tag:theconversation.com,2011:/africa/topics/gender-bias-3490/articlesGender bias – The Conversation2024-02-06T14:23:24Ztag:theconversation.com,2011:article/2180962024-02-06T14:23:24Z2024-02-06T14:23:24ZWomen fishers in Makoko, Lagos’s ‘floating slum’, are struggling as breadwinners: education and funding would make a difference<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/569612/original/file-20240116-29-azy84l.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=53%2C0%2C6000%2C3907&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Makoko women fish traders waiting to buy fish from fishermen. </span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/news-photo/picture-taken-on-march-2-2019-shows-women-waiting-to-buy-news-photo/1193942119">Yasuyoshi Chiba / AFP / Getty Images</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>Makoko, a coastal fishing community in Lagos, Nigeria, was <a href="http://participedia.prod.s3.amazonaws.com/25e8cc0d-6da8-4364-a9aa-f1e994725030_SlumSettlementsRegenerationinLagosMega-city-anOverviewofaWaterfront.pdf">established</a> by fishermen in the 19th century. It is considered the world’s largest “floating slum”. There are conflicting figures about its population but it is home to about <a href="https://edition.cnn.com/2020/02/26/africa/nigeria-makoko-mapping-intl/index.html">a million</a> inhabitants living in poor and informal housing built on the Lagos Lagoon. </p>
<p>The main economic activities are fishing, sand dredging and salt making. Men in Makoko are mostly fishers. Some women also fish; others trade fresh or smoked fish or process other people’s catches. </p>
<p>The incentives distributed in Makoko by the government (such as fishing nets and powered engines) go <a href="https://sipanews.org/makoko-fisherwomen-seek-gender-equality/">mostly to the men</a>. </p>
<p>I was interested in how the women managed to keep their businesses going without much education, information or financial support. Understanding this could be useful in designing ways to help them, and others like them, to improve their lives.</p>
<p>My <a href="https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/08920753.2022.2022969">study</a> of the livelihood strategies, lived experiences and prospects of women in the Makoko fishing community found that their contributions to artisanal fisheries were rarely appreciated. Though most of them were breadwinners, they got little or no institutional or cultural support. Those who were married often had to hide their income from their partners. Access to capital to fund their businesses was limited. They depended on the local thrift collection system, called Ajo in the Yoruba language, to bank and save money. </p>
<p>I suggest that social capital and social networks are therefore the entry points for any interventions to help the women, such as literacy programmes and access to credit. Men also need to be part of the solutions.</p>
<h2>Surviving challenges that keep Makoko women down</h2>
<p>One hundred women in the Otodo Gbame and Oko Agbon fishing communities within Makoko and the nearby Asejere fish market participated in the study. </p>
<p>The education levels of the women interviewed ranged from no formal education to 12 academic years (secondary education). None had tertiary education. Among the women with no formal education, 51% were fisherwomen, 30% were fish processors, and 19% were fish traders.</p>
<p>Our study also revealed that most of the women were poor. Their working capital was as little as 50,000 naira (US$139). </p>
<p>The majority lived separately from their husbands. This was due to their partners being at sea or in a different fishing settlement, or because they were in polygamous relationships. </p>
<p>The women reported often being bullied by their husbands to hand over their money, or having to hide it from them. Mama Ola, a trader in Asejere fish market, shared her mother’s experience: </p>
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<p>My father often came to Asejere fish market to fiercely demand money for feeding from my mother and if he was not given, he would become hysterical, shouting at her in the local market, and on rare occasions he flogged her when she got home.</p>
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<p>Most of the women were financially constrained by inadequate working capital to pursue their fish business and insufficient state support. They lacked market information about cost, demand and supply of fish products. Contributing factors were low literacy levels and a lack of confidence in managing their finances.</p>
<p>Some relied on credit support from “fish mammies”: wealthier women who own equipment, or are wholesalers, creditors or intermediaries.</p>
<p>Women fisherfolk who could not access bank loans to expand their businesses also relied on local thrift collectors, called Alajo. The Alajo manage informal savings and loan groups. About 85% of the respondents belonged to and obtained their working capital from these groups. </p>
<p>Ajo group initiatives are mostly found in south-western Nigeria. They provide flexible opportunities to deposit money and to obtain credit at any time of the year. In one of the focus group discussions, a woman fish trader recounted how she safeguarded her earnings through ajo: </p>
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<p>My husband becomes more caring and very romantic every Saturday evening because he thinks I will bring a huge amount of money home after my weekly fish sales. I disappoint him by keeping my money with the local saver.</p>
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<p>The study also revealed other difficulties the women faced: the depletion of fish stocks due to sand dredging; and fluctuating income based on fishing seasons. </p>
<h2>Pathways that can work for Makoko women fisherfolk</h2>
<p>The study identified pathways which could enhance resilience and reduce poverty. </p>
<p>Social capital and social networks can be entry points for policy advocacy and intervention. Formal and informal cooperatives or associations could be registered, making it easier to get recognition and support from the state. For this to work effectively, members would have to follow their cooperative’s particular social values, objectives and rules about loan repayment.</p>
<p>This requires the active participation of members in running the group and knowledge of financial management and book-keeping. </p>
<p>To empower the women economically, their literacy level must increase. Women can be targeted through adult literacy classes supported by the state or NGOs. </p>
<p>It is also important for women to benefit from assistance and empowerment programmes for micro and small-scale enterprises provided by the state or private sector. For example, I have observed a <a href="https://www.undp.org/nigeria">UN Development Programme</a> which succeeded in boosting agricultural productivity by providing skills training to women. An indirect option would be to use the Alajo as vehicles to create better access to financial services for the fisherfolk. This has been done for <a href="https://edepot.wur.nl/168049">women fish traders in Ibaka</a>, Delta State. </p>
<p>Improving access to financial capital and the social well-being of women fisherfolk should also focus on the limiting or harmful gender norms and relations deeply rooted in culture. Gradual changes must go beyond focusing on women alone. </p>
<p>Engaging both women and men is necessary to understand and adopt new perspectives. This will have better, long-lasting outcomes for fisheries and for the people who depend on them.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/218096/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Ayodele Oloko receives funding from Deutscher Akademischer Austausch Dienst (DAAD) -German Academic Exchange Service. </span></em></p>Women in Makoko, a floating slum in Nigeria, face challenges funding their fish trade. Literacy and financial inclusion programmes can make a difference.Ayodele Oloko, Researcher, University of British ColumbiaLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/2200422024-01-30T00:54:24Z2024-01-30T00:54:24ZThere is overwhelming gender bias in the NDIS – and the review doesn’t address it<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/570825/original/file-20240123-25-s61vs2.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=0%2C1030%2C2663%2C2271&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">
</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://disabledandhere.files.wordpress.com/2019/10/dah-meeting03.jpg">Chona Kasinger/Disabled and Here Collection</a>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/">CC BY-SA</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>The <a href="https://www.ndisreview.gov.au/resources/reports/working-together-deliver-ndis">review</a> of the National Disability Insurance Scheme (NDIS) released last month included welcome recommendations to better support First Nations people, understand culturally diverse concepts of disability and care, and advocacy for LGBTIQ+ people. The review acknowledges women with disability face barriers to access support and efforts to understand their experiences <a href="https://www.ndisreview.gov.au/sites/default/files/resource/download/NDIS-Review-Supporting-Analysis.pdf">need to be accelerated</a>. </p>
<p>As part of review feedback, key disability organisations said <a href="https://www.ndisreview.gov.au/sites/default/files/resource/download/NDIS-Review-Supporting-Analysis.pdf">a gender strategy</a> was needed.</p>
<p>Yet <a href="https://www.crikey.com.au/2023/12/18/ndis-ndia-review-women-disabilities/">the final recommendations remain largely silent on gender</a>, despite overwhelming gender inequality in the NDIS. This was also largely true of the <a href="https://disability.royalcommission.gov.au/publications/final-report">Disability Royal Commission recommendations</a>. </p>
<p>Here’s why change is needed.</p>
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<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/recommendations-to-reboot-the-ndis-have-finally-been-released-5-experts-react-215805">Recommendations to reboot the NDIS have finally been released. 5 experts react</a>
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<h2>To uphold women’s right to safety</h2>
<p>More than one-third of women with disability are likely to <a href="https://mspgh.unimelb.edu.au/research-groups/centre-for-health-equity/disability-and-health-unit/violence-against-people-with-disabilities#:%7E:text=They%20are%20twice%20as%20likely%20than%20women%20without%20disability%20to,7%25%20of%20men%20without%20disability">experience intimate partner violence</a> compared to 21% of women without disability, 15% of men with disability and 7% of men without disability. </p>
<p>The NDIS review places a strong emphasis on “safeguarding” participants and to this end, makes the <a href="https://www.thesaturdaypaper.com.au/news/politics/2024/01/13/the-hidden-risks-the-ndis-restructure">controversial recommendation</a> to use only registered providers (which some participants say will limit their choice and control). But when it comes to addressing violence and abuse disproportionately experienced by women with disability, the review doesn’t go much further than referencing the previously released <a href="https://disability.royalcommission.gov.au/publications/final-report">disability royal commission recommendations</a>.</p>
<p>Only three out of the 222 disability royal commission recommendations explicitly focus on women. These include the banning of non-therapeutic sterilisation (preventing some women with disability from getting pregnant), plans to develop action plans and adopting nationally consistent disability-inclusive definitions of family and domestic violence. </p>
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Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/unregistered-ndis-providers-are-in-the-firing-line-but-lots-of-participants-have-good-reasons-for-using-them-196375">Unregistered NDIS providers are in the firing line – but lots of participants have good reasons for using them</a>
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<h2>To support women as participants, as well as carers</h2>
<p>Women with disability have significantly <a href="https://theconversation.com/women-make-up-half-the-disability-population-but-just-over-a-third-of-ndis-recipients-173747#:%7E:text=Australia's%20National%20Disability%20Insurance%20Scheme,participants%20are%20women%20and%20girls">lower NDIS participation rates</a>. </p>
<p>Women are also <a href="https://www.abs.gov.au/statistics/health/disability/disability-ageing-and-carers-australia-summary-findings/latest-release">over-represented as carers</a> for people with disability. Half of all NDIS participants <a href="https://www.ndisreview.gov.au/resources/reports/working-together-deliver-ndis">are children</a> and <a href="https://equityhealthj.biomedcentral.com/articles/10.1186/s12939-021-01571-7">nearly 90%</a> of primary carers for children are women. </p>
<p>Women are highly successful advocates for their children. Indeed, women’s advocacy for others has contributed to similar rates of access approval between <a href="https://data.ndis.gov.au/media/3862/download?attachment">male and female children up to the age of 14</a>.</p>
<p>Older applicants are encouraged and more likely to advocate for themselves. From age 15, the likelihood of NDIS access <a href="https://equityhealthj.biomedcentral.com/articles/10.1186/s12939-021-01571-7">is gendered</a>. Male access requests are <a href="https://data.ndis.gov.au/media/3862/download?attachment">approved at far higher rates</a> than females and applicants gendered “other”. This gap further widens with age. </p>
<p><div data-react-class="Tweet" data-react-props="{"tweetId":"1732994200273318206"}"></div></p>
<h2>To stop reproducing medical bias</h2>
<p>NDIS assessments rely on evidence from health-care professionals, which means the NDIS likely reproduces the <a href="https://theconversation.com/gender-bias-in-medicine-and-medical-research-is-still-putting-womens-health-at-risk-156495">gender biases of the medical system</a>.</p>
<p>On average, women wait <a href="https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC9518795/#B17">two to five years longer than men to obtain a diagnosis</a> and studies repeatedly find <a href="https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/9066458/">gendered differences</a> in how <a href="https://www.liebertpub.com/doi/pdf/10.1089/whr.2022.0052">symptoms are interpreted</a>. </p>
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<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/more-than-mental-illness-how-the-ndis-review-could-help-people-with-psychosocial-disability-219502">More than mental illness. How the NDIS review could help people with psychosocial disability</a>
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<p>Many chronic conditions experienced predominantly by women can have <a href="https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/17455057221103994">fluctuating symptoms</a>. The reviews’ attention to the <a href="https://theconversation.com/more-than-mental-illness-how-the-ndis-review-could-help-people-with-psychosocial-disability-219502#:%7E:text=The%20NDIS%20review%20recommends%20%E2%80%9Ca,people%20with%20severe%20mental%20illness.">episodic nature of psychosocial disability</a> (when mental illness is severe and disabling) is welcome, but episodic disability needs to be addressed more broadly. </p>
<p>Women are <a href="https://www.abs.gov.au/statistics/health/health-conditions-and-risks/health-conditions-prevalence/latest-release#:%7E:text=One%20in%20two%20(49.9%25%20or,52.3%25%20compared%20to%2047.4%25)">more likely than men to have at least one chronic health condition</a> and are <a href="https://www.aihw.gov.au/reports/chronic-disease/chronic-condition-multimorbidity/contents/what-is-multimorbidity-and-how-common-is-it">significantly more likely to experience two or more chronic conditions at once</a>. </p>
<p>Chronic health conditions with higher prevalence among women include <a href="https://equityhealthj.biomedcentral.com/articles/10.1186/s12939-023-02072-5">long COVID</a>, <a href="https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6425926/">fibromyalgia</a>, <a href="https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/26190206">chronic fatigue syndrome</a>, <a href="https://bmjopen.bmj.com/content/9/11/e031365">Ehlers-Danlos Syndrome</a>, <a href="https://www.aihw.gov.au/reports/chronic-disease/prevalence-of-lymphoedema-in-australia/summary">lymphoedema</a>, <a href="https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/pdf/10.1111/jan.15745">endometriosis</a> and <a href="https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0140673623004579?casa_token=NtbXDPvqNT8AAAAA:F5LoNOwElLtviVatTy-Fm4bet6Vvu9fa1t3tBt0k6OwBui1G_Afp82KM2P3mUQoR2Dhuz0MVyipy">many autoimmune conditions</a>, (such as <a href="https://www.thelancet.com/journals/laneur/article/PIIS1474-4422(18)30443-5/fulltext">multiple sclerosis</a>, <a href="https://lupusnsw.org.au/#:%7E:text=Being%20female%3A%2090%20per%20cent,families%20and%20some%20racial%20groups">lupus</a> and <a href="https://www.aihw.gov.au/reports/chronic-musculoskeletal-conditions/musculoskeletal-conditions/contents/arthritis">rheumatoid arthritis</a>). These conditions – and others that get worse over time – can significantly escalate without appropriate daily living supports.</p>
<p>The NDIS review recommends <a href="https://www.smh.com.au/politics/federal/diagnosis-list-for-ndis-to-be-scrapped-under-five-year-reboot-plan-20231207-p5epq6.html">doing away</a> with <a href="https://ourguidelines.ndis.gov.au/home/becoming-participant/applying-ndis/list-conditions-are-likely-meet-disability-requirements">lists of conditions</a> that make people likely to be eligible for support. Instead the focus will be on <a href="https://www.ndisreview.gov.au/resources/reports/working-together-deliver-ndis/overview/our-reform-blueprint">functional impact</a>. It’s unclear how effective removing such lists will be towards addressing gender inequity. </p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/570829/original/file-20240123-23-99ulyz.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="woman helps small child with disability in blue room" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/570829/original/file-20240123-23-99ulyz.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/570829/original/file-20240123-23-99ulyz.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/570829/original/file-20240123-23-99ulyz.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/570829/original/file-20240123-23-99ulyz.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/570829/original/file-20240123-23-99ulyz.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/570829/original/file-20240123-23-99ulyz.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/570829/original/file-20240123-23-99ulyz.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
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<span class="caption">Women are more likely to care for people with disability, especially when they’re younger.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.shutterstock.com/image-photo/child-physical-disability-sensory-stimulating-room-2209106979">Shutterstock</a></span>
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<h2>To close access gaps</h2>
<p>State health systems are <a href="https://www.dss.gov.au/sites/default/files/documents/09_2021/ndis-principles-determine-responsibilities-ndis-and-other-service-1.pdf">currently responsible for early intervention and treatment of chronic conditions</a> but the <a href="https://www.health.gov.au/resources/publications/national-strategic-framework-for-chronic-conditions?language=en">existing framework</a> doesn’t provide daily living supports where a condition leads to disability. </p>
<p>The fresh NDIS review echoes <a href="https://www.dss.gov.au/sites/default/files/documents/04_2016/independent_review_of_the_ndis_act.pdf">previous reviews</a> that found <a href="https://www.dss.gov.au/sites/default/files/documents/01_2020/ndis-act-review-final-accessibility-and-prepared-publishing1.pdf">gaps and ambiguity</a> between the NDIS and health systems. <a href="https://theconversation.com/states-agree-to-do-more-heavy-lifting-on-disability-in-exchange-for-extra-health-and-gst-funding-219321">New agreements with states</a> announced prior to the review similarly lack attention to gender, so there is no assurance women trying to access support outside the NDIS won’t continue to face the same barriers.</p>
<hr>
<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/when-is-a-condition-chronic-and-when-is-it-a-disability-the-definition-can-determine-the-support-you-get-183365">When is a condition 'chronic' and when is it a 'disability'? The definition can determine the support you get</a>
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<h2>More detailed data would be a good start</h2>
<p>The review reports some <a href="https://www.ndisreview.gov.au/sites/default/files/resource/download/NDIS-Review-Supporting-Analysis.pdf">36,500 participants have entered the scheme</a> after initially being found ineligible. The cycle of applying and re-applying is a heavy administrative and emotional burden, disproportionately shouldered by women. Meanwhile, <a href="https://www.ndisreview.gov.au/sites/default/files/resource/download/NDIS-Review-Supporting-Analysis.pdf">adults with chronic conditions make up over half</a> those who didn’t meet NDIS access requirements. These decisions are likely to have disproportionately impacted women, but again, a gendered breakdown hasn’t been given. </p>
<p>Collecting more detailed data about participants “disaggregated by gender and sexuality” is listed in the review’s <a href="https://www.ndisreview.gov.au/resources/reports/working-together-deliver-ndis/preface/recommendations-and-actions">recommendations</a>. Many people may be surprised to learn this is not happening already. If the government doesn’t urgently address the NDIS’ gender bias, women will continue to be left behind.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/220042/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Diana Piantedosi works for Women with Disabilities Victoria (WDV) and is also a member of the Victorian Disability Advisory Council (VDAC), Victorian NDIS Community Advisory Council (VCAC) and DFFH's LGBTIQA+ Disability Inclusion Expert Advisory Group.</span></em></p><p class="fine-print"><em><span>Lena Molnar works for Women with Disabilities Victoria (WDV).</span></em></p><p class="fine-print"><em><span>Maya Panisset and Raelene Wilding do not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and have disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Women are under-represented as NDIS participants and over-represented as carers. But the NDIS review ignored them.Diana Piantedosi, Honorary Research Fellow (Deakin University), PhD Candidate (La Trobe University), La Trobe UniversityLena Molnar, Research Fellow, Newcastle Youth Studies Centre, University of NewcastleMaya Panisset, Senior Research Fellow, The University of MelbourneRaelene Wilding, Associate Professor of Sociology, La Trobe UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/2133362024-01-26T13:17:43Z2024-01-26T13:17:43ZWhy are so many robots white?<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/568910/original/file-20240111-27-va5e62.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=0%2C0%2C2048%2C1364&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">This little guy is very cute − and very white.</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/jiuguangw/4981810943/"> Jiuguang Wang/Flickr</a>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/">CC BY-SA</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>Problems of racial and gender bias in artificial intelligence algorithms and the data used to train large language models like ChatGPT have <a href="https://doi.org/10.1145/3597307">drawn the attention of researchers</a> and <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/technology/interactive/2023/ai-generated-images-bias-racism-sexism-stereotypes/">generated headlines</a>. But these problems also arise in social robots, which have physical bodies modeled on nonthreatening versions of humans or animals and are designed to interact with people.</p>
<p>The aim of the subfield of social robotics called socially assistive robotics is to interact with ever more diverse groups of people. Its practitioners’ noble intention is “to create machines that will best help people help themselves,” writes one of its pioneers, <a href="https://www.wsj.com/articles/how-to-build-robots-people-can-relate-to-11570807206">Maja Matarić</a>. The robots are already being used to help people on the <a href="https://theconversation.com/how-robots-can-help-us-embrace-a-more-human-view-of-disability-76815">autism spectrum</a>, children with special needs and stroke patients who need physical rehabilitation. </p>
<p>But these robots do not look like people or interact with people in ways that reflect even basic aspects of society’s diversity. As a <a href="https://scholar.google.com/citations?hl=en&user=9JvGLRcAAAAJ&view_op=list_works&sortby=pubdate">sociologist who studies human-robot interaction</a>, I believe that this problem is only going to get worse. Rates of diagnoses for autism in children of color are now <a href="https://www.cdc.gov/ncbddd/autism/addm-community-report/spotlight-on-racial-ethnic-differences.html">higher than for white kids</a> in the U.S. Many of these children could end up interacting with white robots.</p>
<p>So, to adapt the famous Twitter <a href="https://knowyourmeme.com/memes/oscars-so-white">hashtag around the Oscars</a> in 2015, why #robotssowhite?</p>
<h2>Why robots tend to be white</h2>
<p>Given the diversity of people they will be exposed to, why does <a href="https://robotsguide.com/robots/kaspar">Kaspar</a>, designed to interact with children with autism, have rubber skin that resembles a white person’s? Why are <a href="https://robotsguide.com/robots/nao">Nao</a>, <a href="https://robotsguide.com/robots/pepper">Pepper</a> and <a href="https://robotsguide.com/robots/icub">iCub</a>, robots used in schools and museums, clad with shiny, white plastic? In <a href="https://doi.org/10.1007/s13347-020-00415-6">The Whiteness of AI</a>, technology ethicist Stephen Cave and science communication researcher Kanta Dihal discuss racial bias in AI and robotics and note the preponderance of stock images online of robots with reflective white surfaces. </p>
<p>What is going on here?</p>
<p>One issue is what robots are already out there. Most robots are not developed from scratch but purchased by engineering labs for projects, adapted with custom software, and sometimes integrated with other technologies such as robot hands or skin. Robotics teams are therefore constrained by design choices that the original developers made (Aldebaran for Pepper, Italian Institute of Technology for iCub). These design choices tend to follow the clinical, clean look with shiny white plastic, similar to other technology products like the original iPod.</p>
<figure>
<iframe width="440" height="260" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/wT0RtnCR13o?wmode=transparent&start=0" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen=""></iframe>
<figcaption><span class="caption">Kaspar is a robot designed to interact with children with autism.</span></figcaption>
</figure>
<p>In a paper I presented at the 2023 American Sociological Association meeting, I call this “<a href="https://convention2.allacademic.com/one/asa/asa23/index.php?program_focus=view_paper&selected_paper_id=2066209&cmd=online_program_direct_link&sub_action=online_program">the poverty of the engineered imaginary</a>.”</p>
<h2>How society imagines robots</h2>
<p>In anthropologist Lucy Suchman’s <a href="https://www.cambridge.org/us/universitypress/subjects/psychology/developmental-psychology/human-machine-reconfigurations-plans-and-situated-actions-2nd-edition">classic book on human-machine interaction</a>, which was updated with chapters on robotics, she discusses a “cultural imaginary” of what robots are supposed to look like. A cultural imaginary is what is shared through representations in texts, images and films, and which collectively shapes people’s attitudes and perceptions. For robots, the cultural imaginary is derived from science fiction. </p>
<p>This cultural imaginary can be contrasted with the more practical concerns of how computer science and engineering teams view robot bodies, what Neda Atanasoski and Kalindi Vora call the “engineered imaginary.” This is a hotly contested area in feminist science studies, with, for example, Jennifer Rhee’s “<a href="https://www.upress.umn.edu/book-division/books/the-robotic-imaginary">The Robotic Imaginary</a>” and Atanasoski and Vora’s “<a href="https://www.dukeupress.edu/surrogate-humanity">Surrogate Humanity</a>” critical of the gendered and racial assumptions that lead people to design service robots – designed to carry out mundane tasks – as female.</p>
<p>The cultural imaginary that enshrines robots as white, and in fact usually female, stretches back to European antiquity, along with an explosion of novels and films at the height of industrial modernity. From the first mention of the word “android” in Auguste Villiers de l’Isle-Adam’s 1886 novel “The Future Eve,” the introduction of the word “robot” in Karel Čapek’s 1920 play “Rossum’s Universal Robots,” and the sexualized robot Maria in the 1925 novel “Metropolis” by Thea von Harbou – the basis of her husband Fritz Lang’s famous 1927 film of the same name – fictional robots were quick to be feminized and made servile. </p>
<p>Perhaps the prototype for this cultural imaginary lies in ancient Rome. A poem in Ovid’s “Metamorphoses” (8 C.E.) describes a statue of Galatea “of snow-white ivory” that its creator Pygmalion falls in love with. Pygmalion prays to Aphrodite that Galatea come to life, and his wish is granted. There are numerous literary, poetic and film adaptations of the story, including one of the first special effects in cinema in <a href="https://youtu.be/lw8ckUGbbMY">Méliès’ 1898 film</a>. Paintings that depict this moment, for example by Raoux (1717), Regnault (1786), and Burne-Jones (1868-70 and 1878), accentuate the whiteness of Galatea’s flesh.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/568932/original/file-20240111-23-qycib1.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="A painting of a man embracing a nude female figure whose bottom half is a marble statue and upper half is a woman" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/568932/original/file-20240111-23-qycib1.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/568932/original/file-20240111-23-qycib1.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=739&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/568932/original/file-20240111-23-qycib1.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=739&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/568932/original/file-20240111-23-qycib1.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=739&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/568932/original/file-20240111-23-qycib1.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=928&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/568932/original/file-20240111-23-qycib1.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=928&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/568932/original/file-20240111-23-qycib1.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=928&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">The painting Pygmalion and Galatea by Jean-Léon Gérôme depicts an ancient Roman tale of a statue brought to life.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/peterjr1961/2920107167/">Peter Roan/Flickr</a>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/">CC BY-NC</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>Interdisciplinary route to diversity and inclusion</h2>
<p>What can be done to counter this cultural legacy? After all, all human-machine interaction should be designed with diversity and inclusion in mind, according to engineers <a href="https://theconversation.com/building-machines-that-work-for-everyone-how-diversity-of-test-subjects-is-a-technology-blind-spot-and-what-to-do-about-it-174757">Tahira Reid and James Gibert</a>. But outside of Japan’s ethnically Japanese-looking robots, robots designed to be nonwhite are rare. And Japan’s robots tend to follow the subservient <a href="https://www.forbes.com/sites/zarastone/2018/02/27/ten-incredibly-lifelike-humanoid-robots-to-get-on-your-radar/?sh=2f7f323334d2">female gender stereotype</a>.</p>
<p>The solution is not simply to encase machines in brown or black plastic. The problem goes deeper. The <a href="https://www.hansonrobotics.com/bina48-9/">Bina48 “custom character robot”</a> modeled on the head and shoulders of a millionaire’s African American wife, Bina Aspen, is notable, but its <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2010/07/05/science/05robotside.html">speech and interactions are limited</a>. A series of conversations between Bina48 and the African American artist <a href="https://www.stephaniedinkins.com/about.html">Stephanie Dinkins</a> is the basis of a <a href="https://www.stephaniedinkins.com/conversations-with-bina48.html">video installation</a>. </p>
