<p>I have seen several posts lately that make reference to the issue of girls and their supposed inferiority in the area of math. Some of these posts are in response to a chance thread and seem to send the message that "girls are just bad at math, Sweetie, it's not really your fault".<br>
Before I comment on this I would like to acknowledge that I am, indeed, female and am, in fact, terrible at math. Okay, now that I have that out in the open, I believe that my lack of success in this area has nothing to do with my gender. I am also the mother of two girls who both excel at math. Again, this ability has nothing to do with their gender. We are individuals who have different strengths and weaknesses, varying educational experiences and unique preferences and interests.
After reading the last offensive post, I decided to hold off on replying in order to look up the latest research on the subject. I found an interesting article in the NY Times concerning a recent study that debunks the stereotype of the math disabled female. Check out the link below and weigh in if you dare.
<a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2008/07/25/education/25math.html%5B/url%5D">http://www.nytimes.com/2008/07/25/education/25math.html</a></p>
<p>For those too lazy to read the link:
Girls and boys now equal performers in math. Hooray for everyone.</p>
<p>The “math gap” is negligible at best and closes rapidly when girls . . . are you ready for this? . . . [play</a> video games](<a href=“http://scienceblogs.com/cognitivedaily/2008/07/will_video_games_solve_sexdisc.php]play”>http://scienceblogs.com/cognitivedaily/2008/07/will_video_games_solve_sexdisc.php). That’s right . . . playing shoot-em-up games improves math and spatial skills. Not only that, but the girls in the study who played action games retained their increased spatial skills five months after the study, which is simply amazing.</p>
<p>The moral of the story is buy your daughter a Wii. ;)</p>
<p>^Yes, in all seriousness, there actually has been a lot of research done supporting it.</p>
<p>I am a girl, and I consider myself a pretty good math student when it comes to algebra, calculus, etc. The more spatial stuff (like geometry) is a lot harder for me.
In my classes at school, a lot the math classes are pretty evenly split. My AP Computer Science class is 1/3 female; AP Physics E/M (which I’m not in) has a similar disparity, but other than that, it’s pretty much 50/50.</p>
<p>I do have to say, though, that girls seem to be a lot less inclined to take a lot of math/science classes, even if they’re pretty good at it. I wouldn’t say that the disparity has just suddenly “disappeared.” For example, I take APCS, AP Calc, and AP Physics C - there are girls in all those classes, but I rarely find other girls who take a combination of classes like this and are considering a career in math/science/engineering.</p>
<p>I agree, California Dancer. I think that the disparity that does exist is due to social influence and undercurrents that lead girls to believe that they are not up to the standards needed to succeed. It bothers me to see quotes from people responding to posts that reinforce this stereotype in a tone that is both condescending and dismissive to the OP (presumably a young woman who is still defining herself and figuring out where she fits in the world). These comments can be very damaging as it sets a ceiling on achievement that is, in fact, hogwash. As I mentioned in my original post, I have two daughters who are both strong in math. One is a fine arts major and the other is planning a medical career. Neither ever felt that they were limited by the physiology of their brain due to the fact that they were born female. I’m happy to see that you feel no such limits, as well!</p>
<p>Video games were before my time, but I suspect that my math (and especially geometry) abilities were helped by the amount of time I spent playing with legos. </p>
<p>The other gender thing I notice is how few girls there are in competitive chess. Our school taught everyone to play in second grade and they had classes once a week for the rest of elementary school, but most of the kids who went to tournaments were boys. There was only one school in the county that had an equal number of girls participating - their program was organized by a woman.</p>
<p>I think society has a lot to do with it, but that doesn’t mean I don’t think it’s also possible that there are also some wiring differences that may explain why more boys seem to gravitate to math, chess, video games and computer programming.</p>
<p>
So true! For me, at least. I’ve never liked math, and yet I consistently get some of my highest grades in the subject (97 in Calc BC this quarter). Alas, this year AP Comp Sci has only 5 girls (all one section, though there are two). The other sciences have reasonable female enrollment because I go to a math/science school (55% male).</p>
<p>There were lots of girls at my school who were better than me at math… But… <a href=“http://www.act.org/news/data/09/pdf/National2009.pdf[/url]”>http://www.act.org/news/data/09/pdf/National2009.pdf</a> (page 15)</p>
<p>Average Math ACT for a Male: 21.6
Average Math ACT for a Female: 20.4</p>
<p>Michigan is one state which requires all students to take the ACT…</p>
<p>Male: 20.1
Female: 19.1</p>
<p>The states they quote in the study</p>
<p>Colorado
Male: 20.9
Female: 20.1</p>
<p>Illinois
Male: 21.3
Female: 20.3</p>
<p>Consider this part of the article when you are contemplating the difference in test scores. Statistics are a funny thing.</p>
<p>“The study also analyzed the gender gap on the math section of the SAT. Rather than proving boys superior talent for math, the study found, the difference is probably attributable to a skewed pool of test takers. The SAT is taken primarily by seniors bound for college, and since more girls than boys go to college, about 100,000 more girls than boys take the test, including lower-achieving girls who bring down the girls average score.”"
