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Stereotypes add up on math tests

STEPHANIE LEVITZ

Canadian Press

Latest comment posted at 2:19 PM EDT 20/10/06

Tell a woman that females are worse at math, and she probably will be ...Read the full article

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  1. Marie Lake from Calgary, Canada writes: Another interpretation of the results comes to mind for me, and I wonder whether the experiment was designed to control for this factor: Maybe the women did not do poorly because they bought into the stereotype, but rather because the stereotypes presented in the essay made them angry. Personally, being told I will not be capable of something simply because of my gender tends to piss me off. Many people simply do not perform well when they are angry or otherwise upset. It might not necessarily mean they believed the message.
  2. The Observer from Canada writes: Sounds like another piece of pseudo-junk 'science' meant to justify the continued 'politically correct' view on gender differences in the face of mounting evidence. Why bother reporting such nonsense.
  3. Steve K from Alberta, Canada writes: Interesting... a similar test should be performed on males. Otherwise, some could postulate that women are more prone to suggestion?
  4. Richard Hawrelak from Sarnia, Canada writes: 'The researchers set out to explore if giving women different explanations for the stereotype that they can't do math would impact their actual performance.

    It's a concept known as stereotype threat, in which being reminded of long-held beliefs about a group to which you belong will make you act in accordance with that stereotype.'

    And so, how was the placebo presented?
  5. Bob ImamI from Canada writes: Don't faint now. Don't get a case of the vapours like Nancy Hopkins at the news that boys are better at math than girls. I am amused that the latest explanation is because of the power of suggestion. Women make terrible fighter pilots too. The two famous ones in the US air force crashed and were grounded. But why? They were told they were the best? My DNA makes my eyes brown my earlobes short and makes me just excellant at mathmatics and terrible at having babies. Maybe if somebody told me more as I grew up, that I'd make a wonderful mother, then I would have mutated and grew a uterus. All those ny sayers out there. I wanted to be a mommy!
  6. D D from Ottawa, Canada writes: I wish people would stop worrying about this stuff and actually get on to the education of children. I have a young nephew who is partially autistic and is fortunate enough to have extra help in his school. Many other others across the country are not as fortunate. Shouldn't we be focusing on basic and special needs instead of creating divisions and biases?
  7. R Gretton from N. Vancouver, Canada writes: I think it has as much to do with how you teach math at school as the effect of gender stereotyping. I was an A math student until I entered high school (grade 10 in Alberta) when all of a sudden I felt at a distinct disadvantage--I had a male teacher who had one way to explain things, and I am more of a visual learner, plus I find applied math makes much more sense to me than abstract principles. My math marks dropped accordingly to a B.

    Interestingly enough, my son is the same. He tested gifted in math on psycho-educational tests, yet has a really hard time understanding math the way it is taught in grade 4 elementary school. (He works from left to right, not right to left when adding and substracting numbers with more than one digit.

    My male grade 10 physics teacher stated in the very first class that 'girls can't do physics' so rather than stay in a class dominated by boys and this teacher, I chose to take biology instead. My grade 12 math teacher was also very disparaging about girls' ability to understand math concepts, so several girls in the class set out to prove him wrong--I was one of them--and made it back up to an A.

    You still see this in engineering faculties as well--those stereotypes are pretty ingrained.

    Last night, I tried to help my grade 7 daughter (also a A student in math) who was tearing her hair out over two questions from her math textbook, and we were both stumped by the wording of the question (it had to do with fractions and decimals). Both my husband (a computer science grad) and I could come up with the answer, but he also found the wording of the question vague at best. Not sure what my daughter actually learned from the experience.
  8. Nemo Umbra from Canada writes: Bravo...it's time that people see and realize you really shouldn't put blame on things like genetics to define outcomes in life. Sure they may help contribute to it but it doesn't mean that it will happen or it has to happen. At the same time, it shows how much influence society, family, and your peers have over you so a societal change is needed as well as our thought process to overcome negative items. If you haven't already, it's time to believe in yourself.
  9. An overworked MD from Canada writes: The real question is: how did the women in each group perform compared to men?
  10. Hugh Draper from Vancouver, Canada writes: Think with your head and not your emotions.