<p>The absurdity of talking about racism with a disembodied animated head becomes apparent in one such conversation – it literally has no personal experience to speak of, yet its AI-powered answers refer to an unnamed person’s experience of racism growing up. These are implanted memories, like the “memories” of the <a href="https://bladerunner.fandom.com/wiki/Replicant">replicant</a> androids in the <a href="https://www.imdb.com/list/ls092704633/">“Blade Runner” movies</a>.</p>
<p>Social science methods can help produce a more inclusive “engineered imaginary,” as I discussed at Edinburgh’s <a href="https://www.cdcs.ed.ac.uk/events/imagining-artificial-life">Being Human festival</a> in November 2022. For example, working with Guy Hoffman, a roboticist from Cornell, and Caroline Yan Zheng, then a Ph.D. design student from Royal College of Art, we invited contributions for a publication titled <a href="https://doi.org/10.1145/3594713">Critical Perspectives on Affective Embodied Interaction</a>. </p>
<p>One of the persistent threads in that collaboration and other work is just how much people’s bodies communicate to others through gesture and expression, as well as vocalization, and how this differs between cultures. In which case, making robots’ appearance reflect the diversity of people who benefit from their presence is one thing, but what about diversifying forms of interaction? Along with making robots less universally white and female, social scientists, interaction designers and engineers can work together to produce more <a href="https://doi.org/10.1080/17458927.2023.2179231">cross-cultural sensitivity in gestures and touch</a>, for example. </p>
<p>Such work promises to make human-robot interaction less scary and <a href="https://doi.org/10.1027/2151-2604/a000486">uncanny</a>, especially for people who need assistance from the new breeds of socially assistive robots.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/213336/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Mark Paterson has received funding in the past from AHRC-EPSRC and OC Robotics in the U.K.</span></em></p>Humanoid robots tend to be white or resemble white people. Here’s why this is a problem and what social scientists, designers and engineers can do about it.Mark Paterson, Professor of Sociology, University of PittsburghLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/2174972023-12-20T13:39:31Z2023-12-20T13:39:31ZHow media attention harms female political candidates<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/563683/original/file-20231205-15-pooeku.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=0%2C0%2C2995%2C1994&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Finnish former Prime Minister Sanna Marin gives a press conference in Brussels, Belgium 10 February 2023.</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.shutterstock.com/es/image-photo/finnish-prime-minister-sanna-marin-gives-2270724641">Alexandros Michailidis/Shutterstock</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>A video of Finnish Prime Minister Sanna Marin <a href="https://time.com/6207085/sanna-marin-prime-minister-video-dancing/">dancing at a party</a> was leaked in August 2022. There was massive media reaction to what was, essentially, a young female politician having a good time. Accusations spread like wildfire, to the point where she had to <a href="https://www.politico.eu/article/finlands-sanna-marin-drug-test-leaked-dancing-video/">take a drug test</a> in order to quell speculation about her personal life.</p>
<p>Although Marin was <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/2022/nov/04/finnish-pm-sanna-marin-cleared-of-misconduct-over-partying-footage">cleared of any wrongdoing</a>, she has subsequently left office, having lost the April 2023 general election in Finland. It is difficult to imagine that the negative media attention she received months earlier had no impact on her result at the ballot box.</p>
<p>Reporting on female politicians is often less favourable than that on men, <a href="https://academic.oup.com/joc/article/70/1/114/5761879">with more attention to physical appearance and personal or family life and less to policy issues and leadership traits</a>. Politicians <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/2023/jul/21/spanish-peoples-party-leader-accused-sexism-makeup-jibe">even try to encourage this imbalance</a> to discredit their opponents, but they are not always successful.</p>
<p>Numerous academics have examined whether certain types of coverage have a different effect on voters for male and female political candidates. In our research, <a href="https://academic.oup.com/joc/article/73/2/101/6964484">we compiled their studies</a> in order to answer the question of which types of media reporting hurt or reward female politicians disproportionately.</p>
<p>We collected all existing studies that tested the impact of media messages where a politician’s gender is mentioned or highlighted. There was a lot of data: 50 experiments, with 671 evaluation outcomes based on over 23,000 participants in North America, Europe, and South Korea. We focused on assessing which types of media coverage result in different evaluations of male and female candidates.</p>
<p>Our <a href="https://academic.oup.com/joc/article/73/2/101/6964484">meta-analysis</a> reveals four key insights into how the media affects male and female political candidates.</p>
<h2>Voters are not naturally biased</h2>
<p>Our first finding was that, by and large, voters are not inherently biased when it comes to a candidate’s gender. Many types of media messages had a similar impact on voter’s evaluations of both male and female candidates. This fits well within the overall idea of <a href="https://www.annualreviews.org/doi/full/10.1146/annurev-psych-010213-115057">gender similarities</a>, and has been backed up by evidence <a href="https://bristoluniversitypressdigital.com/view/journals/ejpg/4/3/article-p341.xml">from other</a> <a href="https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0261379420300925">election</a> <a href="https://books.google.nl/books?id=a23rAwAAQBAJ&lpg=PP1&ots=i0Ju8VH9V6&dq=dolan%202014%20gender&lr&pg=PP1#v=onepage&q=dolan%202014%20gender&f=false">surveys</a> and <a href="https://www.journals.uchicago.edu/doi/full/10.1086/716290">experiments</a>. </p>
<p>This leads us to conclude that media coverage of politicians plays a big part in the evaluation of male and female candidates.</p>
<h2>Reinforcing prejudices</h2>
<p>When media coverage does have an impact on perceptions of male and female politicians, it mainly strengthens pre-existing stereotypical beliefs about gender. Men are assumed to be more ambitious, level-headed and goal-oriented. Women, on the other hand, are typically thought to be more emotional, caring and cooperative – a set of traits that we call “communality” in our analysis. </p>
<p>These assumptions <a href="https://www.jstor.org/stable/2111526">affect the way voters see their policy strengths</a>. Men are typically thought to be good at handling what are seen as masculine issues, such as economic crises or terrorist threats. Women, on the other hand, are thought to be better with policy issues such as welfare, health or education.</p>
<p>Some media coverage exacerbates these beliefs. We found that when the media talks about a candidate expressing emotion, it increases perceptions of communality among female candidates more than male, meaning they are seen as caring but lack the ability to make objective decisions. The same type of coverage therefore has different impacts on how voters perceive male and female candidates. </p>
<p>Similarly, media reporting on a candidate’s personality also widens the gender gap, especially when it focuses on stereotypically masculine or feminine traits. Coverage of a candidate’s children in particular reinforces the assumption that female candidates are better at dealing with “feminine policy issues”. </p>
<p>Therefore, when the media pays attention to politicians, it reaffirms <a href="https://oce.ovid.com/article/00000487-202004000-00001/HTML">stereotypical</a> <a href="https://oce.ovid.com/article/00006832-200207000-00007/HTML">expectations of gender roles</a>, and the <a href="https://oce.ovid.com/article/00006823-201107000-00005/HTML">masculinity</a> of the political domain.</p>
<h2>Attention that harms female candidates</h2>
<p>Some media messages directly hurt female politicians’ chances at the ballot box. Discussions of their appearance or families were two areas that triggered especially unequal responses between male and female candidates. Media responses to Sanna Marin’s sartorial style in a <a href="https://edition.cnn.com/style/article/sanna-marin-finland-pm-trendi-photoshoot-intl-scli/index.html">2020 photo shoot</a> are a prime example of this, while UK politicians Nicola Sturgeon and Theresa May <a href="https://twitter.com/hendopolis/status/846470664278196225">received similar treatment in 2017</a>. </p>
<p>Attractiveness was found to play a somewhat unexpected role, as any type of coverage evaluating female politicians’ attractiveness – whether negative, neutral or positive – had a negative impact on voter preferences. Thus, attention to appearance of any kind is disproportionately harmful to female candidates.</p>
<h2>Not all attention is bad attention</h2>
<p>We also found that there are, in fact, media messages that reward female candidates compared to their male counterparts, such as campaign attacks. When the media report on these, female politicians are punished less strongly then male candidates. For instance, a <a href="https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s11109-008-9065-x">negative campaign advertisement</a> emphasising the corrupt and immoral behaviour of a male candidate was more effective at lowering vote intentions than the same message about a female candidate.</p>
<p>This kind of media attention tends to lean heavily on blatant gender stereotypes or sexism. This often leads voters to <a href="https://www.cogitatiopress.com/politicsandgovernance/article/view/5752">overcompensate</a> in favour of a female candidate, and they can even can spark feelings of protectiveness towards them. This is a very clear example of <a href="https://oce.ovid.com/article/00005205-199603000-00007/HTML">benevolent sexist attitudes</a> at play.</p>
<h2>Good news and bad news</h2>
<p>There is good and bad news in these findings. The good news is that in most instances voters do not systematically discriminate between male and female candidates. This should, theoretically, mean better representation for women in political office. </p>
<p>The bad news is that when voters respond differently to media messages about male or female candidates, it tends to reaffirm stereotypes and in some cases hurt them electorally. This comes on top of the fact that political media is already <a href="https://academic.oup.com/joc/article/70/1/114/5761879">biased against women</a>, giving them less attention overall, and focusing on their personal lives. This means that when voters do discriminate based on gender, it is almost always to the detriment of female candidates.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/217497/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Daphne Joanna van der Pas receives funding from the NWO (Dutch Science Council). </span></em></p><p class="fine-print"><em><span>Loes Aaldering receives funding from the Dutch Research Council. She is a member of Groenlink (the Green Party). </span></em></p><p class="fine-print"><em><span>Tobias Rohrbach no recibe salario, ni ejerce labores de consultoría, ni posee acciones, ni recibe financiación de ninguna compañía u organización que pueda obtener beneficio de este artículo, y ha declarado carecer de vínculos relevantes más allá del cargo académico citado.</span></em></p>News coverage focuses on female political candidates’ appearance and personal lives, disproportionately impacting them at the ballot box.Tobias Rohrbach, Early postdoctoral researcher, University of FribourgDaphne Joanna van der Pas, Associate Professor, University of AmsterdamLoes Aaldering, Associate Professor in Comparative Politics, Vrije Universiteit AmsterdamLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/2171562023-11-28T12:02:18Z2023-11-28T12:02:18ZGirls less likely to be diagnosed with special educational needs – new research<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/561328/original/file-20231123-15-vctgar.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=121%2C0%2C4372%2C3002&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">
</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.shutterstock.com/image-photo/upset-caucasian-girl-sitting-desk-writing-2105450654">Mariia Korneeva/Shutterstock</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>The point when <a href="https://www.gov.uk/children-with-special-educational-needs">a child with special educational needs (SEN)</a> is diagnosed is an important moment in their lives. </p>
<p>It allows schools to provide them with access to additional resources, such as assistive technology, specialised teaching programs or the services of professionals such as educational psychologists. These resources help to meet children’s academic, emotional or social needs.</p>
<p>But girls and boys don’t fare equally. My <a href="https://bera-journals.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10.1002/rev3.3437">recent research</a> with colleague Hsin Wang, conducted using UK government data, found a consistent gender gap in SEN identification.</p>
<p>Of the roughly 1.5 million children in English schools identified for SEN services in 2022-23, only 0.5 million were girls. We found the same pattern across the country, with girls making up between 34% to 36% of all students accessing SEN support in most regions.</p>
<p>In some cases, this may be because certain disabilities are more common in boys. But it is likely to be also down to gender bias in assessment and from those referring children for assessment, as well as girls being better at hiding the challenges they face from some conditions.</p>
<h2>An established pattern</h2>
<p>When we looked at specific types of special educational needs we found that boys were more likely to be diagnosed for all of them. Boys made up 75% of those diagnosed with autism spectrum disorder. They were also about two times more likely than girls to be diagnosed with speech, language and communication disorders, as well as mental health disorders.</p>
<p>We did find some changes when looking at SEN identification rates over time. Between 2015 and 2022, the proportion of girls out of all students identified with autism spectrum disorder increased from 17% to 25%. Similarly, there was an increase in the proportion of girls being identified for specific learning difficulties – from 38% in 2015 to 44% in 2022. </p>
<p>However, this trend of increasing female identification does not apply to all disability categories. For example, from 2015 to 2022, girls consistently accounted for 44% of those identified with visual impairments. </p>
<p>Past research has suggested several reasons for these gender differences. Biological factors may make boys more vulnerable to certain disabilities. For instance, research has suggested that neurobiological differences between girls and boys make <a href="https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6509633/pdf/CroatMedJ_60_0141.pdf">boys more likely</a> to be diagnosed with speech, language and communication needs. </p>
<h2>Gender bias</h2>
<p>But social factors can also play a big part. <a href="https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s11881-997-0024-8">Past research</a> has suggested that gender bias among people who refer students for diagnostic assessment, like teachers, contributes to this unequal distribution. <a href="https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/17903118/">One study of twins</a> reports that teachers may be more likely to refer boys because boys are more disruptive and command more attention, while girls go under the radar. </p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="Children putting hands up to answer teacher's question" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/561339/original/file-20231123-23-uhd0zr.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/561339/original/file-20231123-23-uhd0zr.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/561339/original/file-20231123-23-uhd0zr.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/561339/original/file-20231123-23-uhd0zr.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/561339/original/file-20231123-23-uhd0zr.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/561339/original/file-20231123-23-uhd0zr.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/561339/original/file-20231123-23-uhd0zr.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Boys may command more attention in class.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.shutterstock.com/image-photo/pupils-raising-hand-during-geography-lesson-253351462">ESB Professional/Shutterstock</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Research on autism also points out the “<a href="https://molecularautism.biomedcentral.com/articles/10.1186/s13229-016-0073-0">camouflage effect</a>”. This means girls may be better at masking or hiding their autism-related challenges, leading to under-identification or delayed diagnosis. </p>
<p><a href="https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s10803-018-3510-4">Some researchers</a> have also reported that assessments used for diagnosis are typically based on male characteristics, and potentially overlook how autism spectrum disorder presents differently in girls. </p>
<p>This imbalance is likely to mean that some girls are not getting the recognition and support they need. </p>
<p><a href="https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7557860/">Past research</a> has found that girls have higher rates of mental health disorders such as anxiety compared to boys. Importantly, for some disability categories such as visual impairment or intellectual disabilities, data on gender differences is scarce. </p>
<p>The low number of girls identified with disabilities is worrying. Early detection of disabilities is vital to provide students with necessary services to support their development. Delayed or missed diagnoses for girls can worsen their challenges and affect their long-term outcomes. </p>
<p>Awareness of the differences between girls and boys who need support for special educational needs is crucial. For example, teachers and schools should adopt standardised criteria for SEN diagnosis. This can help reduce subjective judgements that are influenced by biases and ensure fair support for all students.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/217156/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Johny Daniel does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Of the 1.5 million children in English schools identified for SEN services, only one in three – 0.5 million – were girls.Johny Daniel, Assistant Professor, School of Education, Durham UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/2140502023-10-08T17:14:29Z2023-10-08T17:14:29ZWhy do so few women take on scientific careers?<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/549417/original/file-20230608-25-g76o5p.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=6%2C0%2C4127%2C2373&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Women are still in the minority in the laboratories.</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://unsplash.com/fr/photos/9dxalrR0xFI">National Cancer Institute/Unsplash</a>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/">CC BY-SA</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>There were around 8 billion human beings in 2022, 50% of them women. Although there are as many women as men, the former continue to be underrepresented in science.</p>
<p>The list of Nobel Prize laureates is a case in point: out of 965 winners, <a href="https://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/Place_des_femmes_dans_l%27attribution_du_prix_Nobel">only 64 (7%) are women</a>. Could the differences between men and women justify such a disparity?</p>
<h2>Natural differences?</h2>
<p>The first difference between the sexes can be observed at the level of chromosomes. Human beings are endowed with 23 pairs of chromosomes, the last pair differing according to sex: two X chromosomes for women, and one X and one Y chromosome for men. This difference accounts for the difference in genitalia, which are distinguishable from birth in over 99% of cases.</p>
<p>Gender, a social norm that defines how we should behave according to our sex, comes on top of these biological differences. Throughout history, gender expectations over how we ought to speak, sit, walk and dance have varied not only across time, but space: in 17th-century France, wealthy men wore shoes with heels, reflecting their high social status. Nowadays in Europe, with the notable exception of the Scots, few men wear skirts. In Asia, however, skirts are widely worn by men. Such variations show that when it comes to expressing gender identity, a person’s sex counts less than their social and cultural context.</p>
<p>Gender is also defined by stereotypes on skills, which as we shall see largely explain why women are so little present in science.</p>
<p>We know that, from the earliest age, boys’ and girls’ environments differ according to these stereotypes. And yet, by the time they enter first grade in France, <a href="https://www.education.gouv.fr/filles-et-garcons-sur-le-chemin-de-l-egalite-de-l-ecole-l-enseignement-superieur-edition-2021-322668">girls outperform boys</a> in French and are on a part with them in maths. Once in academia, however, only 22% of mathematicians are <a href="https://femmes-et-maths.fr/enseignement-superieur-et-recherche/statistiques/effectifs-a-luniversite/">women</a>.</p>
<p>What has happened in the meantime? Phenomena that affect not only the women on the receiving end, but also teachers, recruiters and parents – namely, stereotypes and gender bias.</p>
<h2>The power of stereotypes</h2>
<p>Stereotypes are character traits that are arbitrarily attributed to specific groups of people. Although they have no scientific basis, they nevertheless influence the way people behave.</p>
<p>Girls, for example, quickly take to the idea that they are not cut out for maths. Such gendered stereotypes are hardly new. During the Renaissance, a dark period for equality between men and women, women were excluded from the cultural, economic and political spheres. Then, during the Enlightenment in France, feminine names that existed for intellectual and artistic professions (author, painter, poet, doctor, etc.) <a href="https://editions-iconoclaste.fr/livres/les-grandes-oubliees/">were suppressed</a> by the Académie Française, legitimising the absence of women in these professions.</p>
<p>Research in the 21st century has continued to starkly expose such preconditioning. In 2009, researchers at the University of Aix-Marseille sought to test the <a href="https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S002210310900105X">mathematical skills of 12-year-old children</a> of both sexes, divided into two groups. In the first group, the children were told they were taking a geometry test. In the other, they were told they were taking a drawing test. The boys ended up outperforming the girls in the “geometry test” group, while girls not only beat them in the “drawing test”, but outscored the boys from the first group. Although the test was the same, the girls performed less well when told they were taking a geometry test. So, it is the mention of geometry that is an obstacle, not differences in ability, since in the “drawing test” instruction, they are better than the boys.</p>
<p>This is the stereotype effect: we observe a <a href="https://psycnet.apa.org/record/1997-04591-001">drop in performance</a> in situations where individuals fear confirming a negative stereotype attributed to the group to which they belong. This is known as stereotype threat. While the stereotype itself has no biological basis (at the cerebral level, <a href="https://www.hachette.co.uk/titles/prof-daphna-joel/gender-mosaic/9781913068011/">the brains of two men have just as many differences as those of a man and a woman</a>), it induces behaviour in those who are its target that conforms to it: women will be less self-confident, and feel less legitimate in disciplines from which stereotypes exclude them, such as maths, and science in general.</p>
<p>Stereotypes will also induce biases in those who teach, judge, evaluate and recruit. <a href="https://www.pnas.org/doi/10.1073/pnas.1211286109">One study</a> has shown that, for the same CV sent for a position of a laboratory manager in a university, a male candidate (boy’s first name) will be judged more competent than a female candidate (girl’s first name), and will be offered a higher salary. This is what we call gender bias: we treat people differently, not because of their skills or qualities, but because of their gender.</p>
<h2>The exclusion of women from scientific careers and its mechanisms</h2>
<p>Gender inequality, which is evident at the outset of scientific studies, is amplified throughout a career. Although their numbers are on the <a href="https://www.enseignementsup-recherche.gouv.fr/sites/default/files/content_migration/document/Note_DGRH_N_4_Avril_2021_La_situation_des_femmes_universitaires_dans_l_enseignement_superieur_en_2020_1405949.pdf">increase, women are still in the minority among teaching and research staff</a> in all disciplines (40% in 2021 in France), but more pronounced in the sciences (at the same date, 34% of female lecturers and 19% of female professors in science and technology). This erosion is described and analysed in the documentary <a href="https://www.pictureascientist.com/"><em>Picture a Scientist</em></a>.</p>
<p>Because women are endowed with the same abilities as men, could it be that they have less of an appetite for the sciences?</p>
<p>It is significant to note the wide variations from one country to another in the proportion of women in scientific courses. Paradoxically, the <a href="https://theconversation.com/pourquoi-legalite-entre-les-sexes-nefface-t-elle-pas-les-segregations-dans-les-filieres-scientifiques-152272">more egalitarian the country, the more women are excluded</a>. Indeed, women who manage to study in countries where they have to fight to gain access have already made a transgressive choice, so their disciplinary orientation is freer. We can see that these variations are explained by context and, as mentioned above, not by natural gender differences. In countries where women’s access to education is not in question, stereotypes play a role in the choice of disciplines. It also has an overall impact on test results, according to the mechanism known as stereotype threat described above.</p>
<p>As a result, the percentage of women in France’s top scientific schools is very low, particularly at ENS-PSL (École normale supérieure), as described in the study: <a href="https://presses.ens.psl.eu/464-cepremap-filles-sciences-une-equation-insoluble.html">“Girls + Sciences = an Unsolvable Equation?”</a>. We were particularly struck to find how commonplace gendered appreciation was in teachers’ school reports. Specific teacher training is therefore desirable to limit these biases.</p>
<p>This phenomenon is not limited to studies. The <a href="https://www.nature.com/articles/s41562-019-0686-3">behaviour of promotion juries</a> at the Centre for National Scientific Research (CNRS) has been analysed by Isabelle Régner: it is not the implicit bias that is responsible for inequality in terms of women’s promotion, but its non-recognition by the jury.</p>
<h2>Why act and how?</h2>
<p>We need to work toward greater individual and social equity, which will in turn lead to greater efficiency. In academic research, but also in industry and education, <a href="https://online.uncp.edu/articles/mba/diversity-and-inclusion-good-for-business.aspx">several studies</a> have shown that mixed groups (gender, social origin…) perform better.</p>
<p>We need to capitalise on this observation on a global scale. Given the scientific challenges we face, we must not lose 50% of our brainpower.</p>
<p>We therefore need to inform and convince people of the deleterious effects of gender bias, which is more widespread than is generally believed. With <a href="https://implicit.harvard.edu/implicit/">Association Implicit Test</a>, the strength of this bias can be measured in the difficulty, via slowness, of associating the words <em>man</em> with <em>literature</em>, or <em>woman</em> with <em>science</em>.</p>
<p>A perverse effect should also be mentioned: while representation on university bodies is parity, which is desirable, there are also burn-out effects on women’s careers. Indeed, since the pool of female professors remains unequal, particularly in the higher positions (full professor, called “A rank” in France), women find themselves individually over-solicited for collective tasks that are not particularly rewarding in terms of their careers. The result is ultimately, and paradoxically, contrary to the objective of equity.</p>
<p>Instead, we should be looking at the foundations – that is to say, the conditions of access to university and research careers. Incentive measures could be envisaged to encourage laboratories to recruit young women by helping them at the start of their careers: welcome funding in addition to that already in place, award of a thesis grant within two years of taking up the position… Measures also justified by inequalities in terms of biological clocks. And above all, in order to objectify these issues of gender bias, we need to collect gendered data on careers and working conditions: Nancy Hopkins in the documentary <em>Picture a Scientist</em> shows that, at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), laboratory space allocated to female professors was significantly smaller than that allocated to male professors. And, as Jane Willenbring says in the same documentary, it is important to make scientific universities a welcoming place for women.</p>
<p>In short, even if changes are moving in the right direction, they are still very slow. Should we carry on at the current pace, a <a href="https://cache.media.enseignementsup-recherche.gouv.fr/file/Charte_egalite_femmes_hommes/90/6/Chiffres_parite_couv_vdef_239906.pdf">recent study</a> by the French Ministry of Higher Education and Research estimates that gender equality within the field of higher education and research won’t happen before 2068, despite being enshrined in law. Action is thus urgently needed.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/214050/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Les auteurs ne travaillent pas, ne conseillent pas, ne possèdent pas de parts, ne reçoivent pas de fonds d'une organisation qui pourrait tirer profit de cet article, et n'ont déclaré aucune autre affiliation que leur organisme de recherche.</span></em></p>From primary school to academic positions, despite some progress, gender inequality continues to be rife.Clotilde Policar, Professeure, directrice des études sciences à l'ENS, École normale supérieure (ENS) – PSLCharlotte Jacquemot, Chercheuse en sciences cognitives, directrice du département d'études cognitives à l'Ecole normale supérieure, École normale supérieure (ENS) – PSLLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/2144252023-10-02T11:17:00Z2023-10-02T11:17:00ZHow often do you think about the Roman empire? TikTok trend exposed the way we gender history<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/550388/original/file-20230926-15-138yj2.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=0%2C0%2C5853%2C3926&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">
</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.shutterstock.com/image-photo/flying-brain-head-human-statue-creativity-2017730141">Andrej Maculskij/Shutterstock</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>How often do you think about the Roman empire? This question, posed to men by their partners on social media app TikTok, has led to a storm of viral videos. Women are amused to discover the answer is often “every day”, or at least “several times a week”. </p>
<p>The Roman empire, like other periods of human history, had approximately the same numbers of men and women. But its power structures were notably patriarchal and military. </p>
<p>This may be why it is of great interest to men. As Mary Beard, the British classical historian, <a href="https://www.ft.com/content/bdbbcee8-07cd-40ee-980b-067d61f388d5">suggested</a> when she was asked about the trend, mens’ interest in the Roman empire might represent “a safe way of allowing yourself to be a bit macho – after all it was 2,000 years ago”, in our more feminist contemporary society. </p>
