IEEE Technology and Society Magazine - March 2020 - 13

There is a large heterogeneity
of gender related interests in fields
we might call "STEM." The more we
move from a narrow understanding
of STEM as "technology/electronics"
to a general "science education,"
the less our probability estimates
should be biased by knowledge of
somebody's gender. There are some
important conclusions. First, our
assessment of probability of a female
achieving success in STEM should be
partly dependent on the definition of
STEM itself. Is a successful female
psychologist, a success story in STEM
or not? If not, why?
Second, gender differences in
interest are not that large, and even
in fields such as mechanics or engineering there is a number of highly
interested females, who will most
likely be working there as a minority
(see Figure 1). We will elaborate on
this point in a moment.
Third, gender differences in interest do not correspond to a difference in a subjects' complexity or its
quantitative analytical requirements,
but rather with its expected contents,
especially a "people vs things" orientation [9, 18]. Large meta-analysis
of studies on performance in mathematics supports the conclusion that
there are no gender differences in
this regard [8], and data from Finland
on curiosity in school children shows
that most questions about liking
complex problems, hunger for knowledge, enjoyment of hands-on exploration, preference for solving problems
on your own, or liking strange and
puzzling objects are gender neutral
[2]. Same research shows however,
that some curiosity items, such as
"do you like taking objects apart" or
"understanding how machines work,"
do show a male-bias.
We cite data on gender-related
interests in children from Finland,
because it is a relatively genderequal county. One might suppose
that in such countries, there will be
MARCH 2020

a low gender difference in engagement with STEM subjects. Surprisingly it is the opposite. It turns out,
that if we look globally, the higher the
national gender equality, the higher
the STEM graduation gap will be [17].
It seems that gender inequality is
related to increased life-quality pressures. The higher the life-pressures,
the less important are individual
preferences and perception of one's
personal strengths in career choice.
In gender-equal countries girls are
slightly less interested in "understanding how machines work" and
this influences their subsequent
educational and career choices.
Judgment of one's personal
strengths also matters. It turns out
that while girls perform in school as
well or even better than boys in science, they perform even better in
reading comprehension and writing
[13]. Therefore, what matters most as
far as perception of one's strengths
is concerned is relative comparison
rather than absolute performance.
Data shows that even when boys
overestimate their competence in science subjects and do not show better
results than females in those subjects, they see it - relatively to other
subjects - as their personal strength
[17]. Girls, on the other hand, tend to
see skills related to human communication, such as reading comprehension and writing, as their personal
strengths, even if they perform well
in science subjects. Occupational
choice depends more on a relative
advantage than absolute ability [19],
which is an important element of the
expectancy-value theory [7, 20].
This provides an interesting twist
to the "leaking pipeline" metaphor.
The pipeline can simply be abandoned, when one sees one's strengths
in communication, teaching, mentoring, teamwork, and collaborative
problem solving, and does not perceive (rightly or not) STEM occupations as highly dependent on those
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skills. The degree to which mechanics, electronics, and engineering will
be seen as areas in which those competencies are an advantage, should
relate to the number of females
involved, via their assessments of a
match in personal strengths.
Now we will return to a slightly
more complicated issue that we
mentioned previously. Despite current gender differences in interest,
there are a large number of females
who already are interested in fields
such as engineering, computer science, natural sciences, or mathematics and consider engagement
in those occupations, but will most
likely be working there as a minority.
There are possibly several psychological factors that make this more
difficult than it could be.
The expectancy-value theory
suggests that the amount of effort
that you put into problem solving
is based on a general prediction
about the future: is it worth it? This
depends on whether you think you
will succeed and whether it will be
a worthwhile effort. Subjective task
value consists of four aspects: enjoyment one gets from doing a given
task, whether a task can be useful
to an individual, it's importance for
one's identity, and predicted cost,
such as time, loss of valued alternatives, stress, etc.
Many success expectancies are
socially constructed. Parents declare
expectations as to appropriate
achievement choices and parents'
gender stereotypes may directly
impact perceptions of their own kids'
abilities, with a preference and more
positive evaluation of gender stereotypical behaviors and skills exhibited by children. Those perceptions
may, in turn, affect children's beliefs,
choices, performance, and selfperceptions of their own abilities in
gender-typed domains all throughout
adolescence and young adulthood.
This can happen through provision

IEEE Technology and Society Magazine - March 2020

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