In a landmark study involving over a million students, it appears that the reason boys dominate girls in STEM fields is not that they are better than girls at it (the reverse seems to be true) but, perversely, that gender differences are lower in non-STEM fields.
About the STEM grades, which are often abused as an explanation:
A classroom with more variable grades indicates a bigger gap between high and low performing students, and greater male variability could result in boys outnumbering girls at the top and bottom of the class.
“Greater male variability is an old idea that people have used to claim that there will always be more male geniuses – and fools – in society,” O’Dea says.
The team found that on average, girls’ grades were higher than boys’, and girls’ grades were less variable than boys’.
But girls' and boys' variability were much closer in non-STEM fields.
(Score: 2, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Monday December 10 2018, @03:12AM (3 children)
Let people choose what they want to study.
You are going to have sex differences in what they prefer.
Adjust your theory if theory repeatedly fails to match reality...
(Score: 2, Funny) by Anonymous Coward on Monday December 10 2018, @11:26AM (1 child)
At college in the 1980s, that was as far as I got.
(Score: 2, Funny) by c0lo on Monday December 10 2018, @12:54PM
#metoo
(large grin. A sorta nostalgic one)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aoFiw2jMy-0 https://soylentnews.org/~MichaelDavidCrawford
(Score: 4, Insightful) by The Archon V2.0 on Monday December 10 2018, @06:57PM
> Adjust your theory if theory repeatedly fails to match reality...
As demonstrated by the support the Sokal 2.0 papers received, now it's about attempting to adjust reality if it fails to match your theory.