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<iframe width="440" height="260" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/TuNReqvYuQg?wmode=transparent&start=0" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen=""></iframe>
<figcaption><span class="caption">A compilation of the viral Roman mpire trend videos.</span></figcaption>
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<p>Cynthia Boaz, a political science professor, offers <a href="https://www.glamourmagazine.co.uk/article/roman-empire-trend">a more critical slant</a>: “I’m guessing most of the men who say they think about it all of the time are probably white, cis men. And it’s no coincidence, because the Roman Empire is one of the most patriarchal and hierarchical societies that has ever existed. It is the epitome, the pinnacle of white cis gender masculinity.”</p>
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<img alt="Quarter life, a series by The Conversation" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/451343/original/file-20220310-13-1bj6csd.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/451343/original/file-20220310-13-1bj6csd.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=600&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/451343/original/file-20220310-13-1bj6csd.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=600&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/451343/original/file-20220310-13-1bj6csd.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=600&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/451343/original/file-20220310-13-1bj6csd.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=754&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/451343/original/file-20220310-13-1bj6csd.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=754&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/451343/original/file-20220310-13-1bj6csd.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=754&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
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<p><strong><a href="https://theconversation.com/uk/topics/quarter-life-117947?utm_source=TCUK&utm_medium=linkback&utm_campaign=UK+YP2022&utm_content=InArticleTop">This article is part of Quarter Life</a></strong>, a series about issues affecting those of us in our twenties and thirties. From the challenges of beginning a career and taking care of our mental health, to the excitement of starting a family, adopting a pet or just making friends as an adult. The articles in this series explore the questions and bring answers as we navigate this turbulent period of life.</p>
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<p><em><a href="https://theconversation.com/how-booktok-trends-are-influencing-what-you-read-whether-you-use-tiktok-or-not-213311utm_source=TCUK&utm_medium=linkback&utm_campaign=UK+YP2022&utm_content=InArticleTop">How BookTok trends are influencing what you read – whether you use TikTok or not</a></em></p>
<p><em><a href="https://theconversation.com/seven-tips-for-using-the-back-to-school-mindset-to-help-you-stick-to-your-goals-213591utm_source=TCUK&utm_medium=linkback&utm_campaign=UK+YP2022&utm_content=InArticleTop">Seven tips for using the back-to-school mindset to help you stick to your goals</a></em></p>
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<p>All this puts a distinct spin on the skit from the film <a href="https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0079470/">Monty Python’s Life of Brian</a> (1979) which parodied a group of Jewish freedom fighters <a href="http://montypython.50webs.com/scripts/Life_of_Brian/10.htm">who had to ask</a>: “All right, but apart from the sanitation, the medicine, education, wine, public order, irrigation, roads, a fresh water system and public health, what have the Romans ever done for us?”</p>
<p>Boaz’s underlying question is, perhaps, what did the western empires do for anyone other than white cis men? From this perspective, it is hardly surprising that women are not spending as much time thinking about the Roman empire.</p>
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<iframe width="440" height="260" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/Qc7HmhrgTuQ?wmode=transparent&start=0" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen=""></iframe>
<figcaption><span class="caption">The Life of Brian sketch.</span></figcaption>
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<h2>Is the teaching of history gendered?</h2>
<p>In my experience of university teaching, the title of the course seems to strongly influence the gender balance of the class. </p>
<p>I have taught in art history departments where the courses were mostly attended by women (art appreciation being often seen as <a href="https://www.jstor.org/stable/41035595">feminine</a> and in history departments where there was, by contrast, a rough gender balance. Indeed, <a href="https://www.ucl.ac.uk/news/2018/nov/new-report-gender-equality-uk-history">women are an overall minority</a> in university history teaching.</p>
<p>I never tried to run a class called “War and Rule from Rome to Washington DC”, but I know from experience that I just have to put the word “gender” in a course title to see the men evaporate. I once gave a seminar on this subject to a survey methods course at master’s level and was faced by a stony-faced group of men sitting at the back with their arms crossed defensively. </p>
<p>It turned out, on talking to them, that they were deeply uncomfortable about being there because they thought gender history was all about attacking men. And this challenge extends beyond my classroom. <a href="https://www.irex.org/insight/overcoming-resistance-role-men-power-and-gender-inclusion">Researchers at the global education organisation IREX</a> have found that men and boys devalue spaces and activities they associate with feminine gender roles, leading to a loss of economic and educational opportunities. </p>
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<img alt="A man giving a lecture to a packed hall of students." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/550392/original/file-20230926-27-he7bob.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/550392/original/file-20230926-27-he7bob.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=304&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/550392/original/file-20230926-27-he7bob.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=304&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/550392/original/file-20230926-27-he7bob.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=304&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/550392/original/file-20230926-27-he7bob.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=382&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/550392/original/file-20230926-27-he7bob.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=382&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/550392/original/file-20230926-27-he7bob.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=382&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">A course’s title can greatly impact the gender split of attendees.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.shutterstock.com/image-photo/speaker-giving-talk-on-corporate-business-481869205">Matej Kastelic/Shutterstock</a></span>
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<p>From my perspective, the gendering of subjects is so rampant in our society that is crucial that people learn about it, whether in school or university. I explore this during an introductory class by getting my undergraduates to draw images they associate with the period they are to study. </p>
<p>In my Georgian Britain class, despite that being the height of the male-run slave trade, images of ladies drinking cups of tea hugely outnumber men in uniform. That is certainly not the case when the topic is, say, Nazi Germany or the Battle of Britain. </p>
<p>The success of the Netflix TV series <a href="https://www.salon.com/2020/12/27/bridgerton-ending-season-2-lady-whistledown-racism-incels/">Bridgerton</a> shows the public’s appetite for a sanitised vision of the 18th century, for example. The society it depicts includes an upper class that is female empowered and race-inclusive in ways that speak to contemporary cultural politics more than to strict historical accuracy.</p>
<p>It is not just historical periods, but also countries and even languages that are powerfully gendered in popular culture. How else to explain the fact that women consistently outnumber men in French and Italian classes, but <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/worldviews/wp/2016/03/05/the-worlds-most-male-and-female-languages-according-to-learners/">not in German</a> ones?</p>
<p>In the past this was often put down to supposed differences between Latin languages being intuitive and Germanic ones analytical. Today we are more likely to say that the key factor is <a href="https://doi.org/10.1111/bjep.12446">gender stereotyping</a>.</p>
<p>The underlying point about the TikTok Romans trend is that it illustrates what popular images of the past can do for us. They may serve as a safe space for the displacement of fantasies of unfettered masculinity, or as an incubator of toxic thought.</p>
<p>Either way, the popularity of the meme is a testament to the power of the classical tradition in its broadest sense to shape contemporary western culture. And to influence who precisely chooses my history classes.</p>
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<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/536131/original/file-20230706-17-460x2d.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/536131/original/file-20230706-17-460x2d.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=600&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/536131/original/file-20230706-17-460x2d.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=600&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/536131/original/file-20230706-17-460x2d.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=600&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/536131/original/file-20230706-17-460x2d.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=754&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/536131/original/file-20230706-17-460x2d.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=754&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/536131/original/file-20230706-17-460x2d.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=754&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
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<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Dominic Janes teaches at Keele University and the University for the Creative Arts. He is a member of the Liberal Democrats.</span></em></p>In my experience of university teaching, the title of the course seems to strongly influence the gender balance of the class.Dominic Janes, Professor of Modern History, Keele UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/2047772023-08-31T12:20:15Z2023-08-31T12:20:15ZTrans students benefit from gender-inclusive classrooms, research shows – and so do the other students and science itself<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/541976/original/file-20230809-15-2j6fem.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=0%2C0%2C2121%2C1412&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Teaching sex and gender more accurately can counter gender stereotypes and encourage all students to study STEM.</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/photo/girl-in-denim-t-shirt-with-rainbow-symbol-wear-royalty-free-image/1365444357">Iurii Krasilnikov/iStock via Getty Images Plus</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>Across the U.S., legislators are debating how and when sex and gender should be discussed in the classroom and beyond. Specifically, <a href="https://www.transformationsproject.org/state-anti-trans-legislation">these bills</a> are considering whether anything beyond male or female can be included in library books and lesson plans. These bills are part of a larger debate on how to define and regulate sex and gender, and there are no immediate answers that satisfy everyone.</p>
<p>Many of the bills draw on science to make claims about sex and gender. For example, <a href="https://www.flsenate.gov/Session/Bill/2023/1069">Florida House Bill 1069</a>, which legislates pronoun use in schools, assumes that all of a person’s sex markers – listed as sex chromosomes, “naturally occurring” sex hormones and internal and external genitalia at birth – will align as female or male “based on the organization of the body … for a specific reproductive role.” The bill claims that “a person’s sex is an immutable biological trait and that it is false to ascribe to a person a pronoun that does not correspond to such person’s sex.”</p>
<p>Invoking biology is a way to sound objective, but it’s not so simple. Science itself is still grappling with the nature of sex and gender.</p>
<p>My co-author Sam Long and I are <a href="https://doi.org/10.1525/abt.2021.83.7.427">high school</a> and <a href="https://scholar.google.com/citations?user=rZ-cbGUAAAAJ&hl=en">college science educators</a> who research how to <a href="https://www.genderinclusivebiology.com">increase student motivation, interest and retention in biology</a>. Our work and that of our colleagues show that teaching sex and gender more accurately in classrooms benefits not only gender-diverse students but all students and the field of science.</p>
<h2>Science of sex and gender</h2>
<p>Bills like Florida’s define sex as a binary set of biological traits. But scientists know that sex is far more complicated.</p>
<p>In nature, there is a <a href="https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pbio.1001899">huge diversity</a> in how sexes are arranged within bodies. For example, the sex of some organisms is classified by the size of their gametes, or sperm and eggs. Some species produce both gametes in one body. Some change whether they produce sperm or eggs over their lifetime. Others technically don’t have a sex at all.</p>
<p>Sex in humans is actually an <a href="https://doi.org/10.4324/9780203127971">amalgamation of many traits</a>, which include the type of gametes a person produces as well as their reproductive tract anatomy, hormone levels and secondary sex characteristics like hair growth and chest shape. These traits are determined not just by a few genes on the X and Y chromosomes but also by a <a href="https://doi.org/10.1038/s41598-019-53500-y">myriad of genes</a> on other chromosomes as well as the <a href="https://doi.org/10.1038/s41598-019-53500-y">developmental environment</a>. When <a href="https://courses.lumenlearning.com/wm-biology1/chapter/reading-polygenic-inheritance-and-environmental-effects/">many genes</a> contribute to a trait, it appears as a continuum.</p>
<p>The continuum of human sex is illustrated by the experiences of intersex individuals. For nearly two out of every 100 people, a binary definition of sex <a href="https://www.hachettebookgroup.com/titles/anne-fausto-sterling/sexing-the-body/9781541672895/">would not work</a>. People <a href="https://theconversation.com/not-everyone-is-male-or-female-the-growing-controversy-over-sex-designation-172293">who are intersex</a> don’t have chromosomes, hormones or internal and external genitalia that completely match cultural expectations of what males and females should look like. Under these bills, what pronouns would they be allowed to use? There is <a href="https://doi.org/10.1038/518288a">no universal scientific rule</a> for pronoun assignment.</p>
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<figcaption><span class="caption">Sex is a spectrum.</span></figcaption>
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<p>If sex is not binary, then <a href="https://theconversation.com/sex-and-gender-both-shape-your-health-in-different-ways-98293">gender</a> – or personal perceptions of masculinity, femininity, a mix of both, or neither – cannot be either. A 2022 Pew Research Center survey found that roughly <a href="https://www.pewresearch.org/short-reads/2022/06/07/about-5-of-young-adults-in-the-u-s-say-their-gender-is-different-from-their-sex-assigned-at-birth/">1.6% of U.S. adults</a> describe their gender as not aligned with their sex assigned at birth, which can be captured by the terms transgender or nonbinary.</p>
<p>Overall, science <a href="https://doi.org/10.1086/692517">does not have a definitive answer</a> for how to define sex and gender in people that lawmakers can draw upon – science only indicates that these traits are nuanced and complex.</p>
<h2>Limiting teaching on sex and gender affects everyone</h2>
<p>Bills limiting how sex and gender are taught exacerbate the disproportionate obstacles that transgender students already face. The 2019 National School Climate Survey of over 16,700 students in the U.S., conducted by national education nonprofit Gay, Lesbian and Straight Education Network, or GLSEN, reported that trans teens in <a href="https://www.glsen.org/research/2019-national-school-climate-survey">schools without gender-inclusive curricula</a> experienced more bullying, a decreased sense of belonging, poor academic performance and low psychological well-being.</p>
<p>Restrictive bills also discourage LGBT students from studying science. The 2013 GLSEN Network National School Climate Survey found that LGBT teens were <a href="https://www.glsen.org/sites/default/files/2020-03/GLSEN-2013-National-School-Climate-Survey-Full-Report.pdf">less interested in majoring in STEM</a> and the social sciences when the high school classes they took in those fields were not taught with inclusive curricula. </p>
<p>I and my colleagues found similar downstream effects on <a href="https://doi.org/10.1187/cbe.21-12-0343">college students</a>: Trans and nonbinary students reported feeling isolated and uncomfortable in biology courses that teach sex and gender only as a binary. They felt they couldn’t form relationships with their teachers or peers, and this lack of a supportive personal network prevented them from requesting letters of recommendation or getting involved in research. Some dropped out of STEM, and many others contemplated it.</p>
<p>Limiting gender-inclusive curricula in schools can ultimately have negative effects on all students. Children begin <a href="https://doi.org/10.1146/annurev.psych.093008.100511">developing and testing</a> their understanding of sex and gender starting as young as 2 years old. Erasing gender diversity even in elementary schools reinforces <a href="https://doi.org/10.1037/amp0000307">inaccurate conceptions of sex and gender</a> that can last a lifetime. For example, a 2018 study of 132 college students found that those who read a paper emphasizing binary sex and typical gender roles exhibited <a href="https://doi.org/10.1007/s11199-017-0786-3">increased prejudice against transgender people</a>. A 2019 study of 460 eighth through 10th grade students found that those taught an oversimplified and inaccurate definition of sex – as defined by sex chromosomes – had increased beliefs about the genetic basis of sex and in <a href="https://doi.org/10.1002/sce.21502">stereotypes about men and women</a>, including unchangeable sex differences in intelligence and scientific ability. These studies suggest that teaching oversimplified narratives about sex and gender influences not only how students conceive sex and gender but also beliefs about their own and others’ abilities.</p>
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<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/541788/original/file-20230808-27-jcydy2.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="Protestors holding signs reading 'Protect trans kids' and other slogans" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/541788/original/file-20230808-27-jcydy2.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/541788/original/file-20230808-27-jcydy2.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/541788/original/file-20230808-27-jcydy2.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/541788/original/file-20230808-27-jcydy2.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/541788/original/file-20230808-27-jcydy2.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/541788/original/file-20230808-27-jcydy2.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/541788/original/file-20230808-27-jcydy2.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
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<span class="caption">People rally in front of the Kentucky State Capitol on Mar. 29, 2023, to protest the passing of Senate Bill 150, a ‘Don’t Say Gay’ bill that bans gender-affirming care for trans youth, limits discussion of LGBTQ topics in K-12 schools and allows teachers to misgender students.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/news-photo/people-many-of-whom-are-adolescents-gather-during-a-rally-news-photo/1249909096">Jon Cherry/Stringer via Getty Images</a></span>
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<p>The trans and nonbinary college biology students we interviewed suggest there is another long-term harm of oversimplifying sex and gender: <a href="https://doi.org/10.1187/cbe.21-12-0343">lack of preparation</a> for a future career in science or medicine. An oversimplified understanding of sex and gender does not train students to work with the diverse patients and clients they might encounter, and it can <a href="https://mashable.com/article/transgender-healthcare">worsen health disparities</a> for trans people.</p>
<p>Lack of exposure to a broader range of sex and gender roles also limits potential scientific discoveries. Being taught only binary sex and genders biases the research questions scientists consider and the way they interpret their findings.</p>
<p>The study of <a href="https://theconversation.com/women-have-disrupted-research-on-bird-song-and-their-findings-show-how-diversity-can-improve-all-fields-of-science-142874">birdsong</a> offers one example of how this bias can influence research. A common stereotype is that male birds are more competitive than female birds. Because competition occurs partially through song, researchers studied birdsong only in males for a long time. Some scientists recently challenged these beliefs about sex roles by finding that females sing in <a href="https://doi.org/10.1098/rsbl.2019.0059">about 64% of songbird species</a>, opening doors to greater understanding of the function of birdsong.</p>
<h2>What educators and scientists can do</h2>
<p>When science is being misrepresented to justify oversimplified ideas about sex and gender in schools, scientists and science educators have an important role to play. </p>
<p>Sharing perspectives about gender diversity with school boards and elected officials can make a difference. Bringing conversations about sex and gender into the classroom can help all students feel seen and reduce gender stereotypes. Through his work with educators, my co-author, Sam Long, knows it can be intimidating to get into these conversations, but they do not have to be fights about who is right or wrong. Encouraging curiosity about human variation and questioning the portrayal of any trait as pathological simply because it is different or uncommon can help students think critically about sex and gender in respectful ways. </p>
<p>Disability advocates offer an <a href="https://odpc.ucsf.edu/clinical/patient-centered-care/medical-and-social-models-of-disability">inclusive approach</a> that focuses on changing the environment to fit the person rather than changing the person to fit the environment. Physical and mental variations do not inherently reduce a person’s ability to thrive; instead, it is environmental and culture barriers that are limiting or disabling. Educators can pose questions that encourage students to explore this idea. For example, red hair is as rare as intersex traits. Of the two, why are only intersex traits often framed as a disorder? Likewise, human height varies across people. How are buildings, products and services designed to accommodate a spectrum of heights? Why haven’t other physical variations been accommodated in the same way?</p>
<p>Initiatives like <a href="https://www.genderinclusivebiology.com/">Gender-Inclusive Biology</a>, <a href="https://projectbiodiversify.org/sex/">Project Biodiversity</a>, and <a href="https://welcomingschools.org/resources">Welcoming Schools</a> offer additional resources to help adapt the curriculum to acknowledge and celebrate variation in the living world. My co-author Sam is a founding member of Gender-Inclusive Biology.</p>
<p>Encouraging students to think critically about the complexity of sex and gender will encourage everyone to pursue their passions regardless of gender stereotypes, promote creative thinking in science and medicine and support trans students. In this way, teaching about sex and gender complexity can benefit everyone.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/204777/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Sarah Eddy receives funding from the National Science Foundation.</span></em></p>‘Don’t Say Gay’ bills claim to use science to justify a binary definition of sex based on certain traits. But the biology of sex and gender is not so simple.Sarah Eddy, Assistant Professor of Biological Sciences, Florida International UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/2121312023-08-30T12:40:58Z2023-08-30T12:40:58ZZimbabwe’s election was a fight between men – women are sidelined in politics despite quotas<p>Zimbabwe’s <a href="https://www.bbc.com/news/world-africa-65775996">2023 harmonised elections</a> have largely been depicted as a battle between the two “Big Men” – President <a href="https://apnews.com/article/zimbabwe-elections-emerson-mnangagwa-president-crocodile-56668e87d9459980b9d38b57175c31ce">Emmerson Mnangagwa</a> of the ruling Zanu-PF and <a href="https://www.reuters.com/world/africa/who-is-nelson-chamisa-can-he-win-zimbabwes-election-2023-08-23/">Nelson Chamisa</a> of the leading opposition party, the Citizens Coalition for Change (CCC). Significant media attention focused on the <a href="https://www.theafricareport.com/315335/zimbabwe-police-ban-92-ccc-opposition-party-campaign-rallies/">uneven playing field</a> between the ruling party and the opposition.</p>
<p>The election results announced on the 26 August are <a href="https://www.voanews.com/a/us-embassy-joins-others-voicing-concern-about-zimbabwe-election/7242392.html">being disputed</a> due to <a href="https://www.sadc.int/slide-item/sadc-electoral-observation-mission-2023-harmonised-elections-zimbabwe-launched">reports</a> of delayed voting, voter intimidation and ballot paper irregularities. <a href="https://www.zec.org.zw/download-category/2023-presidential-elections-results/">Mnangagwa</a> has been announced as the official winner of the presidential poll, but the CCC has <a href="https://twitter.com/ccczimbabwe/status/1695576909839487050?s=46&t=knTMoeo4WZETacMv4PIpAw">rejected these results</a>. </p>
<p>Another concern distinct to this election was the stark decline in the number of women candidates nominated by the main political parties for direct election. </p>
<p>We are working on a three year research <a href="https://nai.uu.se/research-and-policy-advice/project/making-politics-safer---gendered-violence-and-electoral-temporalities-in-africa.html">project</a> with a focus on the representation of women in politics in Ghana, Kenya and Zimbabwe as well as gendered electoral violence. This project seeks to explore barriers to women’s participation in politics in Africa and pathways forward, initially researched in the book <a href="https://www.bloomsbury.com/us/gendered-institutions-and-womens-political-representation-in-africa-9781913441210/">Gendered Institutions and Women’s Political Representation in Africa</a>.</p>
<p>Zimbabwe ranks low in measures of gender parity in southern Africa. South Africa, Namibia and Mozambique boast <a href="https://data.worldbank.org/indicator/SG.GEN.PARL.ZS">46%, 44% and 42% women’s participation</a> in parliament, respectively. Zimbabwe’s political parties need to field more women for direct election, outside the confines of the quota, in order to reach gender parity. </p>
<h2>Gender quota</h2>
<p>Zimbabwe’s <a href="https://www.veritaszim.net/sites/veritas_d/files/Constitution%20Updated%20to%202021.pdf">constitution in 2013</a> introduced a gender quota to ensure the equitable representation of women in parliament. Zimbabwe’s parliament is composed of a National Assembly (lower house) and a Senate (upper house). The <a href="https://www.veritaszim.net/sites/veritas_d/files/Constitution%20Updated%20to%202021.pdf">quota requires</a> that the lower house reserve 60 of its 270 seats (22%) for women representatives. The upper house is to appoint 60 of its 80 senators from a list that alternates between female and male candidates, called the “zebra-list”. </p>
<p>The purpose of the quota is to push the country towards gender parity – 50/50 female/male representation – as directed by the <a href="https://au.int/en/treaties/protocol-african-charter-human-and-peoples-rights-rights-women-africa">2003 Maputo Protocol</a> and the Southern African Development Community’s 2008 <a href="https://www.sadc.int/sites/default/files/2021-08/Protocol_on_Gender_and_Development_2008.pdf">Protocol on Gender and Development</a>.</p>
<p>However, women’s representation in Zimbabwe’s parliament has declined since 2013, in spite of the quota. <a href="https://wpp-africa.net/sites/default/files/2021-05/English%20Policy%20brief%20on%20women%20participation%20in%20politics%20in%20Zimbabwe.pdf">In 2013</a> women made up 33% of the National Assembly and 48% of the Senate. Only 12% of these women were elected directly. In <a href="https://wpp-africa.net/sites/default/files/2021-05/English%20Policy%20brief%20on%20women%20participation%20in%20politics%20in%20Zimbabwe.pdf">2018</a> the numbers in the National Assembly and Senate fell to 31% and 44%, respectively. </p>
<p>There was a significant decline in the number of women nominated to contest the 2023 elections. Only 68 (11%) of 633 aspiring parliamentarians for direct election were women. </p>
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Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/women-stand-up-comedians-in-zimbabwe-talk-about-sex-and-the-patriarchy-156052">Women stand-up comedians in Zimbabwe talk about sex - and the patriarchy</a>
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<p>In spite of these challenges, <a href="https://www.zec.org.zw/download-category/national_assembly/">23 women were elected into parliament</a> (against 26 in <a href="https://www.womenpoliticalleaders.org/women-make-up-more-than-one-third-of-zimbabwe-s-new-parliament-un-women-1447/">2013</a> and 25 in <a href="https://www.idea.int/data-tools/data/gender-quotas/country-view/312/35">2018</a>). The 23 newly elected women will be added to the 60 women appointed through the quota, making a total of 83, or 30.7% representation of women, in the lower house. After the appointment of senators, as <a href="https://www.wipo.int/edocs/lexdocs/laws/en/zw/zw038en.pdf#page=52">stipulated by the constitution</a>, the number of women in the full parliament will increase. Though commendable, this still places Zimbabwe below average within the region. </p>
<p>These gains may fail to go beyond the 31% representation achieved in <a href="https://www.idea.int/data-tools/data/gender-quotas/country-view/312/35">2018</a>. The women in the National Assembly will still be less than 50% of parliamentarians and have limited decision making powers. Moreover, there is little indication of the substantive impact these women will have to empower Zimbabwean women, considering their limited numbers. The country’s record of democratic deficits is another important challenge. </p>
<p>The newly elected women MPs may have limited room for manoeuvre to promote gender equality in this political context. But they are still important as decision makers, legislators and role models for other women to enter politics. </p>
<h2>Looking beyond the quota</h2>
<p>A gendered audit of the <a href="https://www.zec.org.zw/download/government-gazette-extraordinary-vol-64-30-06-2023-electoral-act-2/">published list of nominated candidates</a> for direct elections reveals that Zimbabwe’s political parties did not field enough women to reach gender parity in 2023. </p>
<p>Data shows that 633 registered candidates contested 210 seats through direct election. Of these candidates only 68 were women. That is, only 11% of aspiring parliamentarians for direct election were women. Of these 68, Zanu-PF fielded 23 women (34%), the CCC fielded 20 (29%), and the remaining 25 women were from small minority parties (27%) and independent candidates (10%).</p>
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Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/animal-farm-has-been-translated-into-shona-why-a-group-of-zimbabwean-writers-undertook-the-task-206966">Animal Farm has been translated into Shona – why a group of Zimbabwean writers undertook the task</a>