    It's just as destructive to compensate with acclamation.
  11. MC Shanahan from Canada writes: Unfortunately the article is unable to express that stereotype threat is an established concept (first used by Claude Steele in 1992). The comparison to male performance has been done and so have placebo based experiments that address individuals' reactions to stereotype priming, no stereotype priming, and priming of other stereotypes. The actual research question for this study appears to be 'Does the explanation used in the priming affect participants' reactions?'. My biggest reaction to this study is that reporting of research needs to be improved so that the context of both the actual question and its contribution can be properly judged and not misunderstood.
  12. H K from Winnipeg, Canada writes: I'm a woman. I've had A in maths since elementary school, and I now work in a technology field dominated by men. I'd grown up with the stereotypes my whole life, hearing them parroted by instructors, my own parents (my father had really wanted a boy instead) and presented to me through the media and literature. I was determined to prove sexist notions false. I had no role models until I hit technical college - where over 30% of my instructors were incredibly technically capable women. Finding a job in my field was incredibly difficult even though I graduated with honors; I literally had to WOW the interviewer (be outstandingly better than my male co-applicants) and only started getting interviews after I'd taken continuing education in my field. So long as gender stereotypes and sexist attitudes remain, the division of skillsets WILL remain.
  13. Dave E from Hamilton, Canada writes: I'm really curious how they came to the conclusion that 134 people is a statistically significant sample. If they were broken down into 4 groups and given different essays, then each group had 33 or 34 people in it. It's possible that certain groups were overweighted in people who tend to already be particularly good or poor at math. So they intend to take the result of a test of 134 and extrapolate it to apply to billions? Seems a bit sketchy to me. The study also doesn't indicate where they found the participants for this test.
  14. Murray Braithwaite from Canada writes: Curious that an international study found that confidence leads to poorer test results in math. As to #3 above: Disguise, I see, thou art a wickedness, Wherein the pregnant enemy does much. How easy is it for the proper-false In women's waxen hearts to set their forms! Alas, our frailty is the cause, not we! For such as we are made of, such we be.
  15. M S from Ottawa, Canada writes: When I was in high school (10-15 years ago), four of the top five math students in my class were female.
  16. general lee from Canada writes: any excuse will do to avoid looking at reality and simply stating the obvious eh?
  17. d d from c, Canada writes: I think this test proves what the data collected has been showing for years. The majority of women do better in school then men up to a point. ie fact: there are more women in universities then men, however men tend to graduate with higher degrees.. No not because women had babies.. It was because :generally' ,ost women had trouble with the higher degree problems faced with in university,
  18. Normand LaBine from Winnipeg, Canada writes: Wasn't it a UBC study that tried to explain why birthrates among immigrant women who enter our Universities drop from fertility rates in their countries and see their fertility rates drop to ours, among the lowest in the world? I am surprised that today's women don't continue to excel in Math. In my Engineering studies back when computers were driven by punch cards, our 4 female colleagues in a class of 8, used to eat our macho-math lunch! They'd beat us in Business Games, statistics and engineering math! Believe me, we were all VERY competitive, especially in the Business Games, even committing 'Industrial Espionage'. These gals were focussed, gorgeous, and tough-minded. They had our respect. Nobody whined or flicked an eyelash! Just sharp gals with clear goals.
  19. Bob McDonald from Canada writes: Math in Canada is prejudice - not just against women but against any who cannot conceive of the 'whole'. Have you ever lost marks because you didn't add the correct 'inch, or foot, or footcandle or whatever' extension to your answer? Have you ever lost a mark because you didn't add the 'therefore' symbol or the correct 'equals' or 'less than' or 'more than' symbol? Math teachers are 'ANAL'!!! Grade your students on their understanding math instead of on your idea of precision. With this infinitisemally small change, a lot more kids would learn to enjoy the purity and power of math.
  20. Richard Ball from Charlottetown PEI, Canada writes: American school kids are told how great they are in math, and routinely score near the bottom on international tests. So, what does this prove, that being told you're good also leads to poor performance?
  21. Margot C from Canada writes: They actually have tried this test with male respondents before. Specifically, they did the same test with race (with male and female respondents), and found that black students shown essays arguing that black students do worse on standardized tests...do worse on standardized tests.

