So a couple of weeks ago, I wrote an entry about gender and science. I encourage you not only to read the post but also the comments. In that post I mentioned a 2003 Caltech postdoc survey that parsed some of the data by gender. Again I strongly recommend that you examine the raw data.
Here are some interesting differences between Female and Male Postdocs from this 2003 survey:
- Male postdocs are more likely to have children.
- Male postdocs with children have their wives take care of the kids, female postdocs with children rely more on daycare. As a result, female postdocs spend more on childcare cost.
- There is a major income gap between male and female postdocs.
- The average male postdoc was slightly older and had had worked slightly longer at Caltech, as compared to the average female postdoc.
- 40% of both female and male postdocs received a fellowship (usually awarded to outstanding postdoc fellows), indicating that on average the females and males probably did not differ intellectually (unless fellowships practiced affirmative action).
- The income disparity may have been due to differences in the departments. Almost half of the female postdocs were in the biology department, where (in most institutions) the postdoc income follows the NIH guidelines. Back in 2002, it was bad.
- Don't forget that more male postdocs had children, and thus may have received extra income.
And how about career expectations?
Going into their postdoc, this was their ultimate goal:
At the time of the survey, this was their current plan:
-So while only 25% of male postdocs were headed away from academia, that figure goes upto 45% for female postdocs.
- When asked why they changed their plans, the top reason for both male and female postdocs was a lack of publications, but the second highest answer for female postdocs was the family/daycare situation (or "two body problem").
There are other interesting differences in the survey as well
- More females than males disagreed with the statement "My advisor resolves conflicts efficiently."
- More females than males disagreed with the statement "My advisor is impartial to all group members."
So over all it's a mixed bag. But it does look like female postdocs face a steeper hill to climb (especially those with children). But I believe that more studies must be done of the postdoc working environment. If we have more facts we can have a better understanding of the situation, and thus come up with constructive answers.
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What an interesting debate. I think there are lots of things worth considering, including points brought up in your other posts and the comments section. It's likely to be a combination of things, like you say. It's fairly clear (except in biological sciences) that less women begin careers in science and it's no secret that academia of any kind is farily incompaitbile with family life, which women in our society tend to be "responsible" for (not saying that's good or bad). And there may be also be some version of the Larry Sommers "theory" coming into play too - but instead of women being different because of the ways they "approach" science (I have trouble with understanding how that can be viewed as incompatible with a successful career) it might be some other gender differences....
For example, did you see this article in PLOS Biology about gender stereotypes and science? I thought it brought up some interesting theories that could apply here. I encourage people to look it over because I'm not really going to give a complete summary of the article here. But the the article article basically starts out by saying (as you also alluded to in your last comments section) that science tends to select for a certain set of traits including self-promotion and self-confidence (or egotistical maniacs) which are often thought of as "male characteristics". People who exhibit these traits during interviews clearly going to be attractive to search committees, be they male or female.
The article then argues that science might benefit from valuing other traits in researchers and job candidates too - traits that on average are considered to be more feminine (nurturing or whatever he calls them). While I'm not sure I agree completely about the traits being more or less male or female, I do think the other bits are interesting to consider. Any thoughts?
There is also one more interesting point to consider (which I just thought of as I published this comment). You mentioned in your other post (or in the comments) that the selection process for the Harvard hires last year was unbiased. I do hope that was the case, but there is another discussion going on about unconscious biases against women in science (which is very similar to the topic of the PLOS article I linked to above). It's well articulated in this article by Jo Handlesman, in case anyone wants more reading on the issue.
Wow, thanks for all the lit ... I'll have to go through them over the weekend (although I have to give a talk on Tuesday).
As for,
Yeah, you never really know if there are subconscious ideas at play. In fact I myself comment about ego-maniacs here at Harvard, although the ego-maniacs are usually the big guys not the little junior proffs.
Ok having said that, here are the facts about our department's last search. About 20% of the applicants were women. Of those 7 were invited to speak, of those one was female. Of the 7, two ended up coming to the department. So 1 in 7 is close to 20% (had it been 2/7 we would have been above 20%). And I would say from the talks, that the department made offers to the applicants that most people (men and women) agreed were the top candidates.
A coworker of mine who is on the job hunt (and incidentaly is female) was told in private conversations at an institution that she applied to, that the institution in question wanted to hire more women, but that they were not getting enough female applicants. So it's not just at Harvard, something is going on throughout biomedical academia.
What would these numbers look like if we had a social policy that encouraged both genders to advance their careers AND be supported broadly as they become parents? What if we designed into all ambitious career paths the assumption that most people intend to have children and would like to raise them well - and that that requires BOTH parents...
Assuming it takes two people to make a child, why aren't both parents equally burdened with the expectation of raising them?
Some countries acknowledgem through social policy the importance of the presense of both parents (excuse the heteronormative assumption for the moment)...
Why does everyone seem to think this is rocket science? If the burden for raising children and social care of parents did not fall on women by expectation, custom and sometimes choice... IF we chose to do it differently as a society - What would this data look like?
But no-- it's a mystery, it a billion single stories that have nothing in common...
Okay, these are interesting statistics and since I have some insight here I'll weigh in. In terms of hiring post-docs, I have no gender bias whatsoever (I think). I actually would prefer to hire women and minorities (don't tell HR) but I don't get as many applications from that side. That being said, my first PD is a women. Luckily for me, she chose her family over her career and has had to make some sacrifices. I'm lucky, because I get a well trained talented post-doc, but she is far behind her peers in terms of career. These are hard choices.
In searching for a technician I think I interviewed more women than men. As an aggregate, I think my female applicants were better than my male. In the end, I hired a male. This was in some part due to the fact that I felt the most comfortable with him and I thought that we would get along well. Not sure if that was gender biased but I'd like to think it wasn't.
Interestingly, I recently learned that women are much less likely to negotiate salary then are men. I don't know the exact numbers but I could see that somehow playing a factor in the salary gap.
Yes. I want to advance this agenda. I do what I can. But to advance this agenda we need to change the debate from "are men more qualified than women to be postdocs" to "postdocs are over-educated, under-paid and need help to support their families". And right now in academia (aka sciences) females are feeling the crunch more than males -and yes unfairly too.
I agree it's not rocket science, but we need to bring these stats out into the open. The one thing I hated about the whole Summers affair was that it was so political from both sides, from the very beginning, BUT no one was really talking about the most important issues AND that was our chance. This is why I post these stats. I want to bring these issues out. And you're right, a lot of it has to do with balancing family and work. We need to show to the public what we postdocs have to face. That's the first step to improving things. A couple of months after the whole Summers comments came out, Harvard (miraculously) started to do something about daycare for postdocs who have kids. But things like that only happen if the topic is in the public stage.
In any case, I'd rather write about this then all this ID crap. Now that's an issue not worth writing about. But this issue of the postdoc work environment and gender differences is important to all of us in the biomedical sciences (and in all of academia).
Now that is an interesting statement. (But knowing you, I don't think that the "comfortable" part had to do with the fact that your tech was male.)
Rereading that sentence you quoted sounds bad. What I meant is that my overall women candidates were better (there weren't a lot of good candidates). That being said, it came down to three (two women and one man) and the man I felt better about. He was more laid back and had a lot of enthusiasm. My kind of tech. I should add that I almost made an offer to a women except that there were Visa issues.