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<p>Harare and Bulawayo provinces nominated the highest number of women candidates for election. In Mashonaland Central only one woman was nominated across 18 constituencies. Only two women were nominated in Matebeleland South across 12 constituencies.</p>
<p>It is important to ask why political parties are not fielding more women for direct election. And what this means for the future of representative politics in Zimbabwe. </p>
<h2>Gender bias within political parties</h2>
<p>The data above indicates a bias against woman candidates that permeates across political parties. Apart from the women nominated through the obligations of the quota, neither the CCC nor Zanu-PF fielded enough women to make gender parity a reality in the 2023 elections. </p>
<p>The active exclusion of women from politics is driven by gendered prejudices. These are informed by social, cultural and religious beliefs <a href="https://munin.uit.no/handle/10037/29600">rooted in patriarchal values </a> that view women as inherently weak and untrustworthy. </p>
<p>The <a href="https://www.zimbabwesituation.com/news/women-bear-brunt-of-political-violence/">threat and use of violence against women candidates</a> continues to be used to coerce and discourage women from contesting elections. As argued by Zimbabwean scholars <a href="https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/abs/10.1177/0021909620986576?journalCode=jasa">Sandra Bhatasara and Manase Chiweshe</a>, </p>
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<p>patriarchy, intertwined with the increase in militarised masculinities, is producing exclusion with limited spaces for women’s participation. </p>
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<p>A negative perception is also linked to “quota women” as they were not elected by “the people”. These women are often subjected to <a href="https://core.ac.uk/reader/188770530">elite patriarchal bargaining</a>. They primarily serve the needs of their party, rather than representing Zimbabwean women.</p>
<h2>Gatekeeping</h2>
<p>The presence of a gender quota system provides a facade of progress. This conceals the stark reality that neither the CCC nor Zanu-PF is committed to increasing women’s representation outside the confines of the quota. Political parties function as “election gatekeepers”. They determine the level of women’s inclusion in representative politics, outside the quota system.</p>
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<a href="https://theconversation.com/how-informal-sector-organisations-in-zimbabwe-shape-notions-of-citizenship-180455">How informal sector organisations in Zimbabwe shape notions of citizenship</a>
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<p>The number of women elected indicates that, unlike in <a href="https://www.idea.int/data-tools/data/gender-quotas/country-view/312/35">past elections</a>, Zimbabweans seem more willing to vote for women representatives. Political parties should build on these small gains and nominate more women for elections. This will allow the country to move closer to the goals of gender parity, gender equality and democratic plurality.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/212131/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Diana Højlund Madsen is a project leader for the project 'Making Politics Safer - Gendered Violence and Electoral Temporalities in Africa' funded by the Swedish Research Council.</span></em></p><p class="fine-print"><em><span>Shingirai Mtero works for the Nordic Africa Institute on the project Making Politics Safer. This project receives funding from the Swedish Research Council. </span></em></p>Women’s representation in Zimbabwe’s parliament has declined in spite of a quota imposed in 2013.Diana Højlund Madsen, Senior Gender Researcher, Nordic Africa Institute, Uppsala, Sweden, The Nordic Africa InstituteShingirai Mtero, Postdoctoral Researcher, The Nordic Africa InstituteLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/2120982023-08-27T22:42:36Z2023-08-27T22:42:36ZFinancial education has its limits – if we want New Zealanders to be better with money, we need to start at home<p>Even as an economics student at university, I remember heading into town on a Friday night knowing what I needed to pay the bills before I could spend on socialising. But despite having the financial literacy to know better, Monday could still sometimes begin with a trip to the bank to ask for an overdraft extension. </p>
<p>So it was encouraging to hear that financial education has become a political talking point ahead of this year’s election. Both <a href="https://www.stuff.co.nz/national/politics/132778326/labour-promises-compulsory-financial-literacy-lessons-for-school-children-national-backs-the-idea">Labour</a> and <a href="https://www.1news.co.nz/2023/08/20/national-also-aiming-to-make-financial-literacy-compulsory-in-schools/">National</a> are promising to deliver compulsory financial literacy classes as part of the school curriculum. </p>
<p>Labour’s proposed financial literacy programme would include the basics of budgeting, financial concepts and how to be good with money. It would also include explanations of interest rates, retirement savings, insurance, debt and borrowing. </p>
<p>And when Prime Minister Chris Hipkins said “it shouldn’t matter what circumstances you were born into, you should still be able to learn concepts to help you”, he was right. Improved financial literacy can only be a good thing for New Zealand. </p>
<p>With the country in a recession, New Zealanders are facing both <a href="https://theconversation.com/dont-let-financial-shame-be-your-ruin-open-conversations-can-help-ease-the-burden-of-personal-debt-202496">ballooning debt and a legacy of poor saving</a>. The average household debt in New Zealand is now more than 170% of gross household income. This is higher than the United Kingdom (133%), Australia (113%) or Ireland (96%). </p>
<p>And yet, researchers remain divided over whether financial education can actually have a positive impact on financial behaviour in the long term. In New Zealand and elsewhere, it seems factors closer to home have a greater influence on a person’s financial literacy than anything learned at school. </p>
<h2>Education, borrowing and debt</h2>
<p>One 2014 <a href="https://openknowledge.worldbank.org/entities/publication/44870ac3-5b7e-57f7-be49-000f56f4cc30">meta-analysis</a> of 188 research papers and articles concluded financial literacy interventions had a positive impact on increasing savings, but had no impact on reducing loan defaults. </p>
<p>A <a href="https://openknowledge.worldbank.org/entities/publication/eb8b7699-0d2f-5d6d-ab1e-4262122c1a9c">second analysis of 126 studies</a>, published in 2017, found financial education positively affected financial behaviour – but this had limits for lower-income families. Much like the earlier study, the researchers found borrowing behaviour was more difficult to change with formal education than saving behaviour. </p>
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<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/are-you-financially-literate-here-are-7-signs-youre-on-the-right-track-202331">Are you financially literate? Here are 7 signs you're on the right track</a>
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<p>An important caveat is that these analyses measured the short-term response to hypothetical questions, not long-term behaviour.</p>
<p>But even when examining the impact of financial education on short-term behaviour, researchers found it was difficult to influence how people handled debt. Compulsory financial education did not improve the likelihood of getting into debt, or the likelihood of defaulting on loans. </p>
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<h2>Home and financial knowledge</h2>
<p>In his famous work on <a href="https://hr.berkeley.edu/how-social-learning-theory-works">social learning theory</a>, psychologist Albert Bandurra proposed that observation and modelling play a primary role in how and why people learn. They are particularly relevant to the development of financial attitudes, confidence and behaviour. </p>
<p>Specifically, young people learn from the financial behaviour <a href="http://abrn.asia/ojs/index.php/apjssr/article/view/61/68">modelled by their parents</a>, discussions about money in the home, and from receiving pocket money.</p>
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Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/financial-literacy-is-a-public-policy-problem-84695">Financial literacy is a public policy problem</a>
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<p>It has been suggested the differences in how money and finances are dealt with in the home are linked to why women generally <a href="https://theconversation.com/hilda-survey-reveals-striking-gender-and-age-divide-in-financial-literacy-test-yourself-with-this-quiz-100451">score lower on financial literacy quizzes</a>, as do people from lower socio-economic backgrounds. </p>
<p>Parents’ education and their financial sophistication – whether they have stocks, for example – <a href="https://www.mdpi.com/1911-8074/16/4/252">have been shown</a> to affect their offspring’s financial literacy. Women are also found to have <a href="https://institute.eib.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/10/women-conf-lit.pdf">lower financial confidence</a>, even when they have the right knowledge.</p>
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<p>In a <a href="https://www.emerald.com/insight/content/doi/10.1108/YC-07-2017-00717/full/html">New Zealand study</a> of over 1,200 young people aged 14 and 15, the age of the first financial discussion between parent and child was found to be an important influence on future financial knowledge, attitudes and intentions. </p>
<p>The study found boys, on average, had their first financial discussion in the home at a younger age than girls. The age at which these initial discussions happen influence a person’s financial literacy levels at tertiary education age and beyond, even accounting for other demographic variables. </p>
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<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/there-are-serious-problems-with-the-concept-of-financial-literacy-84836">There are serious problems with the concept of 'financial literacy'</a>
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<p>These findings suggest the way parents talk and manage finances in the home may be subject to a gender bias, contributing to <a href="https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/ijcs.12179">different levels of financial literacy</a> – and confidence – between girls and boys. </p>
<p>So, as we consider adding financial education to New Zealand’s curriculum, it’s important to consider all of the factors that will feed into a student’s money literacy – and not just focus on test results in a classroom setting.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/212098/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Stephen Agnew does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Both major political parties have promised to introduce financial literacy to New Zealand’s curriculum. But is school really the best place to teach students about money?Stephen Agnew, Senior Lecturer of Economics, University of CanterburyLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/2102472023-07-26T22:47:09Z2023-07-26T22:47:09ZThe progress of women in the workplace is at a standstill. How can we break through the glass ceiling?<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/539041/original/file-20230724-27-ph4kyq.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=14%2C0%2C1899%2C1200&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">The progression of women in organizations is undermined by stereotypes and prejudices.</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">(Shutterstock)</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>Women are promoted less than men because they are deemed to have less leadership potential than men. </p>
<p>These are the findings <a href="https://danielle-li.github.io/assets/docs/PotentialAndTheGenderPromotionGap.pdf">of a study published in 2022</a> by professors Alan Benson of the University of Minnesota, Danielle Li of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and the National Bureau of Economic Research (NBER) and Kelly Shue of Yale University and the NBER. Their conclusion is based on the consultation of 30,000 performance evaluation forms of employees working in a large American retail chain.</p>
<p>According to <a href="https://insights.som.yale.edu/insights/women-arent-promoted-because-managers-underestimate-their-potential">Prof. Shue</a>, performance assessment is generally very factual and based on very concrete evaluation criteria. Assessing leadership potential, on the other hand, is more subjective and can give free rein to the biases that shape the perception of leadership as conceived by those who carry out these assessments.</p>
<p>“What we commonly talk about in terms of management and potential are characteristics such as assertiveness, execution skills, charisma, leadership and ambition. These are, I believe, real traits. They are also very subjective and stereotypical, associated with male leaders. What we have seen in the data is a fairly strong bias against women in assessments of potential.”</p>
<p>According to these researchers, women’s evaluations of their promotion potential are getting progressively lower than men’s as they rise through the ranks of the organization, leading to an increasingly solid glass ceiling.</p>
<p>This is what we’ve seen when we’ve looked at the presence of women in senior management positions for decades, notably as I have, as dean and executive-in-residence at the John Molson School of Business, as well as co-director of the Barry F. Lorenzetti Centre for Women Entrepreneurship and Leadership. Things are not changing fast. <a href="https://www.weforum.org/reports/global-gender-gap-report-2022">According to a recent World Economic Forum report on gender inequality in the world</a>, at this rate, it would take another 132 years (compared to 136 in 2021) to close the gender gap.</p>
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<strong>
À lire aussi :
<a href="https://theconversation.com/avec-les-nouvelles-generations-il-faut-voir-autrement-les-cheminements-de-carriere-surtout-ceux-des-femmes-200201">Avec les nouvelles générations, il faut voir autrement les cheminements de carrière – surtout ceux des femmes</a>
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<h2>A better work-life balance</h2>
<p>As <a href="https://www.mckinsey.com/ca/%7E/media/mckinsey/locations/north%20america/canada/gender%20diversity%20at%20work/gender_diversity_at_work_in_canada.pdf">the consulting firm McKinsey</a> illustrates, only 30 per cent of senior management positions and only five per cent of CEO positions in Canada are held by women, <a href="https://www.securities-administrators.ca/wp-content/uploads/2022/10/2022oct27-58-314-avis-acvmWOB.pdf">according to a census by the Canadian Securities Administrators</a>.</p>
<p>In addition to perception issues, there are a number of other factors that explain the scarcity of female talent in senior management. These include the demands of balancing work and family, women’s choices for a better life balance, disillusionment about their chances of accessing these strategic positions, and so on.</p>
<p>However, we will be focusing on the following two questions, which were addressed <a href="https://women-initiative-foundation.com/en/the-foundation/">at our last master’s class for the Women Initiative Foundation</a>, which took place in May at the John Molson School of Business:</p>
<p>1) Is there a trend towards a new conception of leadership that is more multidimensional and parity-based and that fosters greater equity?</p>
<p>2) Can women be more proactive in their quest to make a greater impact at the highest levels of decision-making?</p>
<h2>For a new leadership type</h2>
<p><a href="https://theconversation.com/pandemie-les-femmes-font-elles-de-meilleures-leaders-137048">In an article published on <em>La Conversation</em></a> in April 2020, which I co-authored with Anne-Marie Croteau, dean of the John Molson School of Business, we reflected on the challenges of the 21st century that will characterize the evolution of leadership. </p>
<p>More specifically, we referred to climate change, health, the environment and the depletion of the Earth’s resources, the aging population, the shortage of talent and the development of new technologies. All these major factors are reshaping the game and calling for a new type of leadership, different from the command-and-control approach which marked the last century.</p>
<p>This new type of leadership draws heavily on resilience, courage, flexibility, listening, empathy, collaboration, benevolence and recognition of the collective contribution. The involvement of everyone’s intelligence becomes the key to success. As parity in management functions is gradually taking place, these other leadership characteristics are emerging.</p>
<p>In order to overcome the obstacles of the 21st century and achieve success, organizations need to diversify their pool of talent as much as possible, particularly in terms of gender. It is now high time to review the definition of leadership to make it more multidimensional, referring to all the qualities it must include and promote.</p>
<h2>Career-boosting mandates</h2>
<p>Given this move towards a new approach to leadership among today’s managers, we can ask ourselves about the opportunities that women can seize to raise their profile within organizations and develop their expertise. </p>
<p>One of the strategies that deserves attention <a href="https://hbr.org/2014/06/21st-century-talent-spotting">is the acceptance of mandates that we will call career boosters</a>, and which can be defined as follows: a short-term role that enables the acquisition of new strategic knowledge while creating significant added value for the organization.</p>
<p><a href="https://hbr.org/2014/06/21st-century-talent-spotting">According to a study carried out among senior business executives</a>, 71 per cent of respondents identified these types of mandates as having been their career boosters. Another <a href="https://www.kornferry.com/insights/this-week-in-leadership/strategy-activation-planning-leadership-development-journey">study by the consultancy Korn Ferry</a> even described these types of roles as the most valuable career acceleration experience, ahead of mentoring, training and even networking with more experienced leaders.</p>
<h2>Raising awareness in organizations</h2>
<p>Unfortunately, this type of special assignment is offered more frequently to men than to women, with administrative assignments (note-taking, event organization, making coffee for meetings) being the most frequently offered to women <a href="https://www.huffpost.com/entry/women-serve-coffee-at-work-how-to-say-no_l_5d35c9bfe4b004b6adb352a5">as well as those that do not lead to promotion</a>.</p>
<p>Organizations have a duty to be mindful of this discrepancy by documenting the assignment of such mandates by gender, highlighting the inequities that such an assignment process can engender, linking the granting of such mandates to individual performance and, above all, consciously offering more such mandates to women in order to correct these unconscious prejudices.</p>
<p>It’s possible to break through the glass ceiling, but succeeding in this major challenge requires a fresh look at leadership. Opportunities for career acceleration must be offered to people of all genders. Our organizations also need to become more aware of the hidden inequities embedded in promotion processes.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/210247/count.gif" alt="La Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Les auteurs ne travaillent pas, ne conseillent pas, ne possèdent pas de parts, ne reçoivent pas de fonds d'une organisation qui pourrait tirer profit de cet article, et n'ont déclaré aucune autre affiliation que leur organisme de recherche.</span></em></p>To counter stereotypes and prejudices of women at work, we need to take a fresh look at leadership and encourage career-boosting mandates.Louise Champoux-Paillé, Cadre en exercice, John Molson School of Business, Concordia UniversityAnne-Marie Croteau, Dean, John Molson School of Business, Concordia UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/2037342023-05-09T12:24:45Z2023-05-09T12:24:45ZI unintentionally created a biased AI algorithm 25 years ago – tech companies are still making the same mistake<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/524698/original/file-20230505-21-fplz90.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=46%2C0%2C7673%2C4340&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Facial recognition software misidentifies Black women more than other people.</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/photo/biometric-authentication-using-facial-recognition-royalty-free-image/1462119566">JLco - Ana Suanes/iStock via Getty Images</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>In 1998, I unintentionally created a racially biased artificial intelligence algorithm. There are lessons in that story that resonate even more strongly today. </p>
<p>The dangers of <a href="https://theconversation.com/can-a-machine-be-racist-artificial-intelligence-has-shown-troubling-signs-of-bias-but-there-are-reasons-for-optimism-197893">bias and errors in AI algorithms</a> are now well known. Why, then, has there been a flurry of blunders by tech companies in recent months, especially in the world of AI chatbots and image generators? Initial versions of ChatGPT produced <a href="https://www.newstatesman.com/quickfire/2022/12/chatgpt-shows-ai-racism-problem">racist output</a>. The DALL-E 2 and Stable Diffusion image generators both showed <a href="https://doi.org/10.48550/arXiv.2303.11408">racial bias</a> in the pictures they created.</p>
<p>My own epiphany as a white male <a href="https://scholar.google.com/citations?user=Fjk9SMwAAAAJ&hl=en">computer scientist</a> occurred while teaching a computer science class in 2021. The class had just viewed a video poem by Joy Buolamwini, <a href="https://www.ajl.org/about">AI researcher and artist</a> and the self-described <a href="https://www.poetofcode.com/">poet of code</a>. Her 2019 video poem “<a href="https://youtu.be/QxuyfWoVV98">AI, Ain’t I a Woman?</a>” is a devastating three-minute exposé of racial and gender biases in automatic face recognition systems – systems developed by tech companies like Google and Microsoft. </p>
<p>The systems often fail on women of color, incorrectly labeling them as male. Some of the failures are particularly egregious: The hair of Black civil rights leader Ida B. Wells is labeled as a “coonskin cap”; another Black woman is labeled as possessing a “walrus mustache.”</p>
<h2>Echoing through the years</h2>
<p>I had a horrible déjà vu moment in that computer science class: I suddenly remembered that I, too, had once created a racially biased algorithm. In 1998, I was a doctoral student. My project involved tracking the movements of a person’s head based on input from a video camera. My doctoral adviser had already developed <a href="https://link.springer.com/book/10.1007/978-1-4471-1555-7">mathematical techniques</a> for accurately following the head in certain situations, but the system needed to be much faster and more robust. Earlier in the 1990s, <a href="https://doi.org/10.1007/3-540-61123-1_173">researchers in other labs</a> had shown that skin-colored areas of an image could be extracted in real time. So we decided to focus on skin color as an additional cue for the tracker.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/524500/original/file-20230504-29-nvgsq7.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="a color video frame showing a young man entering a room with a red curve overlaying the image outlining his head" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/524500/original/file-20230504-29-nvgsq7.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/524500/original/file-20230504-29-nvgsq7.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=402&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/524500/original/file-20230504-29-nvgsq7.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=402&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/524500/original/file-20230504-29-nvgsq7.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=402&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/524500/original/file-20230504-29-nvgsq7.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=505&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/524500/original/file-20230504-29-nvgsq7.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=505&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/524500/original/file-20230504-29-nvgsq7.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=505&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">The author’s 1998 head-tracking algorithm used skin color to distinguish a face from the background of an image.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Source: John MacCormick</span>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nd/4.0/">CC BY-ND</a></span>
</figcaption>
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<p>I used a digital camera – still a rarity at that time – to take a few shots of my own hand and face, and I also snapped the hands and faces of two or three other people who happened to be in the building. It was easy to manually extract some of the skin-colored pixels from these images and construct a statistical model for the skin colors. After some tweaking and debugging, we had a surprisingly robust real-time <a href="https://link.springer.com/book/10.1007/978-1-4471-0679-1">head-tracking system</a>.</p>
<p>Not long afterward, my adviser asked me to demonstrate the system to some visiting company executives. When they walked into the room, I was instantly flooded with anxiety: the executives were Japanese. In my casual experiment to see if a simple statistical model would work with our prototype, I had collected data from myself and a handful of others who happened to be in the building. But 100% of these subjects had “white” skin; the Japanese executives did not. </p>
<p>Miraculously, the system worked reasonably well on the executives anyway. But I was shocked by the realization that I had created a racially biased system that could have easily failed for other nonwhite people.</p>
<h2>Privilege and priorities</h2>
<p>How and why do well-educated, well-intentioned scientists produce biased AI systems? Sociological theories of privilege provide one useful lens.</p>
<p>Ten years before I created the head-tracking system, the scholar Peggy McIntosh proposed the idea of an “<a href="https://www.jstor.org/stable/community.30714426">invisible knapsack</a>” carried around by white people. Inside the knapsack is a treasure trove of privileges such as “I can do well in a challenging situation without being called a credit to my race,” and “I can criticize our government and talk about how much I fear its policies and behavior without being seen as a cultural outsider.”</p>
<p>In the age of AI, that knapsack needs some new items, such as “AI systems won’t give poor results because of my race.” The invisible knapsack of a white scientist would also need: “I can develop an AI system based on my own appearance, and know it will work well for most of my users.”</p>
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<iframe width="440" height="260" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/QxuyfWoVV98?wmode=transparent&start=0" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen=""></iframe>
<figcaption><span class="caption">AI researcher and artist Joy Buolamwini’s video poem ‘AI, Ain’t I a Woman?’</span></figcaption>
</figure>
<p>One suggested remedy for white privilege is to be actively <a href="https://www.ibramxkendi.com/how-to-be-an-antiracist">anti-racist</a>. For the 1998 head-tracking system, it might seem obvious that the anti-racist remedy is to treat all skin colors equally. Certainly, we can and should ensure that the system’s training data represents the range of all skin colors as equally as possible. </p>
<p>Unfortunately, this does not guarantee that all skin colors observed by the system will be treated equally. The system must classify every possible color as skin or nonskin. Therefore, there exist colors right on the boundary between skin and nonskin – a region computer scientists call the decision boundary. A person whose skin color crosses over this decision boundary will be classified incorrectly.</p>
<p>Scientists also face a nasty subconscious dilemma when incorporating diversity into machine learning models: Diverse, inclusive models perform worse than narrow models.</p>
<p>A simple analogy can explain this. Imagine you are given a choice between two tasks. Task A is to identify one particular type of tree – say, elm trees. Task B is to identify five types of trees: elm, ash, locust, beech and walnut. It’s obvious that if you are given a fixed amount of time to practice, you will perform better on Task A than Task B. </p>
<p>In the same way, an algorithm that tracks only white skin will be more accurate than an algorithm that tracks the full range of human skin colors. Even if they are aware of the need for diversity and fairness, scientists can be subconsciously affected by this competing need for accuracy.</p>
<h2>Hidden in the numbers</h2>
<p>My creation of a biased algorithm was thoughtless and potentially offensive. Even more concerning, this incident demonstrates how bias can remain concealed deep within an AI system. To see why, consider a particular set of 12 numbers in a matrix of three rows and four columns. Do they seem racist? The head-tracking algorithm I developed in 1998 is controlled by a matrix like this, which describes the skin color model. But it’s impossible to tell from these numbers alone that this is in fact a racist matrix. They are just numbers, determined automatically by a computer program. </p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/523921/original/file-20230502-1574-pyg2o.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="a matrix of numbers in three rows and four columns" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/523921/original/file-20230502-1574-pyg2o.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/523921/original/file-20230502-1574-pyg2o.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=167&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/523921/original/file-20230502-1574-pyg2o.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=167&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/523921/original/file-20230502-1574-pyg2o.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=167&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/523921/original/file-20230502-1574-pyg2o.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=209&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/523921/original/file-20230502-1574-pyg2o.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=209&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/523921/original/file-20230502-1574-pyg2o.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=209&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">This matrix is at the heart of the author’s 1998 skin color model. Can you spot the racism?</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Source: John MacCormick</span>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nd/4.0/">CC BY-ND</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>The problem of bias hiding in plain sight is much more severe in modern machine-learning systems. Deep neural networks – currently the most popular and powerful type of AI model – often have millions of numbers in which bias could be encoded. The biased face recognition systems critiqued in “AI, Ain’t I a Woman?” are all deep neural networks.</p>
<p>The good news is that a great deal of progress on AI fairness has already been made, both in academia and in industry. Microsoft, for example, has a research group known as <a href="https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/research/theme/fate/">FATE</a>, devoted to Fairness, Accountability, Transparency and Ethics in AI. A leading machine-learning conference, NeurIPS, has detailed <a href="https://neurips.cc/public/EthicsGuidelines">ethics guidelines</a>, including an eight-point list of negative social impacts that must be considered by researchers who submit papers.</p>
<h2>Who’s in the room is who’s at the table</h2>
<p>On the other hand, even in 2023, fairness can still be the victim of competitive pressures in academia and industry. The flawed <a href="https://www.wired.com/story/review-ai-chatbots-bing-bard-chat-gpt/">Bard and Bing chatbots</a> from Google and Microsoft are recent evidence of this grim reality. The commercial necessity of building market share led to the premature release of these systems. </p>