    But really, is anyone surprised that people who hear positive messages and positive reinforcement perform better than people who're told they're statitically more likely to suck? This message is important for parents and teachers to hear, certainly, but the power of positive thinking isn't exactly a new idea.
  22. Jimmy K from Toronto, Canada writes: Stop ridiculing this study! 'Stereotype threat' is very real, but what this article doesn't mention is that this is nothing new. This is simply a rehash of old studies done decades ago that first observed this phenomenon. Yes, there were controls. And yes, proper scientific principals were followed. Study after study shows that if you get women to watch commercials for example showing women comforming to typical female gender roles, they will all preform relatively poorly on traditionally 'male tasks'. However, when shown other positive images, such an effect does not occur and they perform just as well as males. Essentially, when shown images that demonstrate women in a typical gender role (bad at science/math) then they subsequently perform worse at those tasks, which is why 'math is hard!' Barbies are BAD. Interestingly enough, this is even more pronounced if any of this happens in the presence of attractive males - think about that. The theory is that they try to be more 'feminine' and conform to a particular gender role which would be attractive, and that means math/science/computers etc. are a no go. If anyone is interested, look up Stereotype Threat papers by Spencer and Steele, they have completed some great studies in this area.
  23. somegal from Ontario from Canada writes: Some of the comments here are pretty stupid. Everyone knows (or they should know, if they have any kind of education at all) that genetics don't fully determine things. If your earlobes are short, that's part genes and part...wait for it...gasp...environment.
  24. 'Mad Dog Dillon from Rabiesville BC, Canada writes: Tell professors at UBC that their brilliant and sooner or later they'll believe it. I won't however!
  25. Dr. Isabella from United States writes: I am thankful that I was completely unaware of such baseless stereotypes when I was in high school. I was more influenced my Marlo Thomas' 'Free to Be' ideas as a child and I now have a successful career that involves mathematical modelling. If I had ever thought that I would not be able to compete with the best in my field because of pre-determined genetics, I may not have tried. These studies are important so that we can stop using invalid assumptions about why fewer women study math. We need to bring more young women into our math and engineering programs.
  26. Paul Stapleton from Toronto, Japan writes: The report says the study tested 135 women. These apparently were divided into four groups presumably of equal size with each reading a different essay. That would mean that each group had about 34 participants. I wonder whether a study like this performed on such a small sample size merits the wide exposure it has gotten. A sample this size barely reaches the minimum numbers for performing tests of statistical significance plus as other readers have pointed out, one cannot rule out other factors for reduced performance.
  27. chris cooper from Sarnia, Canada writes: Well, no surprise here. Irrespective of the outcome of any of these studies, women will not be blamed for their own behaviour. Could be worse though, we could again blame 'males' for women's behaviour, and thus blame and dehumanise men at the same time.
  28. Harry Bradley from Canada writes: I'm Jewish. Does that mean that I really am rich and control the world?
  29. Todd Kemp from Boston, MA, Canada writes: To #'s 2 and 5 above, or any other misogynists reading this: newsflash! In China, Japan, Russia and other countries that have a strong mathematics tradition, WOMEN PERFORM AT THE SAME LEVEL AS MEN IN MATHEMATICS. The gender difference is, with little doubt, entirely socially constructed.

    I am currently teaching an advanced freshman mathematics course, and more than half of my students are women -- and they are, in EVERY way, indistinguishable in ability from the male students in the class. They were lucky, and managed to avoid (or at least digest) the sexist attitudes of some men who are all too happy to believe any drivel that supports their superiority over women.

    From me and my fellow postdocs (male and female) here at MIT, bravo to this study! Let's hope it's a step in the right direction.

    Todd Kemp
    CLE Moore Instructor
    Department of Mathematics
    MIT
  30. Levente Kornya from Huntsville, AL, United States writes: Reading one essay before taking a challanging math test made such a big difference? Vow!
  31. Carl Eric Codere from Saint-Lambert, Canada writes: Can't people realise that men and women are different... Each gender has its strengths and weaknesses that are offset by the other gender...
  32. Matthew Baldwin from London, Ontario, Canada writes: To Todd Kemp of MIT,

    First, please put away your "misogynist" branding of others. If you don't like someone else's opinion, challenge it above-board.

