Bias Called Persistent Hurdle for Women in Sciences - NYTimes.com

Bias Called Persistent Hurdle for Women in Sciences - NYTimes.com

The report found ample evidence of continuing cultural bias. One study of postdoctoral applicants, for example, found that women had to publish 3 more papers in prestigious journals, or 20 more in less-known publications, to be judged as productive as male applicants.

Making judgments about an individual’s abilities based on his or her sex is a classic form of discrimination, said Nancy Hopkins, an M.I.T. biology professor who created an academic stir in the 1990s by documenting pervasive, but largely unintentional, discrimination against women at the university.

Even if male math geniuses outnumbered female geniuses 3 to 1, Dr. Hopkins said, it would be reasonable to expect one female math professor for every three male professors at places like Harvard and M.I.T. “But in fact, Harvard just tenured its first female, after 375 years,” said Dr. Hopkins, who, famously, walked out of the room after Mr. Summers made his controversial remarks.

The university women’s report cited research showing that girls’ performance suffers from any suggestion that they do poorly at math. In one experiment, college students with strong math backgrounds and similar abilities were divided into two groups and tested on math. One group was told that men perform better on the test, the other that there was no difference in performance between the sexes. Their results were starkly different: in the group told that men do better, men indeed did much better, with an average score of 25 compared with the women’s 5. In the group told there was no difference, women scored 17 and men 19.

Any suggestion of advantage based on sex affects results, the research shows, even where there is no cultural stereotype.

In an experiment ostensibly testing “contrast sensitivity ability” — a made-up skill — men and women in a group told there was no difference between the sexes in such sensitivity rated their own ability equally. But in a group told that men were better at it, men rated their skills far higher than women did.

Teaching girls about how stereotypes affect performance, the report found, can diminish such effects.

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