrast, is horizontal: the boundaries between fields define qualitatively different positions, but fields "represent distinctions more of kind than of grade" (Cha...

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“…In an effort to understand these dynamics, researchers within the fields of sociology, psychology, and education have concentrated on the role that several different factors, including academic performance, attitudes, and self-perceptions of competence play in both shaping students' decisions to pursue STEM fields and in creating and sustaining gender inequality [5,[8][9][10][11]. In general, while recognizing the presence of gender socialization and stereotypes, much of the research in this area can be characterized as arguing that female underrepresentation is driven by the fact that females trail behind their male peers on the academic (e.g., high test scores) or psychological (e.g., self-confidence) factors that best predict entry into STEM fields [6,12].…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Perceptions of the Social Relevance of Science: Exploring the Implications for Gendered Patterns in Expectations of Majoring in STEM Fields

Kyte

Riegle‐Crumb

2017

Social Sciences

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Despite efforts to increase participation in science, technology, engineering and math fields (STEM), the role of students' perceptions of the social relevance of science in guiding their expectations to major in STEM remains largely unexplored. Though science education scholars predict that perceptions of social relevance likely matter equally for boys and girls, gender scholars suggest that these perceptions should matter more for girls than boys. Using longitudinal data from a large, urban, low-income, and predominantly minority-serving district, this study examines the potentially gendered role of perceptions of social relevance in ninth graders' expectations to major in STEM. Further, it examines these dynamics with respect to expectations to major in any STEM field as well as expectations to major in specific STEM fields. Findings largely support the perspective of gender scholars; perceptions of the social relevance of science positively and significantly predict female, but not male, students' intentions to major in STEM (vs. non-STEM fields). Subsequent analyses that look at intentions to major in specific STEM fields reveal a similar pattern, such that perceptions of relevance positively predict female students' intentions to major in the biological sciences, the physical sciences, and engineering, while male students' intentions are not similarly impacted. By contrast, positive perceptions of the relevance of science predict a modest increase in interest in computer science for both boys and girls.

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The More Things Change, the More They Stay the Same? Prior Achievement Fails to Explain Gender Inequality in Entry Into STEM College Majors Over Time

Cited by 243 publications

References 51 publications

Preferences, constraints, and the process of sex segregation in college majors: A choice analysis

Preferences, constraints, and the process of sex segregation in college majors: A choice analysis

Degrees of Difference: Gender Segregation of U.S. Doctorates by Field and Program Prestige

Perceptions of the Social Relevance of Science: Exploring the Implications for Gendered Patterns in Expectations of Majoring in STEM Fields

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