As a female, am I inherently bad at "top tier" maths/physics?

[meldraft]

I'm in my fourth and final year of grad school in applied mathematics and software engineering. I have met and worked with many people, so here are my observations for my particular societal group of a few dozen people in science. I make no claim that these things are true in general, but they do seem to be true for the people I know:

- Obviously, I have never noticed any difference between my colleagues' intelligence which in any way correlates to their gender.
- People of different genders do tend to think in different ways, partly due to how our brains are wired, but mostly due to societal/cultural influence throughout our lives.
- For instance, many of my female colleagues can perform repetitive tasks with the patience and sheer perseverance of a Buddhist monk. For me this makes sense as millennia of evolution must have gifted women with stronger patience, otherwise half of our children in prehistoric times would never have made it past the first week.
- Many of my male colleagues are incredibly lazy when it comes to this stuff, so they try to write tools that do things automatically.
- Many of my female colleagues then actually get the false impression themselves that the males are smarter because they know how to write tools, assuming that they do it because they're just so smart that it's easy for them. This couldn't be more wrong; they bother to make the time to learn/write the tools because on average they tend to be more lazy than the females. Obviously, any female could do it if they chose to (and some of course do), but most don't because they feel that the alternative is viable for them because they have the patience for it (whereas men generally don't).

Thought patterns like these can lead to a surprising amount of discrimination in any context, but especially in science, and the worst is when women become convinced that they are inferior. Convincing others about something is significantly easier than convincing yourself, so you should never believe that this is the case.

So, next time you compare yourself to your friends and you think that the males are somehow smarter, just remember that we might all be equal, but we do tend to think differently, both for biological and cultural reasons. This in no way means that any way is better than the other, but, depending on the context, it can create the illusion that someone is smarter. For what it's worth I have a very high IQ, and I know many girls who definitely have much more brainpower than I do ;)

 

[Student100]

- Many of my male colleagues are incredibly lazy when it comes to this stuff, so they try to write tools that do things automatically.
- Many of my female colleagues then actually get the false impression themselves that the males are smarter because they know how to write tools, assuming that they do it because they're just so smart that it's easy for them. This couldn't be more wrong; they bother to make the time to learn/write the tools because on average they tend to be more lazy than the females. Obviously, any female could do it if they chose to (and some of course do), but most don't because they feel that the alternative is viable for them because they have the patience for it (whereas men generally don't).

We had a saying, work smarter not harder. While I disagree with the majority of your subjective experiences, what is undoubtedly an incredibly small sample size, your example is basically illustrating what the OP is afraid of - she's biologically inferior because women can't develop tools to do repetitive tasks.

So, next time you compare yourself to your friends and you think that the males are somehow smarter, just remember that we might all be equal, but we do tend to think differently, both for biological and cultural reasons. This in no way means that any way is better than the other, but, depending on the context, it can create the illusion that someone is smarter. For what it's worth I have a very high IQ, and I know many girls who definitely have much more brainpower than I do ;)

IQ is a meaningless, arbitrarily number that says nothing about someones ability to do physics or math and is grossly taken out of context.

I feel the entire OP post was a thinly veiled troll post, and has garnered several pages of noise. If the OP were male with the same problems we might warn them that maybe they just don't have what it takes to be successful in physics. Maybe this OP, should she really believe what she's posted, just isn't capable of being successful in physics or math; all the while, rationalizing it away as some inherent flaw in her biology.

If you're really concerned there are people smarter than you, you might as well quit now. There are always people who're smarter, maybe in one area, maybe in more, but you're always going to encounter people who're better than you are at something. It's a biological thing, but it isn't related to gender.

 

[billy_joule]

"Certainly true, but many solicitations for graduate applications also say they don't favor people of particular genders/races/religions/sexualities, blah blah blah. But we all know that they do."

I don't know any such thing. I served on the hiring and personnel committee for about 10 years, several times as head, and I ordinarily never paid any attention at all to any irrelevant criteria like gender or race.

According to this study even women show bias against women:

Science faculty’s subtle gender biases favor male students
http://www.pnas.org/content/109/41/16474.full

This study met pretty much the same conclusion:
http://advance.cornell.edu/documents/ImpactofGender.pdf

 

[meldraft]

We had a saying, work smarter not harder. While I disagree with the majority of your subjective experiences, what is undoubtedly an incredibly small sample size, your example is basically illustrating what the OP is afraid of - she's biologically inferior because women can't develop tools to do repetitive tasks.

