Women Belong in the Laboratory: Dissecting the Gender Gap in STEM Fields

On Oct. 9, 2024, just a few days after the Nobel Prizes in Chemistry, Physics, and Physiology or Medicine were announced, the highly esteemed scientific journal Nature made a post on the social media platform “X” drawing attention to the gender discrepancies in the recipients of these awards  — both this year and in the past (Nature via X, 2024). Unsurprisingly, the comment section of this post was filled with people lauding the Royal Swedish Academy for refusing to play into “DEI” expectations and clamoring that the lack of female representation was due to a lack of skill, interest, or merit on the part of female scientists. However, some users also pointed out the fact that even in light of growing initiatives to broaden diverse participation in Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics (STEM), women still remain underrepresented in careers such as engineering, computing, and physical science despite their high representation in health-related fields (Pew Research Center, 2021). This raises an important question: What is the root cause for the continued gender disparity in STEM careers? Can it truly be attributed to differences in skills and preferences between men and women, or are there additional societal factors at play that must be considered?

Despite the fact that women have surpassed in men in their pursuit of both bachelor’s and masters degrees over the past decade, women only make up approximately one-third of total STEM occupations, as of 2021 (Pew Research Center, 2021 and NCSES, 2023). This discrepancy can be largely explained by the fact that men are more likely than women to major in a STEM field and graduate from college with a STEM degree (Speer, 2021 and Card et al, 2021). There are two primary explanations for this observed gap: Either women are simply lest interested in pursing STEM degrees (preference), or there are other internal or external factors that prevent them from pursuing a STEM degree, such as a lack of skill or preparedness, or lingering societal expectations.

Economists David Card and Abigail Payne found that entry into STEM programs is linked to high school preparation, with women ending up with slightly lower rates of STEM readiness (measured as an index of STEM course completion) than men after high school (Card et al, 2021). Interestingly, their findings attribute the gap in STEM participation primarily to the fact that a large proportion of non-STEM-ready female students are in fact prepared to pursue other advanced areas in university programs, leading to an gender imbalance in STEM versus non-STEM students (Card et al, 2021). In other words, for women who are not STEM-prepared, many of them still end up attending college, while larger proportions of non-STEM-prepared men will not attend college at all, which skews the gender ratio. Moreover, a study conducted in Italy demonstrated that half of the gender gap in STEM graduation rates resulted from gendered differences in STEM curricula selection in high school, with boys being more likely to enroll in intensive math and science courses (Granato, 2023). These results imply that pre-college preparation for STEM courses and careers plays at least some role both in determining a student’s likeliness to major in a STEM field in college and explaining the subsequent observed gender gap. 

In attributing a component of the gender discrepancy of STEM major selection to differences in preparedness, we are pushing back the question of “interest” or “preference” to an earlier educational time period. Perhaps women were simply less interested in science at an early age and thus less likely to elect to take advanced STEM courses before college. This is certainly not out of the question, especially given the aforementioned observed differences in STEM preparation via course selection (Granato, 2023). Yet in contrast to this finding, a study in the United Kingdom found that girls are as willing as boys to take advanced science in secondary school when those courses are offered (De Philippis, 2017). This research also confirmed that taking additional STEM courses as an adolescent increases the likelihood of enrolling in STEM degrees in college, in agreement with the previous studies (De Philippis, 2017). The concept of “preference” is complex: it requires consideration of a person’s desires in the context of external constraints. Other studies have demonstrated the importance of additional factors such as cultural and familial beliefs on the performance of girls in math classes, indicating the effect of societal pressures on the preferences of individual women (Granato, 2023 and Nollenberger, 2016). Ultimately, these studies highlight the importance of early-stage choices regarding STEM curricula selection and indicate that further research is needed to better understand the factors that influence these decisions.

Even among those students interested in pursuing STEM fields, a definitive gap in preference does emerge in college, where women have been shown to be more likely to elect into more female-dominated fields such as medicine and psychology rather than engineering and math (Wiswall et al, 2018). What is the driving factor behind this shift in interest, even when comparing identical levels of preparedness? A myriad of works have investigated the factors that influence college students’ decisions in major selection and found that men are more likely to consider factors like higher earnings while women are more likely to consider factors such as work flexibility and job stability  (Zafar, 2011). In other words, women are willing to “sacrifice” the potential benefits they might receive from a more competitive, higher-paying job  — such as those in STEM careers — in order to maintain non-monetary benefits like flexibility of hours (Zafar, 2011). Thus, we are faced with a new question: Are women less interested in science per se, or are they less interested in science careers that do not provide flexibility or long-term stability? 

This question is complex and has been considered in-depth by economists such as as Claudia Goldin and Marianne Bertrand: A true discussion of women’s preferences to avoid hyper-competitive careers — or “greedy jobs” as Goldin would say — requires a deep dive into individuals’ preferences regarding family and motherhood, which is beyond the scope of this article. Yet, as more women continue to break into STEM careers, they serve as role models for the next generation of female scientists, showing that it may not be necessary to sacrifice family for a scientific career. Perhaps one step of the solution to the gender disparity in STEM is giving female students a better idea of what careers in STEM fields could look like and showing them a future in which they can envision themselves and their priorities (Kofoed et al, 2019). Indeed, the importance of role models in breaking stereotypes and driving forward gender equity is the argument made in the Nature article that was torn apart on social media (Gibney, 2018). Other authors have highlighted the importance of female role models in the sciences: In her review of a biography of Nobel Prize-winning chemist and physicist Marie Curie, Michelle Francl argued that Curie’s impact in inspiring and leading the next generation of scientists could be considered just as important as her research itself (Francl, 2024). When there are more women in the laboratory, it becomes easier for other women to envision themselves there as well.

Edited by Disha Kumar

References

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