(NY times)</p>
<p>I am admittedly bad at math but…numbers can be deceiving!</p>
<p>That article – over a year old – gives no hint at the real basis of the study. It flies in the face of one of the most blatant differences in the SAT I: Last year, the number of boys and girls scoring 700 or higher on the Critical Reasoning portion of the test was about equal (36,000 or so of each). On the Math portion of the test, however, the number of boys scoring 700 or higher was almost twice the number of girls (62,000 vs. 35,000). The number of boys scoring 600-690 was about 120% the number of girls, whereas in CR and W the girls have a clear numerical advantage at that level. </p>
<p>So, yes, there are 100,000 more girls taking the test, and those extra girls bring down the average. But – with fewer boys taking the test – there are about 57,000 fewer girls than boys with Math scores over 600. That’s a huge difference. (The girls’ advantage in CR at those levels is about 4,500, which is roughly proportional to the extra number of girls taking the test. The girls’ advantage in W is 37,000, which also seems pretty big.) There are fewer girls than boys at the top of the heap in Math.</p>
<p>As I recall it, this difference has, in fact, been shrinking, but it remains huge. I would love to know how the study addressed it, and I don’t think much of Tamar Lewin’s article for not giving me any idea of that.</p>
<p>JHS</p>
<p>Here is a more recent article that, I think, addresses some of your points. </p>
<p>[Culture</a>, Not Biology, Underpins Math Gender Gap](<a href=“http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2009/06/090601182655.htm]Culture”>Culture, Not Biology, Underpins Math Gender Gap | ScienceDaily)</p>
<p>I am of the opinion that the same cultural influences that may impact the female performance in math also affects the male scores in the CR and writing. If a child is receiving subtle and not so subtle messages about the limits of their achievement, it will become a self fulfilling prophecy.</p>
<p>Well, that’s almost completely uninteresting. Of course culture is responsible for the difference, or at least the vast majority of it. But that is an attack on a total straw man. Larry Summers never even sort of suggested that girls are biologically incapable of high-level math skills. At most he suggested that at the Harvard-professor level of math skills – a group so small it is certainly not addressed by standardized tests – it’s not inconceivable that there will always be somewhat more men than women. Even if that were true, it’s no excuse for not addressing the cultural impediments to women’s success, or for assuming that any particular woman has math abilities that are inferior to those of any particular man.</p>
<p>When attending a CTY awards, we noticed the boys receiving the math awards greatly outnumbered the girls, and that’s at the middle school level. I just can’t think of a reason for this…</p>
<p>The way I see it, boys tend to be either really good at math or really bad at it, whereas girls generally fall in the middle. </p>
<p>I would say that the best mathematicians are probably around 90% male</p>
<p>“I do have to say, though, that girls seem to be a lot less inclined to take a lot of math/science classes, even if they’re pretty good at it.” californiadancer’s comment addressed the issue very squarely but, suspiciously enough, seems to have been generally ignored due to preference to “blame” the culture for “holding girls back”. they may very well have the aptitude for hardcore engineering, but most girls seem to prefer less focused - not to say necessarily more softcore - regimens. my daughter was great at math/sci and i, as a father and successful chem eng, tried to encourage her to at least minor in SOMETHING employable. so what was it she spent 120 grand on? ba english, minor art. 6 months later, not a nibble jobwise. girls have more than a little culpability when it comes down to it.</p>
<p>^Preferences are also culturally and socially influenced as well. Our D goes to an all-girls school. It has no particular or special focus on math and science but places students very well and easily half or more of the graduates end up majoring in science/eng/math.</p>
<p>Of course this isn’t scientific evidence of anything, but I have always wondered if the all-girls environment reduces gender preferences (since areas of study aren’t seen as belonging more to one gender than another).</p>
<p>How many girls score an 800 on SAT Math 2?</p>
<p>Touchy topic here. Both of my kids (D & S) score in the 98-99% in math. In elementary school, D sat bored to tears because the teachers insisted that she did not need to be moved up in math. Had several female classmates in similar situation. After several of us complained, the school changed the policy and considered every child for math acceleration. Suddenly, several girls (including D) and minority students qualified. However, D’s confidence was shaken by that time and despite doing very well in class and on the standardized testing, she never felt as if she was good in math. She could have qualified for CTY in middle school, but ran the other way. Only when she was in HS did she finally realize that she is indeed a “math person”.</p>
<p>S was encouraged at school from day one. He was both accelerated in math and given even additional challenges (a good thing), as well as strongly encouraged. Now in MS, he loves things like CTY because he does very well at them. I have noticed that he has several female classmates who also excel at math. I believe the change in the elementary school’s policy has much to do with this.</p>
<p>My daughter only scored 790 on the SAT Math 2, which is obviously evidence for girls’ inferiority in math, at least on this board.</p>
<p>There does seem to be something about physical sciences and engineering that turns many girls off. There’s no lack of girls in medical or law schools, and they now dominate veterinary schools. Many aspire to careers in the life sciences or social sciences, and they constitute a substantial proportion (though still a minority) of the students in MBA programs. But guys still dominate the physical sciences and engineering. Does anyone know why?</p>
<p>I think that everyone makes great points but it would be easier to discuss this if everyone read the two articles that are linked in the first couple of posts. The second one from Science Daily addresses the “why” question and is very thought provoking.</p>