I'm not sure I managed to get the message across. What I'm trying to say is that I have observed exactly what the OP is describing: many of my female colleagues do feel like the males are more capable/smarter (which is obviously nonsense).

According to this study even women show bias against women:

This is what I'm talking about. Most men I know don't think women are less capable. Interestingly, most of the women I know, do, which is why I describe one of the mechanisms I have observed that leads them to this conclusion. It's not meant to be describing the norm, but I observe things like these around me all the time: people thinking someone else is smarter and then setting the bar really low for themselves because they feel that they're not "good enough". This is especially true form gender comparisons because we are conditioned from a very early age to think that way.

 

[Sophie Carmen]

I feel the entire OP post was a thinly veiled troll post, and has garnered several pages of noise. If the OP were male with the same problems we might warn them that maybe they just don't have what it takes to be successful in physics. Maybe this OP, should she really believe what she's posted, just isn't capable of being successful in physics or math; all the while, rationalizing it away as some inherent flaw in her biology.

I can guarantee to you that I am (unfortunately) NOT trolling.I am genuinely curious about the supposed differences(I hear of them very frequently) regarding the male and female brain, especially when concerning scientific/mathematical skills. I also do not struggle in my maths/physics classes, at all. I do not feel inferior to any of my male classmates intellectually, I took my AS levels last year, receiving A*s in Maths,Further Maths and Physics,also a B in biology,which definitely interests me less. Regardless of this, I fear that if I decide to study mathematics/physics at university/higher levels, these supposed differences that make the female brain inferior, may hold me back intellectually.

 

[Student100]

I can guarantee to you that I am (unfortunately) NOT trolling.I am genuinely curious about the supposed differences(I hear of them very frequently) regarding the male and female brain, especially when concerning scientific/mathematical skills. I also do not struggle in my maths/physics classes, at all. I do not feel inferior to any of my male classmates intellectually, I took my AS levels last year, receiving A*s in Maths,Further Maths and Physics,also a B in biology,which definitely interests me less. Regardless of this, I fear that if I decide to study mathematics/physics at university/higher levels, these supposed differences that make the female brain inferior, may hold me back intellectually.

So you're doing well but you think your anatomy might hold you back? What kind of backwards logic is that?

Anything you might have heard or read applies on averages between the genders, or is just blatantly wrong and doesn't apply at all. If you're doing well enough to earn good marks in your studies you should be smart enough to realize that you aren't going to be held back by some perceived biological difference - especially when none is evident in relation to your peers.

If you can't overcome the feeling, when you have evidence (your grades) to the contrary, it might be a good idea to seek counseling from a professional.

 

[Intraverno]

I can guarantee to you that I am (unfortunately) NOT trolling.I am genuinely curious about the supposed differences(I hear of them very frequently) regarding the male and female brain, especially when concerning scientific/mathematical skills. I also do not struggle in my maths/physics classes, at all. I do not feel inferior to any of my male classmates intellectually, I took my AS levels last year, receiving A*s in Maths,Further Maths and Physics,also a B in biology,which definitely interests me less. Regardless of this, I fear that if I decide to study mathematics/physics at university/higher levels, these supposed differences that make the female brain inferior, may hold me back intellectually.

The only, ONLY trend in differences in brain composition between males and females is that due to more testosterone in early brain development males are slightly more likely to be at either extreme in intelligence, either a super genius or incredibly dumb. One being male or female has absolutely no impact on your ability to be a good physicist. None at all.

 

[symbolipoint]

Being absolutely sure about intelligence qualities between the "two" genders is not possible, but here is what I have seen so far:

Usually very few women college or university students in my classes or location were Math or Physics majors, but the ones who were, were very intelligent and seemed to not have any noticeable personality problems. They knew what they were doing, did not seem shy or timid, and earned good grades.

Very few women teachers or professors taught Math or Physics, but the ones who were my teachers generally were organized, spoke well, were very intelligent, understood their subject extremely well and demonstrated this just as well (although I myself did not always understand it), and generally had no noticeable personality problems nor disturbances. They were just as good in instructive quality as the male ones, and they knew what they were doing.

EDITED: I forgot to include the word, "women".

 

[gleem]

The main issue between men and women is not intelligence but behavior. If one is doing well in their academic endeavors the only thing that can keep them from succeeding is themselves. You cannot change intelligence but you can change behavior.

Men typically overestimate their abilities that causes them to act quickly and confidently making them appear that they are totally in command. Women on the other hand underestimate their abilities, are tentative, hold back actions making them look less competent and thus less competitive. Men and women are not playing by the same rules.