<p>The systems suffer from exactly the same problems as my 1998 head tracker. Their training data is biased. They are designed by an unrepresentative group. They face the mathematical impossibility of treating all categories equally. They must somehow trade accuracy for fairness. And their biases are hiding behind millions of inscrutable numerical parameters.</p>
<p>So, how far has the AI field really come since it was possible, over 25 years ago, for a doctoral student to design and publish the results of a racially biased algorithm with no apparent oversight or consequences? It’s clear that biased AI systems can still be created unintentionally and easily. It’s also clear that the bias in these systems can be harmful, hard to detect and even harder to eliminate. </p>
<p>These days it’s a cliché to say industry and academia need diverse groups of people “in the room” designing these algorithms. It would be helpful if the field could reach that point. But in reality, with North American computer science doctoral programs graduating only about <a href="https://cra.org/resources/taulbee-survey/">23% female, and 3% Black and Latino students</a>, there will continue to be many rooms and many algorithms in which underrepresented groups are not represented at all.</p>
<p>That’s why the fundamental lessons of my 1998 head tracker are even more important today: It’s easy to make a mistake, it’s easy for bias to enter undetected, and everyone in the room is responsible for preventing it.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/203734/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>I worked for Microsoft from 2003-2007.</span></em></p>One researcher’s experience from a quarter-century ago shows why bias in AI remains a problem – and why the solution isn’t a simple technical fix.John MacCormick, Professor of Computer Science, Dickinson CollegeLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/2004152023-03-10T13:48:48Z2023-03-10T13:48:48Z5 tips for women to negotiate a higher salary<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/514522/original/file-20230309-18-m81h0x.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">U.S. women earn 82% of what U.S. men earn — and the gap is significantly higher for Black and Hispanic women.</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/photo/young-female-applicant-at-job-interview-royalty-free-image/1355656345">Portra/E+ Collection/Getty Images</a></span></figcaption></figure><p><a href="https://www.pay-equity.org/day.html">Equal Pay Day</a> falls in 2023 on March 14 — a date determined by how long into the new year American women must work to catch up to American men’s earnings the previous year. In 2022, <a href="https://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2023/03/01/gender-pay-gap-facts/">women earned 82%</a> of what men earned. The wage gap for Black and Hispanic women is even higher — these groups made <a href="https://www.pewresearch.org/social-trends/2023/03/01/the-enduring-grip-of-the-gender-pay-gap/#gender-pay-gap-differs-widely-by-race-and-ethnicity">70% and 65%, respectively</a>, of what white men made.</p>
<p>Some of the gender pay gap can be attributed to differences in <a href="https://doi.org/10.1093/qje/qjab026">how women negotiate</a>.</p>
<p>This is not to say that women don’t negotiate as well as men, or even less often. Women are negotiating well and self-advocating in their careers every day – sometimes <a href="https://doi.org/10.1111/ncmr.12153">more actively and effectively</a> than their male counterparts. Women have been observed to <a href="https://doi.org/10.5465/amj.2017.1497">negotiate exceptions</a> to typical work or business practices more than men. This includes, for example, negotiating a remote work arrangement prior to the pandemic.</p>
<p>But when it comes to salary and wage negotiations, research suggests that women are <a href="https://doi.org/10.1037/bul0000135">more reluctant to ask</a> and <a href="https://doi.org/10.1111/irel.12214">less effective</a> when they do.</p>
<p>That’s because salary negotiations are generally seen as competitive <a href="https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1750-4716.2010.00072.x">situations that favor men and masculinity</a>. In such settings, self-advocating violates societal norms that women should be kind and communal. According to the authors of one study, <a href="https://doi.org/10.1037/a0017094">women anticipating backlash from attempting to negotiate</a> “hedge their assertiveness, using fewer competing tactics and obtaining lower outcomes.” </p>
<p>The fear of backlash is reasonable. Men and women alike say they are <a href="https://doi.org/10.1016/j.obhdp.2006.09.001">less willing to work with women</a> who ask to be paid more. </p>
<p>I <a href="https://scholar.google.com/citations?hl=en&user=p2WhPu4AAAAJ&view_op=list_works&sortby=pubdate">research negotiation and conflict management</a> and <a href="https://www.american.edu/kogod/faculty/mislin.cfm">teach a variety of negotiation courses</a> to undergraduate and graduate students.</p>
<p>Here are five tips that you can start applying today to be more effective in your workplace negotiations. These strategies benefit women but represent best practices for anyone seeking higher pay regardless of where they identify on the gender spectrum.</p>
<h2>1. Think before you ask</h2>
<p>Consider what you really want before you launch into your negotiation – hit pause and take a step back. How does what you’re asking for fit into your bigger work or life aspirations? You might start with a focus on a salary increase, but what you really want is an accelerated promotion track. </p>
<p>Negotiating professional development opportunities and your role at work <a href="https://doi.org/10.5465/amj.2017.1497">may do more</a> to help close the pay gap than getting paid more than you are currently earning. So, take stock of your goals and make sure you are focusing on negotiating about the right issues.</p>
<h2>2. Communicate your value</h2>
<p>Once your purpose and objective are clear, figure out how to articulate your value. Women are <a href="https://doi.org/10.1177/0361684312455524">more persuasive and reduce the risk of backlash</a> when they explain why what they are asking for is appropriate and justified. As you do this, put yourself into the hiring manager’s or your boss’s shoes and consider how the request you are making is legitimate from their perspective. How can, for example, your data visualization skills help your team communicate more successfully at the next client meeting? How can you position what you are asking for, such as a promotion to senior analyst, in terms of bigger business goals, like expanding the client base?</p>
<p>When women articulate their value while considering the other person’s objectives, their negotiation behavior is perceived as more socially acceptable and women are <a href="https://doi.org/10.1177/0361684312455524">better positioned to succeed</a>.</p>
<h2>3. Ask for more than just salary</h2>
<p>Gender differences are <a href="https://doi.org/10.1037/a0038184">most likely to arise</a> when it is less clear whether negotiating is appropriate. This might be a job that doesn’t explicitly indicate that wages are negotiable, or where the salary range is not disclosed. In these cases, women are less inclined to negotiate because they anticipate backlash. This applies not just to salary or wage negotiations, but also negotiations for other opportunities, including promotion, work assignments, developmental opportunities and resources.</p>
<p>When you are not sure whether negotiating is appropriate, ask around and gather information from trusted sources. Use your network, but also stretch beyond your network. You may want to seek advice from, for example, men in male-dominated work settings. People tend to <a href="https://doi.org/10.1038/srep01214">connect with others who are similar</a> in age, gender, ethnicity and socioeconomic status, so information from your close network can be skewed. Find out what people are negotiating at work and <a href="https://doi.org/10.1521/soco.2009.27.3.418">reduce the social risk of asking by decreasing ambiguity</a> around whether negotiating is appropriate.</p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="Young woman with long hair wearing white blazer smiles at laptop screen" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/514529/original/file-20230309-20-htsh1k.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/514529/original/file-20230309-20-htsh1k.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/514529/original/file-20230309-20-htsh1k.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/514529/original/file-20230309-20-htsh1k.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/514529/original/file-20230309-20-htsh1k.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/514529/original/file-20230309-20-htsh1k.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/514529/original/file-20230309-20-htsh1k.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Successful negotiators offer solutions that aim to work out a problem rather than win a fight.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/photo/happy-businesswoman-working-in-a-coffee-store-royalty-free-image/910726126">Richiesd/iStock/Getty Images Plus</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>4. Check your mindset</h2>
<p>Whether you see yourself as a reluctant negotiator, a competitive negotiator or a people-pleaser, what matters more is your mindset going into the negotiation. A <a href="https://doi.org/10.1177/2041386613505857">review of individual differences in negotiations</a> identified the single best predictor of performance as having a positive mindset – confidence in one’s own ability and confidence that it is appropriate to negotiate.</p>
<p>A positive mindset also means approaching negotiations with curiosity. Make it about trying to work out a problem, not winning a fight. This approach is more aligned with <a href="https://doi.org/10.2307/41166421">social expectations that women are communal</a>, and it is also a best practice that produces better results.</p>
<p>Even if the other person starts with no, don’t let that derail your negotiation. Prepare to stay at the table and find out why. If you cannot get the salary increase you are asking for, maybe you can successfully negotiate a developmental opportunity and revisit the salary conversation in six months. </p>
<h2>5. Don’t skip the small talk</h2>
<p>On the other side of the negotiation is a person, and you will find it easier to reach a solution together if you get along. Small talk before the negotiation helps build the relationship and can have a <a href="https://doi.org/10.1016/j.obhdp.2011.01.002">positive effect on your negotiations</a>. Familiarity with the employer may even <a href="https://doi.org/10.1287/mnsc.2017.2880">give women a bigger boost</a> than men. So get to know the person you will be negotiating with personally, and don’t skip the small talk.</p>
<p>Practice these five tips and keep negotiating. The more experience you have negotiating, <a href="https://doi.org/10.1037/a0032255">the better you will do</a>. And the better results women get from negotiating well will help shrink the gender pay gap between men and women.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/200415/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Alexandra Mislin does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>A negotiation expert offers practical tips for getting the salary or promotion you want.Alexandra Mislin, Associate Professor of Management, American UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/2006252023-03-03T13:24:55Z2023-03-03T13:24:55ZThe retention problem: Women are going into tech but are also being driven out<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/513069/original/file-20230302-98-hr8cj6.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=0%2C0%2C5700%2C3797&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">A sense of community and mutual support help women respond to toxic tech culture.</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/photo/high-angle-view-of-male-and-female-programmers-royalty-free-image/1387362037">Maskot/DigitalVision via Getty Images</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>By 2029, there will be 3.6 million computing jobs in the U.S., but there will only be enough college graduates with computing degrees to fill <a href="https://wpassets.ncwit.org/wp-content/uploads/2021/12/13163828/1209_2021_BTN_FullSize.pdf">24% of these jobs</a>. For decades, the U.S. has <a href="https://carnegieendowment.org/2022/03/22/how-u.s.-gender-equality-funding-increase-can-actually-be-effective-pub-86686">poured resources into improving gender representation</a> in the tech industry. However, the numbers are not improving proportionately. Instead, they <a href="https://www.census.gov/library/stories/2021/01/women-making-gains-in-stem-occupations-but-still-underrepresented.html">have remained stagnant</a>, and initiatives are failing. </p>
<p>Women make up 57% of the overall workforce. Comparatively, women make up only <a href="https://wpassets.ncwit.org/wp-content/uploads/2021/12/13163828/1209_2021_BTN_FullSize.pdf">27% of the workforce in the technology industry</a>. Of the 27% that join the technology industry, more than <a href="https://www.accenture.com/_acnmedia/PDF-134/Accenture-A4-GWC-Report-Final1.pdf">50% are likely to quit</a> before the age of 35, and <a href="https://www.spencerstuart.com/-/media/images/inline-images/womenintech-062116-graphic-large.jpg">56% are likely to quit by midcareer</a>.</p>
<p>So, questions arise: Why does the technology industry have a retention problem? Why are women who are employed by the technology industry quitting in such high volumes? What factors contribute to this low retention of women in the technology industry, and what kind of support do women need to stay and succeed in it? </p>
<p>I’m an <a href="https://scholar.google.com/citations?user=xdJqYcsAAAAJ&hl=en">information science researcher</a> who studies gender and information technology, women in STEM – science, technology, engineering and math – online communities and open source software. My team at the University of Tennessee conducted research to address these questions. We found that retention plays a large role in the gender disparity in the tech field and that online and physical spaces that support women can boost retention.</p>
<h2>Women quitting the tech industry</h2>
<p>Research shows that women face many challenges in the tech industry. The <a href="https://www.codecademy.com/resources/blog/gender-pay-gap-in-tech/">gender pay gap</a> is severe. Women do not get the <a href="https://www.accenture.com/_acnmedia/PDF-134/Accenture-A4-GWC-Report-Final1.pdf">same opportunities as men</a>; for example, only 18% of the chief information officers/chief technology officers are women. And women receive unfair treatment. </p>
<p>My research team focused on the experiences of women in the tech industry with a particular focus on the treatment they receive in the workplace and the nature of support systems for women who succeed. We studied open-source software communities because open-source software communities are an extreme example of gender inequity. Seventy percent of all the software that supports technology infrastructure is open source, which makes open-source software integral to the future of the tech workforce. Yet women <a href="https://doi.org/10.1145/3510460">make up only 9.8%</a> of the people who contribute to open-source software projects.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/513278/original/file-20230302-28-u0k3ha.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="a woman seated at a desk in front of a computer with her eyes closed and her left hand on her forehead" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/513278/original/file-20230302-28-u0k3ha.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/513278/original/file-20230302-28-u0k3ha.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/513278/original/file-20230302-28-u0k3ha.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/513278/original/file-20230302-28-u0k3ha.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/513278/original/file-20230302-28-u0k3ha.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/513278/original/file-20230302-28-u0k3ha.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/513278/original/file-20230302-28-u0k3ha.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Women often have to deal with sexism, harassment and outright misogyny in tech workplaces.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/photo/tired-businesswoman-with-head-in-hand-sitting-at-royalty-free-image/1073867488">Maskot via Getty Images</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>In seeking answers to this retention problem of the tech industry, our research found that women’s negative experiences range from <a href="https://dl.acm.org/doi/10.1145/3524501.3527602">minor to severe harassment, sexism, discrimination and misogyny to explicit death threats</a>. Their expertise is challenged, <a href="https://doi.org/10.33137/ijidi.v5i3.36197">their contributions are not well-received</a> and their roles are diminished. They face <a href="https://dl.acm.org/doi/10.1145/3524501.3527602">constant harassment and deal with normalized abuse</a>, often hearing that “guys will be guys,” and they deal with isolation because they are often severely outnumbered by men.</p>
<p>The impact of these negative experiences shows evidence of multiple levels of harm. For example, the individual harm that a woman faces leads to incidental harm of other women being discouraged from participation, resulting in further collective harm for the open-source software community in the form of fewer women participating. Overall, these negative experiences are detrimental to the retention of women in open-source software and the tech industry in general.</p>
<h2>The culture problem</h2>
<p>Mainstream media often reports on open-source software’s <a href="https://diginomica.com/ada-lovelace-day-tackling-toxic-tech-bro-culture">toxic “tech bro” culture</a>. In recent years, high-profile leaders in open-source software have been exposed for their abusive behavior. </p>
<p>Open-source software icon Linus Torvalds stepped aside from the Linux kernel after his toxic, abusive emails to other developers were highlighted in the media. His decision to step down came as a result of questions about his <a href="https://www.newyorker.com/science/elements/after-years-of-abusive-e-mails-the-creator-of-linux-steps-aside">abusive behavior in discouraging women</a> from working as Linux kernel programmers.</p>
<p>Another towering figure in this field, <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/education/2019/09/17/computer-scientist-richard-stallman-resigns-mit-after-comments-about-epstein-scandal/">Richard Stallman</a>, was pushed into resigning from the Free Software Foundation and MIT after a very successful career in open-source software because of his views on pedophilia, as well as a multitude of <a href="https://thenewstack.io/why-almost-everyone-wants-richard-stallman-cancelled/">sexual harassment cases from students and faculty at MIT over the course of 30 years</a>. These types of public incidents of unprofessional behavior from tech industry leaders have a chilling effect on the participation of women and perpetuate toxic behavior.</p>
<figure>
<iframe width="440" height="260" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/QGo9v4TE8eo?wmode=transparent&start=0" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen=""></iframe>
<figcaption><span class="caption">Stark statistics about women in the tech field.</span></figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>Support systems for women</h2>
<p>In our research about the <a href="https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-20883-7_7">support systems</a> for women in tech, we observed and documented the value of <a href="https://doi.org/10.1109/GE.2019.00010">online spaces that focus on women</a> in the form of <a href="http://hdl.handle.net/10125/64033">social, emotional, technical and networking support</a>. Based on our results, key to supporting women in open-source software are online spaces that are focused on female participants and are readily accessible through the websites of open-source software organizations. The spaces help because they provide a sense of community for women working in open-source software. </p>
<p>These spaces are mainly but not exclusively for women. Examples include <a href="https://fedoraproject.org/wiki/Women">Fedora Women</a> and <a href="https://www.debian.org/women/">Debian Women</a>. When women face discrimination and misogyny, these spaces allow them to reach out to other women and seek social and emotional support. Women guide and mentor each other to navigate the toxicity of the tech industry and find avenues to advocate for gender equality.</p>
<p>Additionally, we found that women flourish when supported by community guidelines, such as the <a href="https://doi.org/10.1007/s11219-020-09543-w">codes of conduct for online spaces</a>, in-person events and professional organizations. We found that codes of conduct often become advocacy tools for women’s equal treatment in open-source software online communities. They serve as tools for women and allies alike. </p>
<p>When women are supported by mentors and allies and can network in their communities, and when they see role models who look like them succeeding in tech communities, they are <a href="https://dl.acm.org/doi/10.1145/3524501.3527602">less likely to quit</a>. The retention problem can be addressed by tackling the gender disparities of the technology industry with online and physical spaces that focus on women, policies and practices to ensure equal treatment of women, and female mentors and role models.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/200625/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Vandana Singh has received funding for her research from NSF, IMLS, USGS, Google, and the University of Tennessee.</span></em></p>Women are severely underrepresented in tech. Strength in numbers – communities for women and women mentoring women – can counter tech’s sexist culture and help retain women in the field.Vandana Singh, Professor of Information Science, University of TennesseeLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1942772023-01-27T10:25:31Z2023-01-27T10:25:31ZArtificial intelligence in South Africa comes with special dilemmas – plus the usual risks<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/503376/original/file-20230106-13-750vf8.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">
</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">3rdtimeluckystudio/Shutterstock</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>When people think about artificial intelligence (AI), they may have visions of the future. But AI is already here. At its base, it is the recreation of aspects of human intelligence in computerised form. Like human intelligence, it has wide application. </p>
<p>Voice-operated personal assistants like <a href="https://theconversation.com/artificial-intelligence-has-a-gender-bias-problem-just-ask-siri-123937">Siri</a>, self-driving cars, and <a href="https://openai.com/blog/chatgpt/">text</a> and <a href="https://theconversation.com/text-to-image-ai-powerful-easy-to-use-technology-for-making-art-and-fakes-195517">image</a> generators all use AI. It also curates our social media feeds. It helps companies to detect <a href="https://researchberg.com/index.php/rrst/article/view/37">fraud</a> and <a href="https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s43681-022-00166-4">hire employees</a>. It’s used to manage <a href="https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0959652621041251">livestock</a>, <a href="https://edis.ifas.ufl.edu/publication/AE571">enhance crop yields</a> and <a href="https://link.springer.com/chapter/10.1007/978-3-030-40850-3_2">aid medical diagnoses</a>.</p>
<p>Alongside its growing power and <a href="http://dx.doi.org/10.1038/s41467-019-14108-y">its potential</a>, AI raises <a href="https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s10551-022-05060-x">moral and ethical questions</a>. The technology has already been at the centre of <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/news/2018/mar/17/cambridge-analytica-facebook-influence-us-election">multiple scandals</a>: the <a href="https://theconversation.com/artificial-intelligence-carries-a-huge-upside-but-potential-harms-need-to-be-managed-173073">infringement of laws and rights</a>, as well as <a href="https://www.propublica.org/article/machine-bias-risk-assessments-in-criminal-sentencing">racial</a> and <a href="https://ainowinstitute.org/AI_Now_2018_Report.pdf">gender</a> discrimination. In short, it comes with a litany of ethical risks and dilemmas.</p>
<p>But what exactly are these risks? And how do they differ among countries? To find out, <a href="https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=4240356">I undertook</a> a thematic review of literature from wealthier countries to identify six high-level, universal ethical risk themes. I then interviewed experts involved in or associated with the AI industry in South Africa and assessed how their perceptions of AI risk differed from or resonated with those themes.</p>
<p>The findings reflect marked similarities in AI risks between the global north and South Africa as an example of a <a href="https://theconversation.com/developing-countries-are-being-left-behind-in-the-ai-race-and-thats-a-problem-for-all-of-us-180218">global south nation</a>. But there were some important differences. These reflect South Africa’s <a href="https://www.worldbank.org/en/news/press-release/2022/03/09/new-world-bank-report-assesses-sources-of-inequality-in-five-countries-in-southern-africa#:%7E:text=South%20Africa%2C%20the%20largest%20country,World%20Bank%27s%20global%20poverty%20database.">unequal society</a> and the fact that it is on the periphery of AI development, utilisation and regulation.</p>
<p>Other developing countries that share similar features – a vast <a href="https://mg.co.za/opinion/2022-11-10-south-africa-must-bridge-digital-divide-to-best-benefit-from-4ir/">digital divide</a>, high <a href="https://time.com/6087699/south-africa-wealth-gap-unchanged-since-apartheid/">inequality</a> and <a href="https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2022-11-29/south-africa-jobless-rate-drops-to-third-highest-in-the-world?leadSource=uverify%20wall">unemployment</a> and <a href="https://www.imf.org/en/Publications/WP/Issues/2019/03/01/Struggling-to-Make-the-Grade-A-Review-of-the-Causes-and-Consequences-of-the-Weak-Outcomes-of-46644">low quality</a> education – likely have a similar risk profile to South Africa. </p>
<p>Knowing what ethical risks may play out at a country level is important because it can help policymakers and organisations to adjust their risk management policies and practices accordingly.</p>
<h2>Universal themes</h2>
<p>The six universal ethical risk themes I drew from reviewing global north literature were: </p>
<ul>
<li><p><strong>Accountability</strong>: It is unclear who is accountable for the outputs of AI models and systems.</p></li>
<li><p><strong>Bias</strong>: Shortcomings of algorithms, data or both entrench bias.</p></li>
<li><p><strong>Transparency</strong>: AI systems operate as a “black box”. Developers and end users have a limited ability to understand or verify the output.</p></li>
<li><p><strong>Autonomy</strong>: Humans lose the power to make their own decisions.</p></li>
<li><p><strong>Socio-economic risks</strong>: AI may result in job losses and worsen inequality.</p></li>
<li><p><strong>Maleficence</strong>: It could be used by criminals, terrorists and repressive state machinery.</p></li>
</ul>
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Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/in-a-world-first-south-africa-grants-patent-to-an-artificial-intelligence-system-165623">In a world first, South Africa grants patent to an artificial intelligence system</a>
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<p>Then I interviewed 16 experts involved in or associated with South Africa’s AI industry. They included academics, researchers, designers of AI-related products, and people who straddled the categories. For the most part, the six themes I’d already identified resonated with them. </p>
<h2>South African concerns</h2>
<p>But the participants also identified five ethical risks that reflected South Africa’s country-level features. These were:</p>
<ul>
<li><p><strong>Foreign data and models</strong>: Parachuting data and AI models in from elsewhere.</p></li>
<li><p><strong>Data limitations</strong>: Scarcity of data sets that represent, reflect local conditions.</p></li>
<li><p><strong>Exacerbating inequality</strong>: AI could deepen and entrench existing socio-economic inequalities.</p></li>
<li><p><strong>Uninformed stakeholders</strong>: Most of the public and policymakers have only a crude understanding of AI.</p></li>
<li><p><strong>Absence of policy and regulation</strong>: There are currently no specific legal requirements or overarching government positions on AI in South Africa.</p></li>
</ul>
<h2>What it all means</h2>
<p>So, what do these findings tell us?</p>
<p>Firstly, the universal risks are mostly technical. They are linked to the features of AI and have technical solutions. For instance, bias can be <a href="https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s44206-022-00017-z">mitigated</a> by more accurate models and comprehensive data sets. </p>
<p>Most of the South African-specific risks are more socio-technical, manifesting the country’s environment. An absence of policy and regulation, for example, is not an inherent feature of AI. It is a symptom of the country being on the periphery of technology development and related policy formulation. </p>
<p>South African organisations and policymakers should therefore not just focus on technical solutions but also closely consider AI’s socio-economic dimensions.</p>
<p>Secondly, the <a href="https://www.ipsos.com/sites/default/files/ct/news/documents/2022-01/Global-opinions-and-expectations-about-AI-2022.pdf">low levels of awareness</a> among the population suggest there is little pressure on South African organisations to demonstrate a commitment to ethical AI. In contrast, organisations in the global north have to show cognisance of AI ethics, because their <a href="https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s43681-021-00068-x">stakeholders</a> are more attuned to their rights vis-à-vis digital products and services.</p>
<p>Finally, whereas the <a href="https://uploads-ssl.webflow.com/614b70a71b9f71c9c240c7a7/62fbe1c37eff7d304f0803ac_Brussels_Effect_GovAI.pdf">EU</a>, <a href="https://www.gov.uk/government/news/uk-sets-out-proposals-for-new-ai-rulebook-to-unleash-innovation-and-boost-public-trust-in-the-technology">UK</a> and <a href="https://www.whitehouse.gov/ostp/ai-bill-of-rights/what-is-the-blueprint-for-an-ai-bill-of-rights/">US</a> have nascent rules and regulations around AI, South Africa has no regulation and <a href="https://uir.unisa.ac.za/bitstream/handle/10500/28134/thesis_jogi_aa.pdf?sequence=1&isAllowed=y">limited laws</a> relevant to AI. </p>
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Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/artificial-intelligence-carries-a-huge-upside-but-potential-harms-need-to-be-managed-173073">Artificial intelligence carries a huge upside. But potential harms need to be managed</a>
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<p>The South African government has also <a href="https://www.orfonline.org/research/g20-ai-national-strategies-global-ambitions/">failed</a> to give much recognition to AI’s broader impact and ethical implications. This differs even from <a href="https://www.orfonline.org/research/g20-ai-national-strategies-global-ambitions/">other emerging markets</a> such as Brazil, <a href="https://ai.altadvisory.africa/wp-content/uploads/AI-Governance-in-Africa-2022.pdf">Egypt</a>, India and <a href="https://ai.altadvisory.africa/wp-content/uploads/AI-Governance-in-Africa-2022.pdf">Mauritius</a>, which have national policies and strategies that encourage the responsible use of AI.</p>
<h2>Moving forward</h2>
<p>AI may, for now, seem far removed from South Africa’s prevailing socio-economic challenges. But it will become pervasive in the coming years. South African organisations and policymakers should proactively govern AI ethics risks. </p>
<p>This starts with acknowledging that AI presents threats <a href="https://theconversation.com/defining-whats-ethical-in-artificial-intelligence-needs-input-from-africans-171837">that are distinct from those in the global north</a>, and that need to be managed. Governing boards should add AI ethics to their agendas, and policymakers and members of governing boards should become educated on the technology. </p>
<p>Additionally, AI ethics risks should be added to corporate and government risk management strategies – similar to <a href="https://www.oecd-ilibrary.org/sites/272d85c3-en/index.html?itemId=/content/publication/272d85c3-en">climate change</a>, which received scant attention 15 or 20 years ago but now features prominently. </p>
