Who is Better at Science - Men or Women?

There's no shortage of controversy surrounding the gender employment and pay gap, which is prevalent across a host of industries. For example, in the USA women hold just 24% of science and maths jobs, while in the UK females account for just 5% of the EngTech industry.

While research has conclusively debunked the idea of size differentiation between male and female brains, a recent study suggests that women are conditioned to believe that they're not suited to excel in science, tech, engineering and math, also known as the 'STEM' fields.

The study was conducted by researchers at Arizona State University and drew on insight sourced from an upper-level physiology seminar. The results revealed that of the 202 students surveyed, women had a significantly lower opinion of their scientific ability.

Lack of self-confidence blamed for STEM gap

The researchers were able to create a model based on the results, which predicted that the average male student with a GPA of 3.3 considers himself smarter than 66% of classmates. Meanwhile, female students with the same GPA consider themselves smarter than just 54% of their fellow academics. They also explored the concept in a classroom context, finding that students who consider themselves smarter are over three times more likely to participate in dialogue.

In the long term, this lack of female confidence could explain why women are underrepresented in the STEM fields. This suggests that it could be a lack of self-assurance, not skill, that's contributing to the gender gap within science, tech, engineering and math careers.

Sexism and salaries in the STEM sphere

Of course, there are a myriad of other factors at play. Sexism is a highly controversial and concerning subject, with research revealing that men are 40% more likely to be promoted into management roles than women. Furthermore, just 5% of Fortune 500 companies are fronted by female CEOs. Salaries reflect the gender gap, with New Science confirming that women working in the STEM industries are paid 30% less than their male counterparts. It's not just women who are suffering from this "boy's club" mentality, with research suggesting that the gender gap is holding back US businesses.

Women play a pivotal role in advancing scientific research in a host of fields, including near-infrared spectroscopy (NIRS). Summarising the workflow of analytical methods, 'Avoiding Pitfalls During NIR Spectroscopy Analytical Method Transfer' introduces the concept of relaying technique between different laboratories.