Scenario : Research director wants someone to solve a problem in the lab. A male student boldly steps forward and announces that he will undertake the challenge even though he may not have a clue as to how to approach the problem yet. He sees the opportunity to impress his RD and believes he can solve the problem. A female student. must convince herself that she can solve the problem before she commits to volunteering. And she has also be brought up to be courteous and is less assertive. What is she to assume but that the male student is smarter. really?

http://www.wsj.com/articles/women-at-work-a-guide-for-men-1418418595

 

[billy_joule]

According to this study even women show bias against women:

This is what I'm talking about. Most men I know don't think women are less capable.

I'm not sure why you quoted me? Your experience does not align with the research I linked to.

 

[mpresic]

I had Dr. Dorothy Maharam Stone teach me a course in Differential Equations given by the Mathematics Department. She is a prominent American Mathematician. (You can look her up) She was as good or better than any other teacher I had for Mathematics.

 

[meldraft]

I'm not sure why you quoted me? Your experience does not align with the research I linked to.

I wasn't quoting the links, just that sentence; my personal experience of women in science is that they are sometimes biased against women, including themselves :)

 

[jack476]

I can guarantee to you that I am (unfortunately) NOT trolling.I am genuinely curious about the supposed differences(I hear of them very frequently) regarding the male and female brain, especially when concerning scientific/mathematical skills. I also do not struggle in my maths/physics classes, at all. I do not feel inferior to any of my male classmates intellectually, I took my AS levels last year, receiving A*s in Maths,Further Maths and Physics,also a B in biology,which definitely interests me less. Regardless of this, I fear that if I decide to study mathematics/physics at university/higher levels, these supposed differences that make the female brain inferior, may hold me back intellectually.

Think of it this way. Any difference between the male and female brain would be a product of evolution, right?

It is true that there were slight differences in role between males and females as a result of sexual dimorphism. Men were taller and stronger and therefore more inclined to hunt, women were capable of nursing children and so spent more time watching after them. These were of course results of evolutionary pressure and sexual selection. So, what evolutionary pressures or sexual selection forces in prehistoric humans would have resulted in men being better at math? How would being able to write proofs improve a man's ability to club mammoths over the head? Where on Earth has anyone ever heard of programming and computer skills making a man more sexually appealing?

The fact is that there is no appreciable difference in natural ability in STEM-related disciplines between men and women because math, science, computing, etc are not natural activities and therefore would not have been a source of evolutionary pressure.

There are some specific cognitive differences, but they don't generalize. For instance, men consistently outperform women at spatial, visualization, and sound recognition tasks (which begs the question of why there are more women getting degrees in music and visual arts than men, if things are supposed to be solely down to biology), and women consistently have denser grey matter in the Brocca's areas (related to language processing). When you present different pictures and videos to male and female infants, boys are more likely to have their eyes drawn towards straight lines, geometric shapes, and "mechanical" motion, whereas girls are more likely to be drawn to look at disorganized "organic" movement and rounder, less well-defined shapes.

But in practice, those differences are very narrow and attempting to use them to make broad statements about social trends is ad hoc reasoning and begging the question. Any conclusive differences in mathematical ability, or with STEM skills in general, between men and women are insignificant because math is an activity that involves a huge range of cognitive processes that are based in areas throughout the entire brain, so any advantages in specific cognitive skills would not generalize to overall mathematical skill. It becomes even more of a moot point after you factor in the effect of neuroplasticity, the ways in which the brain changes with experience and training, because that makes it impossible to distinguish whether brain differences are due to differing experiences in education (which would be a social factor) or innate predisposition, and it also means that training could easily undo whatever innate differences may exist.

 

[Dr. Courtney]

Where on Earth has anyone ever heard of programming and computer skills making a man more sexually appealing?

Maybe that's where I went wrong. Someone should have told me sooner!

 

[radium]

You shouldn't base your decision to pursue physics on your gender as there are a ton of women today and in the past who are truly extraordinary physicists at the top of their field. For example, Lisa Randall is one of, if not the most cited theoretical physicists in the world. Vera Rubin was one of the first people to find convincing evidence of dark matter. Deborah Jin was one of the Reuters citation laureates this year predicting the winner of the Nobel prize.

One of the reasons you don't hear more about women in physics these days is they don't have the same political connections as men. This is likely the reason there hasn't been a female Nobel prize winner in over fifty years, even though there are many women who have done Nobel prize worthy work.

The academic environment in physics has really become a lot more supportive of women in the past fifteen years or so. There are both men and women who are really passionate about improving the situation. My department once had a reputation for being a very hostile environment for women, but I find it to be the exact opposite.