<p>Perhaps most importantly, the government should build on the recent <a href="https://www.uj.ac.za/news/south-africas-new-national-artificial-intelligence-institute-can-help-transform-our-economy/">launch</a> of the Artificial Intelligence Institute of South Africa, and introduce a tailored national strategy and appropriate regulation to ensure the ethical use of AI.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/194277/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Emile Ormond does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Artificial Intelligence comes with a litany of ethical risks and dilemmas. Some are universal, but some are unique to particular countries, like South Africa.Emile Ormond, PhD on AI Ethics, Governance, University of South AfricaLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1963022023-01-16T12:16:44Z2023-01-16T12:16:44ZWomen’s voices are missing in the media – including them could generate billions in income<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/500401/original/file-20221212-103851-okrley.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Women are severely underrepresented in editorial leadership and in news coverage.</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">Stefan Heunis/Getty Images</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>How can the news media represent women’s voices better? The answer might be in a recent <a href="https://internews.org/from-outrage-to-opportunity-women-media/">report</a>, “From outrage to opportunity: How to include the missing perspectives of women of all colors in news leadership and coverage”. </p>
<p>The report was written by <a href="https://www.lubakassova.com/">Luba Kassova</a>, the award-winning evidence-based storyteller, and commissioned by the <a href="https://www.gatesfoundation.org/">Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation</a>. It is based on extensive research in South Africa, Kenya, Nigeria, India, the UK and the US. The report discusses gender parity in news leadership and production, as well as news coverage.</p>
<p>Socio-economic and patriarchal structures have long determined and usually hampered women’s entry and ascendance in society and the workplace. But the news media provide a very particular case of gender discrimination. This is especially through the hurdles and threats the contemporary media sphere presents to women journalists. </p>
<p>Research outlining gender imbalances remains scarce and uneven across media platforms, organisations and national contexts. This means that the effect of gender on decisions about the structure and content of news media is left unaddressed. </p>
<p>Research on female leadership in the news media is scarce too. This makes the <a href="https://internews.org/from-outrage-to-opportunity-women-media/">“From outrage to opportunity” report</a> even more important.</p>
<p>The report shows that women in the six countries surveyed remain severely underrepresented in editorial leadership and in news coverage. Their voices are excluded in shaping public discourse in the male-dominated industry. Ensuring better representation of women’s voices in the news media would change not only the industry, but also public discourse.</p>
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Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/people-of-colour-theres-a-bias-in-how-pictures-are-used-to-depict-disease-in-global-health-publications-196056">People of colour: there's a bias in how pictures are used to depict disease in global health publications</a>
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<p>Other studies show that where women control news content, it tends to be <a href="https://www.comminit.com/global/content/who-makes-news-6th-global-media-monitoring-project">more gender sensitive and representative</a>. Women journalists are also more likely to challenge gender stereotypes, raise gender inequality issues, and reference legislation or policy that promote gender equality or <a href="https://www.comminit.com/global/content/who-makes-news-6th-global-media-monitoring-project">human rights</a>. </p>
<p>On the upside, the “From outrage to opportunity” report focuses on solutions. It makes a case for addressing the gender gap in news consumption. This provides a multi-billion-dollar revenue opportunity for a struggling global news industry. The report argues that, if the gender gap were to be addressed and women better represented in the news media, the industry could grow female audiences exponentially. It estimates that closing the gender consumption gap could generate as much as US$83 billion over the next 10 years.</p>
<h2>Patriarchy and sexist attitudes</h2>
<p>Worldwide, women still battle patriarchal and sexist attitudes as well as non-supportive or non-existent policy environments. These contribute to women media workers fighting uphill battles to <a href="https://www.comminit.com/global/content/who-makes-news-6th-global-media-monitoring-project">reach the higher echelons of the industry</a>. </p>
<p>The scarcity of women journalists in senior editorial positions and at board level remains <a href="https://digitalcommons.butler.edu/ccom_papers/169/">an obstacle to gender parity</a>. Research by the Reuters Institute at Oxford University analysing top media outlets in 12 countries across four continents shows that <a href="https://reutersinstitute.politics.ox.ac.uk/women-and-leadership-news-media-2021-evidence-12-markets">only 22% of top editors are women</a>. In the South African news media, some positive inroads have been noted. Women hold 46% of senior management positions and <a href="https://genderlinks.org.za/gmdc/publications/glass-ceilings-women-in-sa-media-houses-2018/">36% are in top management</a>.</p>
<p>In most countries, there is still a <a href="http://journalistsresource.org/studies/society/news-media/female-journalists-media-sexism-emerging-trends">pay gap between men and women journalists</a>, including in <a href="https://genderlinks.org.za/gmdc/publications/glass-ceilings-women-in-sa-media-houses-2018/">South Africa</a>. <a href="https://www.poynter.org/news/cohort-women-public-facing-journalism-jobs-are-exhausted-harassment">Research</a> also shows an increase in the harassment of women journalists through social media. So-called cyber bullying is disproportionately directed at women journalists.</p>
<p>Particularly dire is the situation of women of colour. The <a href="https://internews.org/from-outrage-to-opportunity-women-media/">“From outrage to opportunity” report</a> says women of colour in South Africa, the UK and the US experience even greater marginalisation or outright exclusion from news leadership roles. </p>
<p>The argument made is that if women of colour were represented in senior positions in proportion to their percentage in the working population, their numbers in these roles would be three times higher in the US, 2.2 times higher in South Africa and 1.2 times higher in the UK. Of course, in South Africa people of colour are the majority.</p>
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<p>South Africa does present a slightly different scenario. It leads among the six countries on representation of women in news leadership. This is attributed to its liberal and equitable <a href="https://www.justice.gov.za/legislation/constitution/saconstitution-web-eng.pdf">constitution</a>. The country also has the highest gender parity in terms of reporting on business and economics, health and to some extent politics. </p>
<p>Compared to the UK and the US, South Africa has seemingly made greater strides towards gender equity in some areas. In the UK, no women of colour occupy the most senior editorial positions in politics, foreign affairs and health news beats. In South Africa, 29% of political editors are women of colour, while their proportion in the population is 46%.</p>
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Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/african-newspapers-can-be-anti-african-too-what-my-research-found-190256">African newspapers can be anti-African too: what my research found</a>
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<p>Importantly, the women of colour interviewed for the report perceived newsrooms as being fearful or unwilling to deal with lack of diversity or cultural exclusion. Consequently, women of colour often faced the impossibly onerous expectation that they should resolve the problem of their own under-representation and exclusion from newsrooms and leadership. This has also been well documented and confirmed in earlier studies of the South African news media. Where gender parity in the newsroom might have been reached, women’s experiences still talk to a wide range of <a href="https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/full/10.1177/1742766519899116">impediments to real gender equality</a>.</p>
<h2>Costly lost opportunity</h2>
<p>Globally, research by the <a href="https://whomakesthenews.org/">Global Media Monitoring Project</a> on gender equity in the workforce, news production and editorial decision making over 20 years shows that progress has been <a href="https://www.comminit.com/global/content/who-makes-news-6th-global-media-monitoring-project">very slow</a>. The organisation estimates that at the current pace at which equity is being achieved, it will take another 67 years to close the average gender equality gap in <a href="https://www.comminit.com/global/content/who-makes-news-6th-global-media-monitoring-project">traditional news media</a>.</p>
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Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/william-ruto-vs-kenyas-media-democracy-is-at-stake-190780">William Ruto vs Kenya's media: democracy is at stake</a>
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<p>However, as the “From outrage to opportunity” <a href="https://internews.org/from-outrage-to-opportunity-women-media/">report</a> concludes, there are no quick fixes or silver bullets. Women’s voices and participation need to be amplified on each step in the news value chain, whether in leadership, news production or consumption. Acknowledging the impact that increased women’s participation could have on revenues in the media industry – where new business models are sorely needed – is a first and important step.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/196302/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Ylva Rodny-Gumede does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>The news media provide a very particular case study of gender discrimination.Ylva Rodny-Gumede, Professor of Journalism in the Department of Journalism, Film and Television, University of JohannesburgLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1960272022-12-09T07:12:04Z2022-12-09T07:12:04ZNew study reveals gender bias in sport research. It’s yet another hurdle to progress in women’s sport<p>Throughout history, sports have been guilty of prioritising certain groups at the exclusion of others. There has been a pervasive idea that being an athlete requires the demonstration of traditionally masculine traits. Any individual not doing so was, and often still is, susceptible to being harassed, sidelined, or ostracised.</p>
<p>Indeed, femininity has historically been considered nonathletic. Research finds some athletes describe a perception that being a “woman” and an “athlete” are almost <a href="https://link.springer.com/article/10.1023/B:SERS.0000018888.48437.4f">opposing identities</a>.</p>
<p>For these reasons and more, women’s sport has been held back in ways that men’s sport has not. While progress is certainly now being made, our <a href="https://doi.org/10.1080/1750984X.2022.2150981">new research</a>, published this week, finds large gender gaps persist in sports research.</p>
<p>We found sport psychology research studies – which inform the strategies athletes use to reach peak performance – have predominantly used male participants. </p>
<p>For example, across the sport psychology research we looked at between 2010 and 2020, 62% of the participants were men and boys. Further, around 22% of the sport psychology studies we examined had samples with only male participants. In contrast, this number was just 7% for women and girls.</p>
<p>Women may experience sport and exercise differently from men. As in other areas of medicine, an evidence base that’s predominately informed by men’s experiences and bodies will lead to insufficient, ineffective outcomes and recommendations for women.</p>
<h2>Some progress has been made</h2>
<p>Progress in women’s sport is evident, and continues every year. Gender gaps across recreational and professional sport are slowly narrowing. </p>
<p>Girls’ involvement in sport continues to grow, with the number participating in high school sports in the United States <a href="https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/00913847.2020.1852861?journalCode=ipsm20">increasing by 262% between 1973 and 2018</a>. In Australia, participation in sport among women and girls between 2015-2019 <a href="https://www.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/fspor.2021.710666/full">grew at a faster rate than among men and boys</a>.</p>
<p>Improved opportunity and exposure has also occurred in professional settings, and public interest has increased significantly. For example, the 2020 Women’s Cricket World Cup saw attendance records tumble, with the final played at the MCG in front of <a href="https://mcg.org.au/whats-on/latest-news/2020/march/records-tumble-as-australia-claims-icc-womens-t20-world-cup">86,174 fans</a>.</p>
<p>Many sports now enter a complex new era of professionalisation, <a href="https://theconversation.com/the-afl-has-consistently-put-the-womens-game-second-is-it-the-best-organisation-to-run-aflw-180665">as we’re seeing in AFLW</a>.</p>
<p>Despite positive trends, critical issues remain.</p>
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Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/the-tokyo-olympics-are-billed-as-the-first-gender-equal-games-but-women-still-lack-opportunities-in-sport-165280">The Tokyo Olympics are billed as the first gender equal Games, but women still lack opportunities in sport</a>
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<h2>Gender bias in research</h2>
<p>Any growth in women’s sport must be supported by the underlying evidence base that informs it.</p>
<p>As mental health researchers in the field of elite sport, we aim to make real-world impacts through rigorous applied research. Our team has previously explored gendered mental health experiences among elite athletes, finding women report more significant symptoms of mental ill-health and <a href="https://bmjopensem.bmj.com/content/7/1/e000984">more frequent negative events like discrimination or financial hardship</a>.</p>
<p>Research like this is critical for informing the services and systems which support peak performance. But the research has to represent its target, or else progress will be limited.</p>
<p>It’s now well understood that the field of medical and scientific research is rife with examples of the ways in which unequal participation by gender has caused negative health effects. With men’s experiences and bodies <a href="https://www.science.org/doi/10.1126/science.1115616">considered the norm</a>, inaccurate understanding of causes, tools, and treatments have been frequent.</p>
<p>Medical and scientific research in sport is not exempt.</p>
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<h2>Our findings</h2>
<p>As sports become increasingly competitive and pressurised, sport psychology is critical to supporting athletes within these high-stress environments.</p>
<p>Following concerns about gender bias in scientific research, we wanted to understand whether the field of sport and exercise psychology was appropriately representative.</p>
<p>We recorded the gender of study participants across research published in key sport and exercise psychology journals in 2010, 2015 and 2020, to estimate gender balance over the last decade. This included studies on topics such as: physical and mental health, personality and motivation, coaching and athlete development, leadership, and mental skills.</p>
<p>Across more than 600 studies and nearly 260,000 participants, there were significant levels of gender imbalance.</p>
<p>This imbalance varied, depending on the area being investigated. While sport psychology research focuses on performance and athletes, exercise psychology is more focused on areas of health and participation. Our findings showed that the likelihood of including male rather than female participants in sport psychology studies was almost four times as high as for exercise psychology.</p>
<p>We also identified that those studies which specifically explored themes relating to performance (such as coaching, mental skills, or decision-making) all featured samples with fewer women and girls, as compared to those focused on topics like health, well-being, or activism. </p>
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<h2>What our findings mean</h2>
<p>Our findings, <a href="https://doi.org/10.1123/wspaj.2021-0028">along with those of others</a>, hint at a number of worrying conclusions.</p>
<p>Women and girls in sport are likely to be instructed in strategies and approaches informed by research that does not sufficiently represent them.</p>
<p>Among many factors, topics like coaching methods, injury management, and performance psychology are critical to sports performance. For some or all of these, women athletes’ experiences may differ from those of men.</p>
<p>Changes to policy have made a significant difference to gender equity in sport. But researchers and funding bodies must follow suit, ensuring we develop the understanding and methods to properly represent all groups we seek to serve. Only then can women’s sport truly flourish.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/196027/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Courtney Walton receives funding through a McKenzie Postdoctoral Research Fellowship at the University of Melbourne. He advises a number of elite sports codes and organisations nationally.</span></em></p><p class="fine-print"><em><span>Caroline Gao receives salary support from the Department of Health, State Government of Victoria for unrelated projects. She is an investigator on projects funded by NHMRC, NIH, HCF and MRFF. She is affiliated with Orygen and Monash University. </span></em></p><p class="fine-print"><em><span>Simon Rice receives funding from the NHMRC, MRFF and The University of Melbourne. He advises a number of elite sports codes and organisations internationally.</span></em></p>Sport and exercise psychology research studies – which inform the strategies athletes use to reach peak performance – have predominantly used male participants.Courtney C Walton, Research Fellow & Psychologist, Mental Health in Elite Sports, The University of MelbourneCaroline Gao, Senior Research Fellow, Biostatistician, Centre for Youth Mental Health, The University of MelbourneSimon Rice, Associate Professor & Clinical Psychologist, Mental Health in Elite Sports, The University of MelbourneLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1919332022-11-14T13:26:01Z2022-11-14T13:26:01ZDoctors often aren’t trained on the preventive health care needs of gender-diverse people – as a result, many patients don’t get the care they need<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/492839/original/file-20221101-14-z2rkvm.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=43%2C58%2C4830%2C3593&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Gender-diverse adults have a harder time getting effective primary and preventive health care than their nontransgender counterparts.</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/photo/doctors-pockets-with-medical-instruments-royalty-free-image/91540120?phrase=stethoscope&adppopup=true">Peter Dazeley/The Image Bank via Getty Images</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>Preventive health care – such as cancer screening – is <a href="https://www.cdc.gov/cancer/dcpc/prevention/screening.htm">a critical tool</a> in the early detection of disease. Missed screening can result in a missed diagnosis, delayed treatment and <a href="https://doi.org/10.1093%2Fjnci%2Fdjab028">reduced chances of survival</a>. </p>
<p>But the medical system is poorly equipped to meet the needs of gender-diverse patients.</p>
<p>Around <a href="https://www.reuters.com/world/us/new-study-estimates-16-million-us-identify-transgender-2022-06-10/">1.64 million people in the U.S.</a> identify as transgender, nonbinary or gender diverse – people whose gender identity differs from the sex they were assigned at birth.</p>
<p>This adds up to 1.3 million or 0.5% of U.S. adults, all of whom are more likely to <a href="https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/35308990/">encounter implicit, or unconscious, biases</a> when they seek medical care compared with their cisgender counterparts – those whose gender identity aligns with the sex they were assigned at birth. </p>
<p>I am a <a href="https://directory.hsc.wvu.edu/Profile/40295">primary care doctor in Appalachia</a>, as well as a <a href="https://doi.org/10.15766/mep_2374-8265.11111">medical educator</a> who studies <a href="https://doi.org/10.7189%2Fjogh.10.020387">how to improve the instruction</a> of future health care providers. I work hard every day to improve the health of the underserved. </p>
<p>Primary care doctors devote much of their lives to preventive medicine – the art of stopping disease before it starts. Cancer screening consumes much of my life. </p>
<p>So I’m concerned about the barriers to preventive care for patients who are transgender, including consistent access to <a href="https://www.acog.org/clinical/clinical-guidance/committee-opinion/articles/2021/03/health-care-for-transgender-and-gender-diverse-individuals">adequate cancer screening</a>. </p>
<h2>The problems with the binary model</h2>
<p>Health care spaces and providers often focus on “men’s health” or “women’s health” specifically. Intake forms may have no option for declaring a gender identity separate from the <a href="https://theconversation.com/not-everyone-is-male-or-female-the-growing-controversy-over-sex-designation-172293?notice=Article+has+been+updated.">sex assigned at birth</a>. Health screening and insurance policies for diseases like cancer tend to remain geared to a flawed binary male-female model.</p>
<p>Gender-diverse patients often find themselves <a href="http://dx.doi.org/10.1136/fmch-2019-000130">teaching their primary care doctors</a> how to provide them with competent care, because many medical students <a href="https://doi.org/10.22454/FamMed.2021.509974">get little training</a> on providing gender-affirming care.</p>
<p>As a result, 1 out of 3 gender-diverse adults <a href="https://www.aafp.org/pubs/afp/issues/2018/1201/p645.html">do not seek preventive care</a>, according to a report by the <a href="https://transequality.org/sites/default/files/docs/resources/NTDS_Report.pdf">National Center for Transgender Equality</a> – or they are not offered these services at all – when they see a health care provider. Even more alarming, 19% of transgender folks report that <a href="https://doi.org/10.21037%2Ftau-20-954">they’ve been refused care</a> altogether.</p>
<p>This may contribute to higher rates of <a href="https://transequality.org/sites/default/files/docs/resources/NTDS_Report.pdf">tobacco use, obesity, alcohol use</a> and other cancer risk factors <a href="https://doi.org/10.1186/s12909-019-1727-3">in gender-diverse people</a>.</p>
<h2>Cancer care challenges</h2>
<p>Research to date shows that transgender adults over age 45 are screened for colon cancer <a href="https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6347308/">at a lower rate</a> than cisgender patients. They are also more likely to be <a href="https://doi.org/10.1093/jnci/djab028">diagnosed at later stages</a> of lung cancer. This can be devastating, because <a href="https://www.cancer.org/health-care-professionals/american-cancer-society-prevention-early-detection-guidelines/lung-cancer-screening-guidelines.html">finding lung cancer</a> before it spreads can literally mean the difference between life and death.</p>
<p>The University of California, San Francisco, one of the few places that has protocols for the care of transgender patients, recommends that transgender women who are older than 50 and have been <a href="https://transcare.ucsf.edu/guidelines/breast-cancer-women">taking a feminizing hormone</a> for five years begin getting <a href="https://transcare.ucsf.edu/guidelines/breast-cancer-women">screened for breast cancer</a>. However, according to a recent Canadian study, only <a href="https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6347308/">about 1 in 3 transgender women</a> who are eligible for breast cancer screening receive mammograms, compared with 2 in 3 eligible cisgender women.</p>
<p>In a 2021 study, researchers found that transgender patients with <a href="https://doi.org/10.1093/jnci/djab028">non-Hodgkin lymphoma, prostate cancer or bladder cancer</a> had roughly twice the death rate of their cisgender counterparts. Since the researchers were able to firmly identify only 589 transgender individuals out of nearly 11.8 million records, they could not accurately compare rates for other types of cancer.</p>
<p>Since 2017, the American Society of Clinical Oncology has recommended including <a href="https://doi.org/10.1200/jco.2016.72.0441">data about patients’ sexual and gender minority</a> status in cancer registries and clinical trials. However, in 2022 the society found that <a href="https://ascopubs.org/doi/full/10.1200/OP.22.00084">only half of oncology care providers</a> are routinely collecting gender identity information. So it’s clear that there’s still a lot to learn about the barriers to inclusive cancer care.</p>
<p>Lack of training in both medical school and residencies – intensive training stints where new doctors hone their skills – perpetuates these disparities.</p>
<figure>
<iframe width="440" height="260" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/Ee4fyqk997s?wmode=transparent&start=0" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen=""></iframe>
<figcaption><span class="caption">In a 2019 TEDx talk, educator Jo Codde discussed the importance of compassion, dignity and respect as a means to improving transgender health care.</span></figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>Bias in medical school</h2>
<p>Medical education is <a href="https://doi.org/10.1016/S0140-6736(20)30846-1">plagued by biases</a> that reflect society’s stereotypes and prejudices. Further, researchers have found that students can <a href="https://doi.org/10.1007/s11606-007-0160-1">unconsciously absorb</a> biases or stereotypes encountered in their medical education. </p>
<p>And just 26% of doctors directing family medicine clerkships – courses in which medical students start working and interacting with real patients – say they <a href="https://doi.org/10.22454/FamMed.2021.509974">feel comfortable teaching transgender health care</a>.</p>
<p>So the Association of American Medical Colleges has called for emphasizing at all levels of training the health of people who are lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, queer or questioning and other identities – <a href="https://www.aamc.org/news-insights/insights/keeping-our-promise-lgbtq-patients">known as LGBTQ+</a>. The association <a href="https://store.aamc.org/downloadable/download/sample/sample_id/129/">recommends that schools</a> take a “<a href="https://doi.org/10.1097/acm.0000000000003581">layered” approach</a> that integrates education on gender-affirming health care across their curricula. This can include incorporating LGTBQ+ health in early coursework, <a href="https://health.wvu.edu/news/story?headline=wv-steps-features-diverse-manikins-standardized-patients-for-students-to-gain-experience-working-wit">using practice patients in simulation</a>, and creating opportunities to care for patients with lived experience.</p>
<p>Many medical schools still fail to integrate gender-affirming care throughout the curriculum, though. Instead, <a href="https://doi.org/10.1007/s11930-018-0185-y">medical schools often append</a> it to the existing curriculum – offering dedicated lectures or small-group activities that address LGBTQ+ health. Medical schools overall are providing a median of only five hours of instruction <a href="https://doi.org/10.22454/FamMed.2021.509974">on gender-affirming health care practices</a>. </p>
<h2>Health insurance obstacles</h2>
<p>In 2015, the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services clarified that preventive care services are available under the Affordable Care Act, <a href="https://transcare.ucsf.edu/guidelines/insurance">regardless of gender identity</a>. </p>
<p>However, the main organizations guiding providers and insurance coverage regarding breast, cervical and prostate cancer screening <a href="https://doi.org/10.21037%2Ftau-20-954">continue to use</a> an approach based on the ingrained binary male-female model approach. </p>
<p>For example, the U.S. Preventive Services Task Force still gears its <a href="https://www.uspreventiveservicestaskforce.org/uspstf/recommendation/cervical-cancer-screening">recommendations for breast and cervical cancer screenings</a> toward cisgender women, with <a href="https://www.uspreventiveservicestaskforce.org/uspstf/sites/default/files/file/supporting_documents/jama-tf-approach-addressing-sex-gender-issues-bulletin.pdf">little guidance</a> on how to apply them to transgender patients.</p>
<p>This is driven in part by <a href="https://doi.org/10.21037%2Ftau-20-954">a lack of data</a> on how to best screen transgender patients for cancer. </p>
<p>Insurance coverage and companies also create hurdles. Gender-diverse patients are more likely to be <a href="https://doi.org/10.1093/jnci/djab028">uninsured or underinsured</a> – making it <a href="https://doi.org/10.1097/mlr.0000000000001693">much harder for them to access</a> preventive medical care. A gender identity mismatch in an <a href="https://doi.org/10.1093/jamia/ocab136">electronic medical record</a> can <a href="https://transcare.ucsf.edu/guidelines/insurance">trigger a denial</a> for a cancer screening. </p>
<h2>Momentum for change</h2>
<p>Fortunately, the medical field is recognizing that gender-diverse patients have unique health care needs.</p>
<p>Since 2017, the <a href="https://www.acog.org/clinical/clinical-guidance/committee-opinion/articles/2021/03/health-care-for-transgender-and-gender-diverse-individuals">American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists</a> has published recommendations
for health care providers on making their practices open and inclusive for all individuals. Training all staff and creating an open office space without a gendered approach is a key recommendation.</p>
<p>Now over <a href="https://transhealthproject.org/resources/medical-organization-statements/">20 medical organizations</a> give similar guidance, with hopes of increasing inclusion through the health care system.</p>
<p>Another encouraging sign is that some medical schools are integrating gender-affirming care into their coursework. The University of Louisville in Kentucky reports that it now offers <a href="https://louisville.edu/medicine/ume/ume-office/equality/curriculum">50 hours of LGBTQ+-specific topics</a>. And a faculty-student team at the Boston University School of Medicine has developed a tool to help medical schools assess and improve <a href="https://doi.org/10.1097/acm.0000000000004203">how they educate students</a> to provide sexual and gender-minority health care.</p>
<p>I’m hopeful that <a href="https://doi.org/10.4158/EP171758.OR">the next generation</a> of health care providers will be a <a href="https://www.mededportal.org/doi/10.15766/mep_2374-8265.10536">force for change</a> at their institutions; in my experience, <a href="https://www.npr.org/sections/health-shots/2019/01/20/683216767/medical-students-push-for-more-lgbt-health-training-to-address-disparities">incoming medical students</a> are more aware of health disparities than their older generations of educators.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/191933/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Jenna Sizemore does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>From primary care to cancer screening and insurance coverage, gender-diverse people still face many hurdles to getting good medical care.Jenna Sizemore, Assistant Professor of Medicine, West Virginia UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1914092022-11-01T12:45:59Z2022-11-01T12:45:59ZMen don’t trust female central bankers on inflation or the economy, survey data shows<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/491393/original/file-20221024-25-falo6d.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=80%2C80%2C3489%2C2526&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Photo ops of the world's central bankers and finance ministers typically involve a woman or two surrounded by men, such as this image from the G-7 in Germany in 2015.
