Women in Science

Ethnography & Evaluation Research (E&ER) has conducted multiple research and evaluation studies of gender issues in the sciences. Our work addresses issues of equity and access for women in STEM fields, including topics such as work-life balance, institutional climate, women’s career pathways, and gender schemas.

ADVANCE: Increasing the Participation and Advancement of Women in Academic Science and Engineering Careers

E&ER has served as evaluator for several ADVANCE initiatives, funded by the National Science Foundation to increase the participation and advancement of women in academic science and engineering. We have also carried out research studying ADVANCE programs.

• ADVANCE Institutional Transformation (IT) projects involve comprehensive programs for institution-wide change.
• ADVANCE Partnerships for Adaptation, Implementation, and Dissemination (PAID) projects take a more focused approach on a single sector or discipline. 
• The StratEGIC Toolkit is a practitioner-oriented product from a collaborative research project on organizational change strategies in ADVANCE IT programs. 
• Building Gender Equity in the Academy: Institutional Strategies for Change is a handbook for institutional leaders on evidence-based strategies to improve working environments for women in STEM, based on research on the experiences and outcomes of ADVANCE IT projects.
  • Laursen, S., & Austin, A. E. (2020). Building gender equity in the academy: Institutional strategies for change. Baltimore, MD: Johns Hopkins University Press.

The StratEGIC Toolkit and the research presented in the book, Building Gender Equity in the Academy, were supported by the National Science Foundation under awards HRD-0930097 and HRD-1830185. Any opinions, findings, conclusions, or recommendations expressed in these reports are those of the researchers, and do not necessarily represent the official views, opinions, or policy of the National Science Foundation.

Status of Women in STEM

Our research on institutional transformation to environments summarizes the literature on how STEM workplaces are gender-biased, and what leaders can do about this.

• Laursen, S., & Austin, A. E. (2020). Building gender equity in the academy: Institutional strategies for change. Baltimore, MD: Johns Hopkins University Press.

This study of early-career geoscientists shows that workplace climate outweighed satisfaction with work-life balance in shaping overall job satisfaction and productivity. Work-life balance became more important for women caregivers. The findings suggest that institutional efforts to improve workplace climate benefit all, while unmitigated work-life conflict may tip the balance for women’s job satisfaction.

• Archie, T., Kogan, M., & Laursen, S. L. (2015).  Do labmates matter? The relative importance of workplace climate and work-life satisfaction in women scientists’ job satisfaction.  International Journal of Gender, Science and Technology 7(3), 343-368. [Open access.]

This work was supported by the National Science Foundation under awards HRD-0929828. Any opinions, findings, conclusions, or recommendations expressed in these reports are those of the researchers, and do not necessarily represent the official views, opinions, or policy of the National Science Foundation.

A “fact sheet” reviewing the literature on the status of women in science, technology, engineering and mathematics (STEM) from the K-12 through career levels, summarizes data that shows women’s underrepresentation in these fields and examines explanations for this situation. The review was commissioned by Sociologists for Women in Society as a research and education tool.

• De Welde, K., Laursen, S., & Thiry, H. (2007). SWS Fact Sheet: Women in Science, Technology, Engineering and Math (STEM). Sociologists for Women in Society. Also published in Network News: The Newsletter for Sociologists for Women in Society 23(4), 14-19. 

Experiences of Women Graduate Students in STEM Fields

Based on the experiences of women pursuing Ph.D.s in STEM fields, we propose a new metaphor for the career obstacles that face them: the glass obstacle course.

• De Welde, K., & Laursen, S. L. (2011). The glass obstacle course: Informal and formal barriers for women Ph.D. students in STEM fields. International Journal of Gender, Science and Technology 3(3), 571-595. [Open access.]

In studying a classroom outreach program in which graduate student scientists visit K-12 classrooms to present inquiry-based science lessons, we noticed that women were very strongly represented among the scientist presenters. Our analysis illustrates this pattern and proposes reasons for it.

• Thiry, H., Laursen, S. L., & Liston, C. (2007). (De)Valuing teaching in the academy: Why are underrepresented graduate students overrepresented in teaching and outreach? Journal of Women and Minorities in Science and Engineering 13(4), 391-419. DOI: 10.1615/JWomenMinorScienEng.v13.i4.50

Women in Computing

As part of a research project on the reasons behind women’s low representation in computer science, E&ER researchers identified gender schemas held by computer science students that conflicted with their notions about who could and could not do computer science.

• Crane, R. L, Pedersen-Gallegos, L., Laursen, S. L., Seymour, E., & Donohue, R. (2006). Schema disjunction among undergraduate women in computer science, pp. 1087-1091 in Encyclopedia of Gender and Information Technology, ed. E. M. Trauth. Hershey, PA, London: Idea Group Reference.

This work was supported by the National Science Foundation under award CNS-0090026. Any opinions, findings, conclusions, or recommendations expressed in these reports are those of the researchers, and do not necessarily represent the official views, opinions, or policy of the National Science Foundation.