Interesting Features at PWN for 12.16.13

Happy holidays to you and yours from the PWN team! 

News from the PWN Pipeline:

'Too few girls and minorities are becoming programmers and engineers.'

This impassioned editorial from the New York Times describes several factors that are actively interfering with the ability of women and minorities to succeed in engineering, computer science, and math-heavy fields. Among these obstacles are often limited options for acquiring a good education in math and science, 'entrenched stereotypes' of who typically succeeds in these fields, and lower expectations and investment from educators and employers. A particularly galling point is made by highlighting research showing that females who are told that math skills are innate are less likely to study for and score more poorly on math tests than female students who are told that math skills can be learned through hard work.

Women missing out on senior boardroom roles.

While more women are successfully climbing the corporate ladder, most are still not crossing the distance into senior executive positions. One view of this problem is that women are over-assimilating to a mid-level work culture instead of continuing to 'agitate' the system and move upwards towards senior boardroom positions.

'A lifetime of exposure to what women should be, how they should behave and who they should represent drives and reinforces unconscious and unseen biases.'

Although recent reports indicate that 9 out of 10 people want to see equal numbers of men and women performing leadership positions, the average workplace does not reflect gender equality in upper-level positions. Traditional pervasive gender stereotypes and expectations about women's ability to lead and to perform their jobs at a highly skilled level, in addition to unconscious gender biases, have the ability to undermine social and political frameworks calling for change.

Interesting Features at PWN for 12.9.13

News from the PWN Pipeline:

This week, we are featuring several commentaries on the recent controversial UPenn study reporting sex differences in brain structural connectivity.

"Biological determinism at its silly, trivial worst."

An interesting and skeptical commentary by Britain's Science Writer of the Year, Robin McKie, on the speculation of how these structural differences affect various skill sets in men and women. The criticisms of other national and international researchers regarding the study design and interpretation are cited.

"I am a girl whose mushy head is 'hardwired' for girly things."

The Guardian's Suzanne Moore turns a critical eye on the neuroscience tools and interpretations used to examine sex differences, and also describes how 'neurosexism' may be reinforcing gender stereotypes in our culture.

"We don't need this deterministic fairy-tale."

A brief editorial by Professors Rae Langton and John Dupre suggesting that the UPenn study findings simply reflect an already-known scientific truism-- that neural differences exist between men and women. They suggest, however, that these differences does not mean that the brain is designed or hard-wired for promoting inevitable strengths or weaknesses.

Leave your comments below!

Interesting Features at PWN for 12.2.13

News from the PWN Pipeline:

STEM fields are losing women

A review of a recent article in Social Forces comparing women in Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics (STEM) fields with other professional women. Findings showed that women in STEM fields were more likely to leave their field of specialty for another occupation than other professional women. One possible reason given for this exodus is that women are often the minority on research teams, and traditional gender role beliefs held by other men on the team can influence the kind of scientific role played by these women.