    My question to you specifically in regards to your contention that men & women are exactly the same and the differences are cultural only: "How is it you explain that the huge overriding majority of math teams are male? Not only in western nations but in China, Russia, Japan, etc. "

    Specifically, if you pull up the pictures of ANY of the major world math competitions like the International Math Olympiad, regardless of competing nation, the gender breakdown of teams is about 95% male/5% female.

    Of note and for the record, I don't believe men are superior to women. I believe we both are prone to being wired slightly differently which leads to some level of specialization. Women on-average have superior communications and language skills whilst men are better in maths and the minipulation of 3-dimension models in their heads.

    Looking forward to your response....hopefully without a further attempt to brand those that don't agree with you as a misogynist.

    Matthew.
  33. Walt O'Brien from Columbia, MD, United States writes: Everyone does worse when they are dumped on. Humiliation and discouragement are "gender neutral."

    For all the Ukrainians out there, the leading divebomber pilot of WW II, hands down, was Nadezhda Fedutenko, flying an Il PE-2. At the Battle of Stalingrad in one day's 12 sorties, she blasted 45, repeat, 45 Nazi armoured vehicles, this with a dead copilot she hadn't time to pull out of the cockpit. The Women's Air Army of the Soviet Forces was comprised of several dozens of squadrons which all acquitted themselves better or as well as male equivalents.

    I do seem to recall as well that in my high school environment of the 1960's, young women excelled in math, physics and biology, and many did summer work for BASF Wyandotte as chemist technicians in grades 11 and 12. My perception, too, is that women are clobbered by peers much harder now than then. I cannot imagine any boy in my high school then calling a woman a "hoe" and living beyond the next 30 seconds. The other fellows would have taken him apart, then laughed about it. It's a much crueller and more exclusionary world for a woman today than then, in many respects. No one talks about the secret war against "quota hires." God help the young woman or minority person who gets a job on that basis. Their co-workers do them in, and not always white males, in fact rarely so.
  34. Col. Akula from The North, Canada writes: So...stereotypes exist in the public school system? NEWSFLASH! Have you BEEN to a public school lately?

    Feminists may complain (what am I saying...MAY complain?) About this but girls are not the only ones who are the victims of gender discrimination. Ever since our public schools became training camps for the NDP, boys have endured the larger brunt of sexist treatment. Girls are told to enter university where they “can have it all” while boys are encouraged to go into the trades and underachieve. If a girl checks out a guy s “package” it is encouraged as “an exploration of her inner, sexual self-discovery” whereas if a boy scopes out a chick’s “guns” he is branded a sexual offender and expelled.

    When I attended high school, I had a male teacher tell a hyper-active girl to “settle down sweetie” and he was harassed into resigning. I also had a female teacher say in front of a class that “white males are genetically prone to violence and rape” and she was NEVER punished.

    In today’s universities women have “Womyn’s clubs”; open to women, accessible ONLY to women and paid for by tuition fees of women AND MEN. Try getting a mens’ club and watch how fast you have picket signs on your lawn.

    Sexism and abounds in public schools and it is absolutely intolerable...from ANYONE. Maybe the reason Canadian students are falling behind the rest of the world is because we waste time with “issues” rather than education.

    HS!!!
  35. J Kay from Canada writes: #29 Todd is correct as are the others who point out the history of these types of tests. Having obtained graduate degrees in mathematics, I've encountered both men and women, taught or TA'd both men and women and it has been my experience that both are equally capable. One of the brightest students I ever encounted was a woman. and she was simply quite bright. It wasnt that she worked harder or put in more hours, she just beat everyone. As far as the notion that people being told they cannot do something might actually reinforce that belief and thus become a self fulfilling, self-limiting end consider the 4 minute mile. It was believed at one point that it was impossible for a human beings to break 4 minutes in the mile. For years people tried and no one was able to, further reinforcing this belief until Roger Bannister broke the record. Other runners who were considered superior athletes to Bannister tried on numerous occasions before Bannister broke it, to break it but failed each ime. Once Bannister broke the mark, the psychological barrier, the others too ran sub 4 minute miles as well. The belief that running sub 4 minutes was simply self-limiting until someone proved it could be done. The same psychology works behind stereotype threat.
  36. Gerry Vee from Winnipeg, Canada writes: Gee, I knew there would be at least one person blaming men for this situation. I'm actually surprised it was an educated man. Todd, poster # 29, thanks for not disappointing me.

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