</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://newsroom.ap.org/detail/GermanyG7FinanceMinisters/cf67f8f5114d4b4ebf5525db88de75dc/photo?Query=g7%20canada%20finance%20minister&mediaType=photo&sortBy=arrivaldatetime:desc&dateRange=Anytime&totalCount=53&currentItemNo=36">AP Photo/Jens Meyer</a></span></figcaption></figure><p><em>The <a href="https://theconversation.com/us/topics/research-brief-83231">Research Brief</a> is a short take about interesting academic work.</em> </p>
<h2>The big idea</h2>
<p>Americans <a href="http://dx.doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.4186248">are less likely to trust statements</a> from the Federal Reserve about interest rates when a U.S. central bank official portrayed as a woman delivers the information as opposed to a man, according to our new study. </p>
<p>Women filled just <a href="https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ejpoleco.2022.102192">11% of the seats</a> on the boards of central banks around the world from 2000 to 2015. <a href="https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ejpoleco.2022.102192">Our previous work suggested</a> a key reason for this was that women are seen by lawmakers who fill those seats as less trusted to prioritize inflation fighting, as opposed to men, who are <a href="https://dx.doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.3441659">perceived as monetary policy</a> “hawks.”</p>
<p>To better understand how gender shapes public reactions to central bankers, we conducted a survey experiment in January 2022 in which we gave easy-to-understand summaries of contemporary Fed statements to a random sample of about 11,000 Americans, evenly split between men and women. </p>
<p>We randomly attributed those summaries to real people – either <a href="https://www.clevelandfed.org/people/profiles/m/mester-loretta-j">Loretta Mester</a>, president of the Cleveland Fed, or <a href="https://www.chicagofed.org/people/e/evans-charles">Charles Evans</a>, who heads the Chicago branch. This allowed us to gauge whether the words of a female central banker would be perceived differently than those of a male colleague. We also tweaked their titles, randomly referring to the male or female Fed official as either “President of a Federal Reserve Bank and a Ph.D. Economist” or simply as a “Federal Reserve Economist.” This allowed us to see if highlighting credentials minimized any gender bias as studies suggest that it can in <a href="https://www.jstor.org/stable/2096136">professional settings</a>. </p>
<p>We then asked participants a series of general questions, such as their level of education and self-reported economic literacy, as well as their level of trust in state and federal institutions. We followed with our main questions about trust in the Federal Reserve specifically, optimism about the economy and their concern about inflation and unemployment. </p>
<p>As expected, we found strong evidence of bias against female central bankers among male survey takers. Gender bias was most significant when we asked about confidence in the Fed. For example, 53% of male respondents said they had confidence in the central bank when Evans was cited as the source – with the full Fed title – compared with just 43% who said the same about a similarly credentialed Mester. Similarly, 32% said they were optimistic about the economy when the summary came from Evans, double the share for Mester.</p>
<p>We could also see this bias in the ability of male respondents to remember the gender of the official. Only 60% accurately recalled at the end of the survey the gender of the official when it was a woman, while 97% accurately recalled the gender of the man. </p>
<p>The results from female survey takers showed little or no gender bias – though women showed more confidence in Mester when they were given her full title. </p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="A white woman with gray hair and a blue shirt is seen next to a white man with gray hair, glasses and a dark suit and purple tie" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/490977/original/file-20221020-16-akv9yn.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=62%2C134%2C6857%2C4481&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/490977/original/file-20221020-16-akv9yn.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/490977/original/file-20221020-16-akv9yn.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/490977/original/file-20221020-16-akv9yn.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/490977/original/file-20221020-16-akv9yn.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/490977/original/file-20221020-16-akv9yn.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/490977/original/file-20221020-16-akv9yn.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Janet Yellen was the first woman to become Fed chair.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://newsroom.ap.org/detail/FinancialStability/27f6518c197e46ddb268958ac9461200/photo?Query=janet%20yellen%20federal%20reserve&mediaType=photo&sortBy=arrivaldatetime:desc&dateRange=Anytime&totalCount=1872&currentItemNo=21">Kevin Dietsch/Pool via AP</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>Why it matters</h2>
<p>Women have made inroads in recent years into the male-dominated leadership roles of central banks around the world. </p>
<p>The <a href="https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ejpoleco.2022.102192">share of women on central bank boards</a> has increased from negligible in the late 1990s to over 15% in recent years. In the United States, half of the six members of the Fed’s <a href="https://www.federalreserve.gov/aboutthefed/bios/board/default.htm">Board of Governors</a> are currently women. And women, including Mester, serve as presidents of five of the 12 <a href="https://www.federalreserve.gov/aboutthefed/structure-federal-reserve-banks.htm">regional Federal Reserve banks</a>. And in 2014, Janet Yellen <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/business/2020/nov/23/janet-yellen-fed-chair-treasury-secretary">became the first woman</a> to serve as chair of the Fed.</p>
<p>In <a href="https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ejpoleco.2022.102192">one of our papers</a> we suggested that a big reason for these gains is that developed countries like the U.S. <a href="https://www.frbsf.org/economic-research/publications/economic-letter/2019/july/why-is-inflation-low-globally/">experienced very low inflation</a> for much of the 21st century, which negated the need to consider a nominee’s perceived inflation-fighting credentials as part of the appointment to a central bank. </p>
<p>That era is over as inflation soars across the globe. In the U.S., for example, <a href="https://www.bls.gov/news.release/cpi.nr0.htm">consumer prices are rising at about the fastest pace in 40 years</a>, forcing the Fed and other central banks to wage a global battle against inflation. </p>
<p>Since a key element of reducing inflation is convincing investors, companies and consumers to trust that the central bank can succeed, our study suggests female central bankers like Mester are at a disadvantage in generating public trust, which hurts their efficacy as communicators. This may also put the trend of more female central bankers at risk unless perceptions change.</p>
<h2>What’s next</h2>
<p>We have ongoing Japanese and European surveys underway to understand if we see the same types of gender bias in other countries.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/191409/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>The authors do not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and have disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Men were significantly less likely to express confidence in the Federal Reserve and optimism about the economy when monetary policy information came from a woman versus a man.Cristina Bodea, Professor of Political Science, Michigan State UniversityAndrew Kerner, Assistant Professor of Political Science, Michigan State UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1886002022-09-25T20:03:19Z2022-09-25T20:03:19ZWe studied 309,544 patent applications – and found inventing is still a man’s world<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/485752/original/file-20220921-27-1wjkec.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=37%2C68%2C5015%2C3295&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">
</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">Shutterstock</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>Are women as successful as men in securing a patent for their invention? </p>
<p>We set out to investigate gender bias in patent outcomes at IP Australia – the government agency responsible for administering intellectual property rights.</p>
<p>To do so, we <a href="https://www.unswlawjournal.unsw.edu.au/wp-content/uploads/2022/09/04-Huang-Patrick-Finch.pdf">analysed</a> 309,544 patent applications from across a 15-year period (2001-2015), and categorised close to one million inventors’ names based on whether they sounded male or female.</p>
<p>We found that having a male-sounding first name increases the odds of securing a patent. This gender bias can have serious implications for women’s health, female career progression and equity policies in STEM. But what’s causing it?</p>
<h2>Women are increasingly applying for patents</h2>
<p>Patents provide a 20-year monopoly over a new invention and are a well-known measure of the output from STEM-based industries. </p>
<p>Global studies show the number of patent applications from female inventors (while still lower than the number from men) has grown significantly over the past 20 years. What has been less clear is whether these applications convert to granted patents. </p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/484502/original/file-20220914-23-zvcpay.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/484502/original/file-20220914-23-zvcpay.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/484502/original/file-20220914-23-zvcpay.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=360&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/484502/original/file-20220914-23-zvcpay.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=360&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/484502/original/file-20220914-23-zvcpay.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=360&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/484502/original/file-20220914-23-zvcpay.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=452&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/484502/original/file-20220914-23-zvcpay.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=452&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/484502/original/file-20220914-23-zvcpay.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=452&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">The proportion of female inventors associated with patent applications worldwide has grown from 1915 to 2017.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Intellectual Property Office UK, Gender Profiles in Worldwide Patenting: An Analysis of Female Inventorship (2019 edition)</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p><a href="https://www.nature.com/articles/nbt.4120">Studies</a> of data from the United States Patent and Trademark Office unfortunately reveal inventors with a female-sounding first name are less successful at having their patent granted than those with a male-sounding first name. </p>
<p>This is irrespective of the technical field and the gender of the <a href="https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=3828216#:%7E:text=We%20find%20evidence%20that%20the,the%20examiner%20of%20the%20application.">patent examiner</a>, and despite evidence that female inventor patents are <a href="https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=1508287">just as good</a> as male inventor patents. </p>
<p>We wanted to investigate whether a similar gender bias exists for patents filed at IP Australia, where most applications come from non-residents. Inventors who plan to operate internationally will often file in multiple jurisdictions, including filing in Australia. </p>
<p>So unlike studies of the US Patent and Trademark Office, where the majority of patents come from US residents, a study of patents at IP Australia reflects more worldwide applications.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/484494/original/file-20220914-22-1qjanc.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/484494/original/file-20220914-22-1qjanc.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/484494/original/file-20220914-22-1qjanc.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=248&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/484494/original/file-20220914-22-1qjanc.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=248&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/484494/original/file-20220914-22-1qjanc.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=248&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/484494/original/file-20220914-22-1qjanc.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=312&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/484494/original/file-20220914-22-1qjanc.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=312&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/484494/original/file-20220914-22-1qjanc.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=312&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">A profile of 2020 patent applications to IP Australia.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">IP Australia</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>A gender gap persists</h2>
<p>Our analysis of 309,544 patent applications submitted over 15 years found 90% of applications had at least one male inventor. Just 24% had at least one female inventor (typically as part of a mixed-gender team).</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/484509/original/file-20220914-13-oa7x6k.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/484509/original/file-20220914-13-oa7x6k.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/484509/original/file-20220914-13-oa7x6k.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/484509/original/file-20220914-13-oa7x6k.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/484509/original/file-20220914-13-oa7x6k.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/484509/original/file-20220914-13-oa7x6k.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=502&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/484509/original/file-20220914-13-oa7x6k.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=502&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/484509/original/file-20220914-13-oa7x6k.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=502&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">The percentage of applications per year, per team composition (male, female, ambiguous, unidentified).</span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>We then examined whether these applications converted into a successful patent grant. We found inventors with a female-sounding first name had slightly lower odds of having their patent granted.</p>
<p>Also, as the number of males on a team increased, so did the odds of the team being granted a patent – whereas adding a female had a negligible impact. In other words, bigger teams of inventors had more patent success, unless the additional inventors had female-sounding names.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/484511/original/file-20220914-12-2u0kw6.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/484511/original/file-20220914-12-2u0kw6.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/484511/original/file-20220914-12-2u0kw6.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/484511/original/file-20220914-12-2u0kw6.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/484511/original/file-20220914-12-2u0kw6.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/484511/original/file-20220914-12-2u0kw6.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/484511/original/file-20220914-12-2u0kw6.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/484511/original/file-20220914-12-2u0kw6.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">This graph shows the pattern that emerges when you vary the composition of a single-gender team. You can see more men increases chances of success, whereas more women does not.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Author provided</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>But why is it like this?</h2>
<p>One question for us was whether this gender disparity could be explained by the types of fields patents were being granted in, and whether women simply work in less “patentable” fields such as life sciences.</p>
<p>We found more than 60% of female inventors were clustered in just four of 35 technical fields (the 35 science categories recognised in patents). These were all in the life sciences: chemistry, biotechnology, pharmaceuticals and medical technology. </p>
<p>We also found patents in three of these fields had a lower-than-average success rate. In other words, it’s generally harder to get a patent in these fields, regardless of whether you’re a woman or man.</p>
<p>Nevertheless, even after we statistically controlled for the effect of participating in a less successful field, we still found a gender disparity – male-named inventors did better than female-named inventors. </p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/485489/original/file-20220920-12-awunyy.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="An old-timey depiction of a male inventor in black and white." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/485489/original/file-20220920-12-awunyy.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/485489/original/file-20220920-12-awunyy.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=409&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/485489/original/file-20220920-12-awunyy.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=409&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/485489/original/file-20220920-12-awunyy.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=409&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/485489/original/file-20220920-12-awunyy.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=514&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/485489/original/file-20220920-12-awunyy.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=514&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/485489/original/file-20220920-12-awunyy.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=514&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Women are responsible for some of the greatest inventions, yet inventorship remains a male-dominated field. We’ll have to fight historical biases against women if this is to change.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Shutterstock</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>Women in STEM must be supported</h2>
<p>The implications of women falling out of the patent system are significant for a number of reasons. For one, patents with female inventors are more likely to focus <a href="https://theconversation.com/too-few-women-get-to-invent-thats-a-problem-for-womens-health-162576">on female diseases</a>. </p>
<p>Also, getting a patent can be important for career progression and for securing investment capital. And <a href="https://theconversation.com/how-talented-kids-from-low-income-families-become-americas-lost-einsteins-89126">research has</a> shown a lack of female inventors today impacts the rate at which girls aspire to be the inventors of tomorrow. </p>
<p>The next step in our research is to find out why there is a gender gap in successful patent applications. </p>
<p>We don’t believe it’s a simple case of gender bias at the patent office. We suspect the issues are complex, and related to the systemic and institutional biases that hold back women’s progress in STEM more generally. </p>
<p>Country and cultural differences may also be at play, particularly since more than 90% of patent applications received by IP Australia come from non-Australian inventors (and overwhelmingly from the United States). </p>
<p>We want to look deeper into our results to figure out what’s driving the gender disparity, and what we can do to support female inventors. </p>
<p>The first step in fixing a problem is acknowledging it exists. We hope our research starts a conversation that prompts people to reflect on their own biases. </p>
<hr>
<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/caring-or-killing-harmful-gender-stereotypes-kick-in-early-and-may-be-keeping-girls-away-from-stem-169742">Caring or killing: harmful gender stereotypes kick in early — and may be keeping girls away from STEM</a>
</strong>
</em>
</p>
<hr>
<img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/188600/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>The authors do not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and have disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Although female inventorship has grown over the years, 15 years’ worth of patent outcomes from IP Australia suggests inventing is still a luxury for women.Vicki Huang, Senior Lecturer, Intellectual Property, Deakin UniversityCameron Patrick, Statistical Consultant, The University of MelbourneSue Finch, Statistical Consultant, The University of MelbourneLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1859352022-09-22T12:39:39Z2022-09-22T12:39:39ZFemale Airbnb hosts earn thousands less per year than male hosts<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/475664/original/file-20220722-16-fgxx67.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=33%2C8%2C5558%2C3713&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">The gender wage gap persists even in the 'sharing economy.'</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/photo/salary-and-wage-gap-concept-gender-symbols-and-royalty-free-image/1336139967?adppopup=true">designer491/iStock/Getty Images Plus via Getty Images</a></span></figcaption></figure><p><em>The <a href="https://theconversation.com/us/topics/research-brief-83231">Research Brief</a> is a short take about interesting academic work.</em> </p>
<h2>The big idea</h2>
<p>Female Airbnb hosts in the United States <a href="https://doi.org/10.1080/10696679.2022.2080715">earn on average about 25% less per year than their male counterparts</a> for their rentals, according to our new study. That’s <a href="https://www.bls.gov/opub/reports/womens-databook/2019/home.htm">slightly higher than the annual gender wage gap</a> reported by the U.S. Census Bureau and adds up to more than US$4,000 in lower earnings per year.</p>
<p>Our analysis revealed that the average nightly rate of a female host’s listing was $30 cheaper than those of male hosts.</p>
<hr>
<iframe id="noa-web-audio-player" style="border: none" src="https://embed-player.newsoveraudio.com/v4?key=x84olp&id=https://theconversation.com/female-airbnb-hosts-earn-thousands-less-per-year-than-male-hosts-185935&bgColor=F5F5F5&color=D8352A&playColor=D8352A" width="100%" height="110px"></iframe>
<p><em>You can listen to more articles from The Conversation, narrated by Noa, <a href="https://theconversation.com/us/topics/audio-narrated-99682">here</a>.</em></p>
<hr>
<p>For this research, we analyzed data taken from the public profiles of 8,000 hosts across several U.S. cities. We focused on listings with only one host and just one active listing. The name each host posted on their public profile was coded as female or male, and gender-ambiguous names were excluded.</p>
<p>To determine a host’s annual earnings, we analyzed each listing’s nightly price, number of stays per year and the average length of stay. We also looked at other factors that might contribute to the earnings gap, such as the number of guests that could be accommodated and the number of years each host had been active on the platform. </p>
<p>We also determined the difference in property values between genders by extracting data from <a href="https://www.zillow.com">Zillow.com</a> about the median home value in the ZIP code where each listing was located.</p>
<p>Our analysis revealed that the average nightly rate of female hosts’ listings was $30 cheaper than those of male hosts. Further, female hosts booked fewer reservations, and each stay typically accommodated fewer guests.</p>
<p>We found that women make up just over half – 53% – of hosts and have slightly more valuable properties than male hosts. We did not find any significant difference between the number of years female and male hosts have been active on the platform.</p>
<p>The earnings difference appears to be most prevalent when a host is renting out an entire home as opposed to offering a private room within their own residence. And while the gap narrows after controlling for many listing-related factors – such as median home value – a difference in earnings persists. </p>
<p>This suggests that we need to look beyond the Airbnb data to explain the gap.</p>
<h2>Why it matters</h2>
<p>Our research shines a light on the need to delve further into what factors may be contributing to differences in earnings between genders. </p>
<p>In the U.S., <a href="https://www.bls.gov/opub/reports/womens-databook/2019/home.htm">female full-time workers still earn about 80 cents for every dollar</a> earned by their male counterparts, and <a href="https://www.census.gov/library/stories/2019/09/payday-poverty-and-women.html">more women than men live in poverty</a>. This income shortfall also affects millions of children because according to the Census Bureau, around <a href="https://www.census.gov/library/stories/2019/09/payday-poverty-and-women.html">1 in 4 families headed by a woman</a> are poor, compared to just over 1 in 10 headed by a man. </p>
<p>Among the known reasons for this pay gap: Women are more likely than men to select jobs that <a href="https://www.aeaweb.org/articles?id=10.1257/jel.20160995">require shorter hours</a> or <a href="https://dx.doi.org/10.1257/jel.20160995">provide flexibility in scheduling</a>. Shorter hours and flexibility in scheduling are preferable for workers who have more demanding obligations at home. However, these jobs are often lower paying. </p>
<p>However, Airbnb hosts have full control of their scheduling and booking of their listings, and female hosts set their own rates. So lack of scheduling flexibility should not be a major factor in explaining why women earn less than men on the platform.</p>
<h2>What still isn’t known</h2>
<p>The most important unknown in this area of research is whether women are aware that they are offering lower prices than men.</p>
<p>Exploring whether there are gender-based earnings differences on other hospitality platforms as well, like Vrbo or Homestay, could provide new insights.</p>
<p>Also, it’s not yet clear whether or why male and female hosts take different approaches to setting Airbnb rates – although other research suggests some clues. A 2007 study found that compared to women, men <a href="https://doi.org/10.1037/0022-3514.93.4.600">negotiate for higher payments in bargaining situations</a>. And a 2009 study of gender differences in setting professional fees found that women typically charge less than men for the same services because <a href="https://doi.org/10.1016/j.obhdp.2008.11.004">they tend to be more relationship-oriented toward their clients</a>, which can lead them to charge lower prices.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/185935/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>The authors do not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and have disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Even when they offer similar listings, female hosts tend to charge less than their male counterparts.Alexander Davidson, Assistant Professor of Marketing, Wayne State UniversityMark R. Gleim, Assistant Professor of Marketing, Auburn UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1895132022-08-30T18:09:29Z2022-08-30T18:09:29ZGrey hair: Fine for George Clooney but not Lisa LaFlamme?<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/481623/original/file-20220829-8654-tx2s1p.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=32%2C0%2C982%2C335&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">In the aftermath of her dismissal, alleged statements about Lisa LaFlamme's grey hair by CTV executives have ignited debates around the expectations placed on the physical appearance of women. </span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">(Bell Media)</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>Hillary Clinton once said: “<a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2001/05/21/nyregion/commencements-at-yale-mrs-clinton-ponders-hair-and-politics.html">Pay attention to your hair, because everyone else will</a>.” </p>
<p>It’s been two weeks since the shocking news that longtime CTV News anchor Lisa LaFlamme was <a href="https://www.theglobeandmail.com/canada/article-longtime-ctv-anchor-lisa-laflamme-blindsided-as-bell-media-ends/">dismissed after 35 years</a> with the network. It’s still not clear why she was let go. </p>
<p>But in the aftermath of LaFlamme’s departure, there were allegations LaFlamme’s decision to <a href="https://www.theglobeandmail.com/canada/article-lisa-laflamme-ctv-grey-hair/">allow her hair to go grey</a> was questioned by executives.</p>
<p>LaFlamme’s termination, and the allegations that newsroom executives made comments about her hair, have angered many. More than 70 prominent Canadian journalists, activists, politicians and artists have <a href="https://www.theglobeandmail.com/canada/article-open-letter-bell-media-laflamme/">signed an open letter</a> condemning LaFlamme’s dismissal.</p>
<p>Bell Media, which owns CTV, has denied that LaFlamme’s removal had anything to do with her age or going grey. The company says that terminating LaFlamme’s contract was a <a href="https://toronto.citynews.ca/2022/08/28/bell-media-lisa-laflammes-departure/">“business decision”</a>. </p>
<p>In a post on LinkedIn, <a href="https://www.linkedin.com/feed/update/urn:li:activity:6969086677784915968/">Bell CEO Mirko Bibic said</a>: “The narrative has been that Lisa’s age, gender or grey hair played into the decision. I am satisfied that this is not the case.”</p>
<p>Amid backlash over LaFlamme’s dismissal, Michael Melling, vice president of news at Bell Media, is <a href="https://www.thestar.com/news/canada/2022/08/26/ctv-executive-michael-melling-to-take-leave-in-wake-of-lisa-laflamme-firing.html">on a leave of absence pending the outcome of a workplace review</a>.</p>
<p><div data-react-class="Tweet" data-react-props="{"tweetId":"1559238644317167618"}"></div></p>
<p>Whatever the cause of LaFlamme’s dismissal, the episode has once again highlighted the gendered ageism many women continue to face. </p>
<h2>Aging and gender</h2>
<p>Unfortunately, this story is nothing new in the world of ageism. Ageism is negative stereotypes, prejudice or discrimination <a href="https://doi.org/10.1007/s10433-016-0409-9">directed toward aging people</a>. Issues surrounding ageism continue to <a href="https://doi.org/10.1016/S2468-2667(19)30035-0">be widespread</a> in our society and mainstream media.</p>
<p>Though ageism affects all older adults, <a href="https://doi.org/10.1080/08952841.2021.1899744">women are subject to the greatest discrimination</a>. The standards for attractiveness in our consumerist culture are <a href="https://doi.org/10.1017/S0144686X07007003">defined by youthful characteristics and are constantly portrayed through the media</a>.</p>
<p>How women are judged compared to men in terms of physical appearance varies immensely. </p>
<p>Take the famous (and relatively new) term dad bod. <a href="https://www.vox.com/2015/5/14/8607369/what-is-dad-bod">A “dad bod” is a male body type</a> that is described as “softly round.” It suggests that, because a man has found a partner and fathered children, he doesn’t need to worry about maintaining a sculpted physique. Dad bods have been celebrated because men like <a href="https://www.mirror.co.uk/3am/celebrity-news/shirtless-leonardo-dicaprio-shows-dad-22991075">Leonardo DiCaprio</a> have made them popular. </p>
<p><div data-react-class="Tweet" data-react-props="{"tweetId":"1562408903551467520"}"></div></p>
<p>Where is the equivalent for women? Is there a mom bod? Of course there is, but a mom bod is usually a woman who has “let herself go” as she’s aged and is no longer desirable. </p>
<p>This gendered ageism is particularly apparent when it comes to physical appearance. The unrealistic pressure and expectations put on women in terms of beauty and youthfulness is part of the rise in the importance of <a href="https://www.taylorfrancis.com/chapters/edit/10.4324/9780203740248-24/aesthetic-capital-sylvia-holla-giselinde-kuipers">aesthetic values</a> in society. </p>
<p>These values influence the notion that <a href="https://doi.org/10.1017%2FS0714980811000274">grey hair on a woman produces one of the least desirable personas in Western society – an old woman</a>.</p>
<p>“Ideal” images and media representations of women exaggerate our expectations of female physical attractiveness: forever youthful, thin, light-skinned and <a href="https://doi.org/10.1016/j.bodyim.2019.01.010">toned</a>. This is a physical appearance that is not representative of the majority of women, especially not older women. </p>
<p>The double standard when it comes to aging speaks to the reality that aging women are judged the harshest in society. The loss of youthfulness (which is associated with attractiveness) <a href="http://dx.doi.org/10.4236/ojn.2016.63026">makes women less desirable</a>.</p>
<p>These harmful standards of beauty and aging have ignited calls for an intersectional approach to address the cultural expectations of ageism and physical appearances. Leading feminist scholars like <a href="https://www.ucpress.edu/book/9780520240544/unbearable-weight">Susan Bordo</a> have stated that as women are socialized to be more worried about their physical appearances and aging, the more damaged their self images and confidence will be. </p>
<h2>Grey is for men but not women</h2>
<p>LaFlamme and her alleged experience of gendered ageism makes for some interesting comparisons. There are <a href="https://www.wonderwall.com/celebrity/hot-celebrities/countdown-15-hottest-celeb-silver-foxes-29210.gallery">entire articles</a>, forums, hashtags and social media sites that celebrate “silver foxes” (older men with grey or white hair). What is the equivalent of a silver fox for women? There isn’t. </p>
<p><div data-react-class="Tweet" data-react-props="{"tweetId":"877707747684270080"}"></div></p>
<p>Anderson Cooper continues hosting his show on CNN with grey hair. <a href="https://regalgentleman.com/blogs/blog/george-clooney-proves-that-silver-hair-should-be-embraced">George Clooney</a> and <a href="https://time.com/4834526/steve-carell-grey-hair-internet-reactions/">Steve Carell</a> are praised and labelled as attractive for their grey hair. Most notably, LaFlamme’s predecessor, Lloyd Robertson, was allowed to stay in the anchor’s chair long after his hair turned grey, all while being able to leave on his own terms <a href="https://www.thestar.com/news/gta/2022/08/16/heres-how-other-famous-news-anchors-in-canada-and-the-us-bid-their-final-farewells.html">when he was 77</a>.</p>
<p>This is because aging men are seen as <a href="https://metro.co.uk/2015/02/17/10-reasons-grey-haired-men-are-hot-5065945/">suave, distinguished and sophisticated</a>. Women are just seen as old. <a href="https://doi.org/10.1080/08952841.2021.1899744">“Whatever a woman does or does not do with her hair will affect how others respond to her and thus her social power”</a>, meaning that women have a choice: let the natural process of aging take over and go grey (and be socially dismissed), or dye their hair to look younger and be more “socially accepted.”</p>
<h2>#KeepTheGrey</h2>
<p>LaFlamme’s experience is the spark that has started a fire.</p>
