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posted by Fnord666 on Thursday September 07 2017, @09:35PM   Printer-friendly
from the doesn't-stem-student's-interest dept.

Research into the obvious, but someone has finally done it: Three women researchers have studied the behavior of undergraduates in STEM fields, and concluded that there basically is no problem. From the abstract:

"The results show that high school academic preparation, faculty gender composition, and major returns have little effect on major switching behaviors, and that women and men are equally likely to change their major in response to poor grades in major-related courses. Moreover, women in male-dominated majors do not exhibit different patterns of switching behaviors relative to their male colleagues."

Furthermore current recruitment efforts to attract more women tend to be counterproductive. In an interview, the primary author says:

"Society keeps telling us that STEM fields are masculine fields, that we need to increase the participation of women in STEM fields, but that kind of sends a signal that it's not a field for women, and it kind of works against keeping women in these fields."

One of our female students told me that the women are interviewed endlessly, for one project or another: "tell us about your experience", "are you doing ok", "have you experienced sexism", and on, and on. That alone is enough to make them question their career choice.


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  • (Score: 3, Insightful) by Arik on Thursday September 07 2017, @10:52PM (9 children)

    by Arik (4543) on Thursday September 07 2017, @10:52PM (#564797) Journal
    There's nothing wrong with that.

    In fact I'd argue that it's exactly this wierd modern hyper-sexualization of children (which is one part of a more general hyper-sexualization in general) that causes these things, which should be quite straightforward and not particularly stressful, into nightmares for the children to go through.

    This little blurb is rather apropos: https://www.theatlantic.com/national/archive/2011/04/fdr-grew-up-in-a-dress-it-wasnt-always-blue-for-boys-and-pink-for-girls/237299/

    There's absolutely no reason to start attributing sex-roles (what is often today called by the misnomer of 'gender') to children before they actually start to develop sexually. Getting the parents obsessed with signalling their offsprings potential sexuality from infancy was a marketing coup that resulted in great profits for manufacturers of childrens clothing and other items, but it has done our culture no favors at all.

    --
    If laughter is the best medicine, who are the best doctors?
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  • (Score: 3, Interesting) by Justin Case on Thursday September 07 2017, @11:03PM (8 children)

    by Justin Case (4239) on Thursday September 07 2017, @11:03PM (#564809) Journal

    Yes I've always found it odd that for almost every newborn the first data point announced is "boy" or "girl". Who cares? Nobody is going to be fucking that rugrat for well over a decade (we can hope) so why is it so important to know what stuff they got on day one?

    This preoccupation with categorizing everyone immediately must be really tough for those born with https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ambiguous_genitalia [wikipedia.org] and other anomalies -- and their families.

    P.S. Is it possible to discriminate against a female based on gender if you don't know she's female?

    • (Score: 3, Insightful) by Arik on Thursday September 07 2017, @11:35PM

      by Arik (4543) on Thursday September 07 2017, @11:35PM (#564827) Journal
      I think it's rough and not just on those individuals but on all of them.

      Sexuality is supposed to be something that grows from within you, and fills the world. In the beginning you're "innocent" in the strict sense of the word, you're without sexuality. Then your bodies change, you start to acquire sexual features, at first more or less muscle mass, more or less long-bone development, awkward little differences arise. And as time goes on, those turn into sexuality. This is a process, a journey, that shouldn't just be skipped over. As a culture we're laying full-blown sexual identities on toddlers, and then we wonder why they grow up kinky and confused?

      --
      If laughter is the best medicine, who are the best doctors?
    • (Score: 2, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Friday September 08 2017, @12:00AM (5 children)

      by Anonymous Coward on Friday September 08 2017, @12:00AM (#564840)

      It's pretty much the only thing that can be learned about the baby at birth that isn't a cause for concern. "The baby likes milk and poops a lot? How fascinating!" isn't a thing. And if the baby has the wrong number of fingers or isn't the expected color, nobody is celebrating. So it gives everyone a way to share in the joy of the birth.

      • (Score: 2) by Arik on Friday September 08 2017, @12:21AM (4 children)

        by Arik (4543) on Friday September 08 2017, @12:21AM (#564851) Journal
        "The baby likes milk and poops a lot? How fascinating!"

        Baby is healthy and normal. How is that not good news?
        --
        If laughter is the best medicine, who are the best doctors?
        • (Score: 1, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Friday September 08 2017, @12:50AM (3 children)

          by Anonymous Coward on Friday September 08 2017, @12:50AM (#564859)

          It's good, but it's not usually news. Doesn't tell you anything about them. If half of babies had two arms and the other half had four, we'd have number-of-arms reveal parties for them.

          • (Score: 2) by Arik on Friday September 08 2017, @01:54AM (2 children)

            by Arik (4543) on Friday September 08 2017, @01:54AM (#564877) Journal
            "It's good, but it's not usually news."

            Well my point was that it *is* news, and in fact it's good news, although you probably wouldn't want to phrase it in exactly the way quoted.

            I suspect simply because of our personal pronoun system it would in fact be awkward (though certainly not impossible) to make the announcement without also announcing the sex of the infant in the process - which is fine too. I'm not saying cover it up. But treating it as the central news seems really creepy.

            "If half of babies had two arms and the other half had four, we'd have number-of-arms reveal parties for them. "

            Would we? Why? In my experience people with newborns have enough to do what with feeding and cleaning and dealing with teething and so forth, there will be plenty of time for parties later.

            --
            If laughter is the best medicine, who are the best doctors?
            • (Score: 2) by kazzie on Friday September 08 2017, @08:29AM (1 child)

              by kazzie (5309) Subscriber Badge on Friday September 08 2017, @08:29AM (#564980)

              "If half of babies had two arms and the other half had four, we'd have number-of-arms reveal parties for them. "

              Would we? Why? In my experience people with newborns have enough to do what with feeding and cleaning and dealing with teething and so forth, there will be plenty of time for parties later.

              I suspect GP was thinking of post-ultrasound baby showers, rather than the situation after birth.

              • (Score: 2) by Arik on Friday September 08 2017, @08:44AM

                by Arik (4543) on Friday September 08 2017, @08:44AM (#564987) Journal
                Great, so it's not just infancy now, it starts even before birth. I knew that, thanks for reminding me.

                That's even creepier.

                --
                If laughter is the best medicine, who are the best doctors?
    • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday September 08 2017, @11:21AM

      by Anonymous Coward on Friday September 08 2017, @11:21AM (#565019)

      > Yes I've always found it odd that for almost every newborn the first data point announced is "boy" or "girl". Who cares? Nobody is going to be fucking that rugrat for well over a decade (we can hope) so why is it so important to know what stuff they got on day one?

      Because 5 year old boys can't get pregnant, but 5 year old girls can (shouldn't, but can).