<p>Brands that joined in solidarity with LaFlamme include <a href="https://wtop.com/business-finance/2022/08/heres-why-wendys-in-canada-has-given-its-iconic-red-headed-mascot-gray-hair/">Wendy’s</a> (their iconic red head logo switching to grey hair), <a href="https://swimsuit.si.com/swimsuit/model/maye-musk"><em>Sports Illustrated</em></a> and <a href="https://twitter.com/DoveCanada/status/1561503357889568768?">Dove Canada</a> (tweeting #KeepTheGrey). </p>
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<p><div data-react-class="Tweet" data-react-props="{"tweetId":"1562894323750141952"}"></div></p>
<p>These companies have taken a step in the right direction. Though this matter seems like a <a href="https://nationalpost.com/news/canada/in-wake-of-laflammes-exit-brands-should-be-wary-when-jumping-on-hot-topics-experts">grey area</a>, it is much deeper than the colour of LaFlamme’s hair. It is a deeply complex matter of gendered ageism. </p>
<p>With more women (and aging women) in the work force, <a href="https://www.forbes.com/sites/avivahwittenbergcox/2022/08/27/companies-beware-grey-hair-rising-fire-the-older-at-your-peril/?sh=126e32ff2910">companies need to learn how to retain, respect and develop older employees</a>. Responding to the mistreatment of LaFlamme and making her an inspiring role model is the beginning of a positive change.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/189513/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>The authors do not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and have disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>For many men, grey hair is just part of getting older, but for women, going grey can have major consequences.Victoria Atabakhsh, PhD Candidate in Aging, Health, and Well-Being/Director of Lifestyle and Programs, University of WaterlooJoe Todd, PhD Candidate in Recreation and Leisure Studies, University of WaterlooLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1840332022-06-06T12:50:54Z2022-06-06T12:50:54ZWhy are so many big tech whistleblowers women? Here is what the research shows<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/466967/original/file-20220603-15396-vcpulz.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=0%2C7%2C2624%2C2038&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">The vast majority of high-profile big tech whistleblowers in recent years have been women.</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/photo/girl-blowing-whistle-outdoors-royalty-free-image/129299771">Elke Meitzel/Image Source via Getty Images</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>A number of high-profile whistleblowers in the technology industry have stepped into the spotlight in the past few years. For the most part, they have been revealing corporate practices that thwart the public interest: Frances Haugen exposed <a href="https://www.wsj.com/articles/the-facebook-files-11631713039">personal data exploitation at Meta</a>, Timnit Gebru and Rebecca Rivers challenged Google on <a href="https://www.vox.com/recode/2019/11/25/20982649/google-fired-rebecca-rivers-employee-questioned-work-customs-and-border-protection">ethics</a> and <a href="https://www.wired.com/story/google-timnit-gebru-ai-what-really-happened/">AI issues</a>, and Janneke Parrish raised concerns about <a href="https://www.cnn.com/2021/11/03/tech/apple-appletoo-janneke-parrish-nlrb-complaint/index.html">a discriminatory work culture at Apple</a>, among others.</p>
<p>Many of these whistleblowers are women – far more, it appears, than the <a href="https://www.cnbc.com/2020/09/29/it-could-take-12-years-to-reach-equal-representation-of-women-in-tech.html">proportion of women working in the tech industry</a>. This raises the question of whether women are more likely to be whistleblowers in the tech field. The short answer is: “It’s complicated.”</p>
<p>For many, whistleblowing is a last resort to get society to address problems that can’t be resolved within an organization, or at least by the whistleblower. It speaks to the organizational status, power and resources of the whistleblower; the openness, communication and values of the organization in which they work; and to their passion, frustration and commitment to the issue they want to see addressed. Are whistleblowers more focused on the public interest? More virtuous? Less influential in their organizations? Are these possible explanations for why so many women are blowing the whistle on big tech? </p>
<p>To investigate these questions, we, a <a href="https://scholar.google.com/citations?user=HzqQ2wYAAAAJ&hl=en">computer scientist</a> and a <a href="https://scholar.google.com/citations?user=Uun9IZkAAAAJ&hl=en">sociologist</a>, explored the nature of big tech whistleblowing, the influence of gender, and the implications for technology’s role in society. What we found was both complex and intriguing.</p>
<h2>Narrative of virtue</h2>
<p>Whistleblowing is a difficult phenomenon to study because its public manifestation is only the tip of the iceberg. Most whistleblowing is confidential or anonymous. On the surface, the notion of female whistleblowers fits with the <a href="http://dx.doi.org/10.1037/0021-9010.82.6.920">prevailing narrative</a> that women are somehow more altruistic, focused on the public interest or morally virtuous than men.</p>
<p>Consider an argument made by the New York State Woman Suffrage Association around <a href="https://wams.nyhistory.org/modernizing-america/woman-suffrage/arguments-for-and-against-suffrage">giving U.S. women the right to vote</a> in the 1920s: “Women are, by nature and training, housekeepers. Let them have a hand in the city’s housekeeping, even if they introduce an occasional house-cleaning.” In other words, giving women the power of the vote would help “clean up” the mess that men had made. </p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/466982/original/file-20220603-14-e7g0vc.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="a woman with light brown skin and an Afro" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/466982/original/file-20220603-14-e7g0vc.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/466982/original/file-20220603-14-e7g0vc.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/466982/original/file-20220603-14-e7g0vc.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/466982/original/file-20220603-14-e7g0vc.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/466982/original/file-20220603-14-e7g0vc.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/466982/original/file-20220603-14-e7g0vc.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/466982/original/file-20220603-14-e7g0vc.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Timnit Gebru called out ethical issues in Google’s AI efforts when she was a computer scientist at the company.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://newsroom.ap.org/detail/InsiderQATimnitGebruAIEthics/3aa9eaa491ab41348e46ce734ce58463/photo">AP Photo/Jeff Chiu</a></span>
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<p>More recently, a similar argument was used in the move to all-women traffic enforcement in some Latin American cities under the assumption that <a href="https://www.americasquarterly.org/fulltextarticle/madame-officer/">female police officers are more impervious to bribes</a>. Indeed, the United Nations has recently identified <a href="https://egypt.un.org/en/165297-addressing-gender-dimensions-corruption">women’s global empowerment as key to reducing corruption and inequality</a> in its world development goals. </p>
<p>There is data showing that women, more so than men, are associated with lower levels of corruption in government and business. For example, studies show that the <a href="https://doi.org/10.1177%2F0010414019830744">higher the share of female elected officials</a> in governments around the world, <a href="https://sites.bu.edu/fisman/files/2015/11/fairersex.pdf">the lower the corruption</a>. While this trend in part reflects the tendency of less corrupt governments to more often elect women, additional studies show a <a href="https://doi.org/10.1177%2F0010414019830744">direct causal effect of electing female leaders</a> and, in turn, <a href="https://doi.org/10.1177%2F0010414020970218">reducing corruption</a>.</p>
<p>Experimental studies and attitudinal surveys also show that <a href="https://doi.org/10.1007/s10551-006-9129-y">women are more ethical in business dealings</a> <a href="https://dx.doi.org/10.1111/j.1465-7287.2009.00188.x">than their male counterparts</a>, and one study using data on actual firm-level dealings confirms that businesses led by women are directly <a href="https://doi.org/10.1080/00220388.2016.1234036">associated with a lower incidence of bribery</a>. Much of this likely comes down to the socialization of men and women into different gender roles in society.</p>
<h2>Hints, but no hard data</h2>
<p>Although women may be acculturated to behave more ethically, this leaves open the question of whether they really are more likely to be whistleblowers. The full data on who reports wrongdoing is elusive, but scholars try to address the question by asking people about their whistleblowing orientation in surveys and in vignettes. In these studies, the gender effect is inconclusive. </p>
<p>However, women appear more willing than men to report wrongdoing <a href="https://doi.org/10.1007/s10551-008-9866-1">when they can do so confidentially</a>. This may be related to the fact that <a href="https://doi.org/10.1287/orsc.1070.0310">female whistleblowers may face higher rates</a> <a href="http://dx.doi.org/10.1353/sor.2007.0061">of reprisal than male whistleblowers</a>.</p>
<p>In the technology field, there is an additional factor at play. Women are under-represented both in numbers and in organizational power. The “Big Five” in tech – Google, Meta, Apple, Amazon and Microsoft – are still <a href="https://www.eeoc.gov/special-report/diversity-high-tech">largely white</a> and male. </p>
<p>Women currently represent <a href="https://www.statista.com/chart/4467/female-employees-at-tech-companies/">about 25% of their technology workforce and about 30% of their executive leadership</a>. Women are prevalent enough now to avoid being tokens but often don’t have the insider status and resources to effect change. They also lack the power that sometimes corrupts, referred to as the <a href="https://www.unodc.org/documents/corruption/Publications/2020/THE_TIME_IS_NOW_2020_12_08.pdf">corruption opportunity gap</a>.</p>
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<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/466983/original/file-20220603-16-ngw7no.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="a woman with light skin and long blonde hair speaks into a microphone" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/466983/original/file-20220603-16-ngw7no.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/466983/original/file-20220603-16-ngw7no.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/466983/original/file-20220603-16-ngw7no.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/466983/original/file-20220603-16-ngw7no.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/466983/original/file-20220603-16-ngw7no.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/466983/original/file-20220603-16-ngw7no.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/466983/original/file-20220603-16-ngw7no.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Frances Haugen testified before Congress about how Meta, then called Facebook, put profits ahead of the public interest. Earlier she had leaked internal company documents to show that Meta was aware of the harm it was causing.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://newsroom.ap.org/detail/BooksFacebookWhistleblower/62bb9e6dae634e23b203850a37a450f9/photo">AP Photo/Alex Brandon</a></span>
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<h2>In the public interest</h2>
<p>Marginalized people often <a href="https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/learning-work/202110/what-motivates-whistleblower">lack a sense of belonging and inclusion</a> in organizations. The silver lining to this exclusion is that those people may feel less obligated to toe the line when they see wrongdoing. Given all of this, it is likely that some combination of gender socialization and female outsider status in big tech creates a situation where <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2021/oct/08/tech-whistleblowers-facebook-frances-haugen-amazon-google-pinterest">women appear to be the prevalent whistleblowers</a>. </p>
<p>It may be that whistleblowing in tech is the result of a perfect storm between the field’s gender and public interest problems. Clear and conclusive data does not exist, and without concrete evidence the jury is out. But the prevalence of female whistleblowers in big tech is emblematic of both of these deficiencies, and the efforts of these whistleblowers are often aimed at boosting diversity and reducing the harm big tech causes society. </p>
<p>More so than any other corporate sector, tech pervades people’s lives. Big tech creates the tools people use every day, defines the information the public consumes, collects data on its users’ thoughts and behavior, and plays a major role in determining whether privacy, safety, security and welfare are supported or undermined.</p>
<p>And yet, the complexity, proprietary intellectual property protections and ubiquity of digital technologies make it hard for the public to gauge the personal risks and societal impact of technology. Today’s corporate cultural firewalls make it difficult to understand the choices that go into developing the products and services that so dominate people’s lives. </p>
<p>Of all areas within society in need of transparency and a greater focus on the public interest, we believe the most urgent priority is big tech. This makes the courage and the commitment of today’s whistleblowers all the more important.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/184033/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Francine Berman is a Trustee of the Sloan Foundation and a Board member of the Marconi Society.</span></em></p><p class="fine-print"><em><span>Jennifer Lundquist does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Frances Haugen, Timnit Gebru and Janneke Parrish are at the forefront of a group of high-profile women calling out big tech. Is there a connection between their gender and their role as whistleblowers?Francine Berman, Director of Public Interest Technology and Stuart Rice Research Professor, UMass AmherstJennifer Lundquist, Professor of Sociology, UMass AmherstLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1784182022-03-07T19:07:03Z2022-03-07T19:07:03ZGender bias in student surveys on teaching increased with remote learning. What can unis do to ensure a fair go for female staff?<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/450252/original/file-20220307-83249-11lx8dz.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=0%2C0%2C5607%2C3732&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">
</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">Shutterstock</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>Gender bias against female academics increased in student evaluations of teaching during remote learning, particularly among male students, <a href="https://ro.uow.edu.au/jutlp/vol19/iss1/10/">our research</a> published today shows. This bias could have impacts on female academics’ leadership and career opportunities, and on their confidence and well-being. Based on our research, we make four recommendations to counter gender bias in teaching evaluations and its impacts.</p>
<p>In early 2020, universities across Australia moved all teaching online due to the spread of COVID-19 and subsequent lockdowns. Academics had to learn very quickly how to teach online and assist their students with online learning. The shift meant teaching moved from the neutral territory of the university classroom into the more private space of the home. </p>
<p>This has had many consequences for academics, particularly women who were also caring for children.</p>
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Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/lose-some-weight-stupid-old-hag-universities-should-no-longer-ask-students-for-anonymous-feedback-on-their-teachers-173911">'Lose some weight', 'stupid old hag': universities should no longer ask students for anonymous feedback on their teachers</a>
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<p>Academics regularly have their teaching performance monitored. This is most often done through student evaluation of teaching. The surveys used for this purpose continued during 2020. </p>
<p>The surveys record student judgement of teacher quality, resources and subject design. Many problems have been identified with institutional reliance on this evaluation measure. These problems include relatively low response rates – <a href="https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0209749">often 30% or less</a> – and the <a href="https://doi.org/10.1080/0309877X.2021.1895093">subjective nature of student perceptions</a> of teaching quality. These perceptions are <a href="https://doi.org/10.1080/02602938.2021.1888075">influenced by teachers’ gender and race</a>, with some comments in an <a href="https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/02602938.2021.2012643?journalCode=caeh20">Australian study</a> qualifying as “hate speech”. </p>
<p><div data-react-class="Tweet" data-react-props="{"tweetId":"994212334360059904"}"></div></p>
<p>Yet universities continue to rely heavily on student evaluations in monitoring teaching quality. They also use them for individual academic performance management, including promotion.</p>
<h2>What did the study find?</h2>
<p><a href="https://ro.uow.edu.au/jutlp/vol19/iss1/10/">Our research</a>, published in a special Women & Leadership issue of the Journal of University Learning & Teaching Practice, analysed more than 22,000 de-identified scores from student evaluations of teaching and over 8,000 de-identified student comments. The data came from surveys in 2019 (face-to-face teaching) and 2020 (remote teaching) that evaluated teaching staff in a multidisciplinary college at Victoria University, Melbourne. All surveys were from first-year students across all disciplines and courses.</p>
<p>There were no differences in student evaluation scores between male and female lecturers or between in-person and remote teaching. But our analysis found a difference in the comments. </p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="Female lecturer standing at the front of a university class" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/450257/original/file-20220307-84100-domzlk.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/450257/original/file-20220307-84100-domzlk.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/450257/original/file-20220307-84100-domzlk.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/450257/original/file-20220307-84100-domzlk.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/450257/original/file-20220307-84100-domzlk.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/450257/original/file-20220307-84100-domzlk.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/450257/original/file-20220307-84100-domzlk.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
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<span class="caption">There were no differences in students’ scoring of male and female lecturers in 2019 and 2020, but there was a clear difference in the comments.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Shutterstock</span></span>
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<p>Most comments from both male and female students were positive about both male and female teachers. These comments mostly emphasised that students recognised and appreciated their teachers’ efforts during the massive and rapid shift to online learning in 2020. </p>
<p>Negative comments were in the minority (7% for each year). However, the students making these comments disproportionately targeted female academics for negative commentary about attitude, irrespective of students’ gender or the mode of delivery. </p>
<p>During remote learning, there were more negative comments about female academics’ teaching style, particularly from male students with a 30 percentage point increase in comments by male students from 2019. Typical examples of such comments by male students about female teachers included:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>“She had no idea.”</p>
<p>“Concepts were not fully explained and key concepts were left out.”</p>
</blockquote>
<p>Female academics were also more often the targets of negative comments on teachers’ ease with the video conferencing software, such as: </p>
<blockquote>
<p>“She struggled more than my other teachers on Zoom.” </p>
</blockquote>
<p>Comments about the domestic environment while teaching online were in a minority. But these comments were directed at female academics only, such as this one by a female student.</p>
<blockquote>
<p>“It was distracting when her child would interrupt her.” </p>
</blockquote>
<p><div data-react-class="Tweet" data-react-props="{"tweetId":"1447106074046308356"}"></div></p>
<h2>Why does this gender bias matter?</h2>
<p>During COVID-19 lockdowns, the burden of caring for children fell disproportionately to women throughout Australia, as the Australian Institute of Family Studies <a href="https://aifs.gov.au/publications/families-australia-survey-life-during-covid-19">has shown</a>. It was no different for academic women. Should they be penalised for it?</p>
<p>Academic women are also more likely than their male peers to suffer from <a href="https://www.proquest.com/dissertations-theses/experiencing-imposter-syndrome-academia-women/docview/2070929379/se-2?accountid=14844">imposter syndrome</a>. The negative gendered comments in student evaluations of their teaching could reinforce these anxieties. </p>
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Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/our-uni-teachers-were-already-among-the-worlds-most-stressed-covid-and-student-feedback-have-just-made-things-worse-162612">Our uni teachers were already among the world's most stressed. COVID and student feedback have just made things worse</a>
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<p>In a year when women’s <a href="https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-020-01294-9">research outputs decreased</a> while men’s research outputs increased, an added concern is there may be an over-reliance on student evaluations for women academics who seek promotion.</p>
<h2>What can universities do to counter this bias?</h2>
<p>Given that universities still use these surveys for teacher promotion and performance evaluations, ways must be found to counter the effect of poor feedback from students that is so gendered and subjective. We recommend that:</p>
<ul>
<li><p>an amnesty applies to negative comments in data from student evaluations of teaching in 2020 and 2021 (due to COVID)</p></li>
<li><p>a guide is created and workshops run for people (line managers and members of promotions panels) reading student evaluation data to highlight their known gendered bias</p></li>
<li><p>implicit gender bias training for students be developed and cautionary information be added in the survey instructions to students</p></li>
<li><p>female academics who have encountered such negative feedback are given strategies on how to deal with it. These may include mental health training, sharing the purpose of the evaluation surveys and the feedback with students, focusing on the positive comments rather than the few negative ones, and citing the published research on bias in promotion applications.</p></li>
</ul>
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<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/yes-uni-students-say-some-awful-things-in-teaching-surveys-so-how-can-we-use-them-to-improve-177155">Yes, uni students say some awful things in teaching surveys, so how can we use them to improve?</a>
</strong>
</em>
</p>
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<img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/178418/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Kathy is a lecturer within the First Year College at Victoria University.</span></em></p><p class="fine-print"><em><span>Dianne Hall is employed by Victoria University. She has recieved funding from the Australian Research Council.</span></em></p><p class="fine-print"><em><span>Kate Kelly and Natalie Kon-yu do not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and have disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Comparing students’ comments on their teachers in in-person classes in 2019 and online classes in 2020, the one difference that stands out is the increase in bias against female lecturers.Kathy Tangalakis, Associate Professor of Physiology, Victoria UniversityDianne Hall, Professor of History, Victoria UniversityKate Kelly, Teaching Focused Academic, First Year College, Victoria UniversityNatalie Kon-yu, Senior Lecturer, Literature and Gender Studies, Victoria UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1754832022-02-10T13:37:23Z2022-02-10T13:37:23ZIn countries more biased against women, higher COVID-19 death rates for men might not tell an accurate story<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/445207/original/file-20220208-23-bl0pjl.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=0%2C0%2C2121%2C1412&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Gender norms can affect every aspect of a person's life, including their health.</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/photo/girl-protecting-herself-with-mask-coronavirus-covid-royalty-free-image/1213944818">YES BRASIL/iStock via Getty Images Plus</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>Pandemics and recessions have the potential to <a href="https://unfoundation.org/blog/post/shadow-pandemic-how-covid19-crisis-exacerbating-gender-inequality/">exacerbate existing health inequalities between men and women</a>. </p>
<p>Many social factors can put women at a higher risk of infection during a pandemic. In almost all societies, women assume the role of <a href="https://www.empowerwomen.org/en/resources/documents/2018/08/unpaid-care-work--the-missing-link-in-the-analysis-of-gender-gaps-in-labour-outcomes?lang=en">primary caregiver</a> when family members fall ill. They are also more likely to be <a href="https://doi.org/10.1111/1468-2346.12704">front-line health care workers</a>.</p>
<p>Despite this increased exposure to infection, the Ebola and Zika outbreaks highlighted how women are more likely to experience unequal <a href="https://doi.org/10.1111/1468-2346.12704">access to resources</a> and <a href="https://doi.org/10.1186/s12992-019-0489-3">health care</a>, and have <a href="https://doi.org/10.1080/01436597.2015.1108827">limited decision-making power</a> about their own health and finances.</p>
<p>COVID-19 is no different. We are researchers in <a href="https://scholar.google.com/citations?hl=en&user=2kWMp-sAAAAJ">economics</a> and <a href="https://som.ucdenver.edu/Profiles/Faculty/Profile/14084">health</a>, and our <a href="https://doi.org/10.1016/j.socscimed.2022.114698">recent study</a> found that COVID-19 cases and deaths among women may be underreported in countries with higher gender discrimination.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/445215/original/file-20220208-22-18y53fz.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="Health care worker wearing a headscarf looking through a medical supply drawer in an ICU." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/445215/original/file-20220208-22-18y53fz.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/445215/original/file-20220208-22-18y53fz.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/445215/original/file-20220208-22-18y53fz.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/445215/original/file-20220208-22-18y53fz.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/445215/original/file-20220208-22-18y53fz.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/445215/original/file-20220208-22-18y53fz.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/445215/original/file-20220208-22-18y53fz.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Although women are more likely to be exposed to COVID-19 as caregivers, they are less likely to be able to access health care for themselves.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/news-photo/medical-staff-are-seen-in-the-newly-inaugurated-intensive-news-photo/1209813461">Mazen Mahdi/AFP via Getty Images</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>Gender differences in COVID-19 rates</h2>
<p>To investigate the effect of the COVID-19 pandemic on gender-based health disparities, we examined male and female COVID-19 case and death rates across 133 countries from 2020 to 2021. We used data from <a href="https://globalhealth5050.org/the-sex-gender-and-covid-19-project/">Global Health 50/50</a>, an organization that tracks COVID-19 cases and deaths by gender worldwide.</p>
<p>We found that most countries, such as the United States, Netherlands, France, Ukraine and Armenia, report roughly equal or slightly higher female infection rates. But 14% of the countries we examined reported over 65% of their COVID-19 cases and deaths were among men. For instance, 88% and 85% of confirmed COVID-19 cases in Bahrain and Qatar, respectively, were among men. Similarly, over 74% of total COVID-19 deaths in Chad, Bangladesh, Malawi and Pakistan were among men.</p>
<p>But what caused these rate differences across countries? We considered both biological factors, like gender differences in healthy life expectancy and death rates from chronic and infectious diseases, and social factors, like employment rates and gender norms. We assessed gender norms using publicly available indices measuring how countries are performing in women’s <a href="https://giwps.georgetown.edu/the-index/">peace and security</a>, <a href="https://globalfindex.worldbank.org/">financial inclusion</a>, <a href="https://doi.org/10.1787/bc56d212-en">access to resources</a> and <a href="https://data.oecd.org/inequality/discriminatory-family-code.htm">status in the family household</a>. </p>
<p>We found that biological differences, which should result in more consistent case and death rates across locations, couldn’t account for these trends alone. Instead, social factors like higher gender discrimination within the family and limited access to wealth and education were significantly associated with larger differences in male and female COVID-19 case and death rates.</p>
<h2>Accounting for gender in health</h2>
<p><a href="https://doi.org/10.1016/S0140-6736(19)30652-X">Gender norms</a> play a role in what opportunities and resources are available for different people. Women often fall through the cracks of the health care system due to <a href="https://doi.org/10.1080/17441690801900795">gender bias and their poorer socioeconomic status</a>. In many developing countries, women resort to <a href="https://doi.org/10.1186/s12939-018-0738-8">informal, unlicensed health care providers</a> and low-cost medicines, while men spend a greater share of family resources on their own health needs. And in some parts of the world, a woman’s husband or father must <a href="https://openknowledge.worldbank.org/handle/10986/19036">provide consent</a> before she can obtain health care treatment.</p>
<p>When women have less independence and decision-making power over their lives, they need to rely on their family members to access health care. In societies where women are devalued and do not have decision-making power, a household may prioritize spending their resources on men’s COVID-19 testing and hospital stays. Thus, we hypothesize that countries are reporting higher male COVID-19 cases and deaths due to underreporting of women’s cases and deaths.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/445218/original/file-20220208-36884-6pok3q.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="Parent and child walking together holding hands under an umbrella." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/445218/original/file-20220208-36884-6pok3q.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/445218/original/file-20220208-36884-6pok3q.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=431&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/445218/original/file-20220208-36884-6pok3q.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=431&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/445218/original/file-20220208-36884-6pok3q.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=431&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/445218/original/file-20220208-36884-6pok3q.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=541&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/445218/original/file-20220208-36884-6pok3q.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=541&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/445218/original/file-20220208-36884-6pok3q.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=541&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">In some families, the health of males is prioritized over females.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/news-photo/student-and-his-parent-wearing-masks-walk-to-school-as-a-news-photo/1237686956">Xinhua News Agency via Getty Images</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>This underreporting extends in other areas as well. For example, our data source does not account for transgender and nonbinary people. And country-level data on gender differences in medical access for other diseases and treatments is also unavailable. The World Health Organization’s European office has <a href="https://www.euro.who.int/en/data-and-evidence/news/news/2021/10/whoeurope-urges-countries-to-collect-gender-data-through-their-health-information-systems">urged countries to collect gender data</a> through their health information systems. While <a href="https://www.paho.org/en/topics/gender-equality-health">efforts have been made</a> to improve data collection across health care systems globally, collecting reliable data remains challenging.</p>
<p>Though our findings do show a strong association between gender norms and COVID-19 health disparities, they do not prove causation as a controlled experiment would. Such studies, however, are not possible during a pandemic. And results may vary regionally due to cultural and social differences. One recent study, for example, found that <a href="https://doi.org/10.1016/j.socscimed.2022.114716">more men in the U.S. die from COVID-19</a> than women because they are less likely to follow mask and social distancing guidelines. </p>
<p>Despite these limitations, it is clear that social factors play a role in COVID-19 health outcomes. Ignoring gender bias in health care has the potential to exacerbate long-standing inequities that existed prior to the pandemic.</p>
<p>[<em>Get the best of The Conversation, every weekend.</em> <a href="https://memberservices.theconversation.com/newsletters/?nl=weekly&source=inline-weeklybest">Sign up for our weekly newsletter</a>.]</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/175483/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Dr. Weinman is a reviewer of imaging studies in fibrosing lung disease for Parexel/Calyx and is on the advisory board and receives non-financial support from Boehringer Ingelheim for fibrosing lung disease.</span></em></p><p class="fine-print"><em><span>Yeva Aleksanyan does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Some countries report higher rates of COVID-19 cases and deaths among men. This might be due to underreporting among women with limited health access.Yeva Aleksanyan, Ph.D. Candidate in Economics, Colorado State UniversityJason Weinman, Associate Professor of Radiology, University of Colorado Anschutz Medical CampusLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.