Men Think They Can STEM, Therefore They Can

by Monica Joshi

For a while now, or at least in the past few years, more and more women have been trying their best to overcome any and all obstacles to enter the world of STEM. University programs, scholarships, and organizations have all tried their hardest to create an environment where girls and women can feel welcome and embrace STEM. Simply because there are still more men who pursue careers in science and engineering, does not mean that they are actually better at math than women are. The key is that men simply think that they are much better at math than they really are.

'You become what you think you are' is not completely untrue, at least in this case. Even though women tend to accurately estimate their mathematical competency, they outperform their male counterparts on mathematical tests in elementary school. According to Shane Bench's new study from Washington State University, people's biases and previous experiences about their mathematical abilities make them more or less likely to consider stepping into STEM-related courses and careers.

Bench's study, now published in Springer's journal Sex Roles, made use of two studies – one had 122 undergraduate students and the other 184 as participants. Each group first completed a math test before guessing how well they had done. In the first study, participants received feedback about their real test scores before they were asked to take the test again and predict their scores.

In the second study, by contrast, participants only wrote one test without receiving any feedback whatsoever. However, they were asked to report the likelihood that they would pursue math-related courses and careers.

On the findings, Bench reported that:

“Gender gaps in the science, technology, engineering and maths fields are not necessarily the result of women’s underestimating their abilities, but rather may be due to men’s overestimating their abilities.”

The conclusion of the two studies found that men overestimated the number of problems that they solved while women accurately reported how well they fared on the test. Following the results of the test in Study 1, the men estimated more accurately how well they had done on the second test. The results of Study 2 showed that because the male participants actually believed that they had a greater knack for maths than was actually true, they were more likely to pursue math-related careers and courses.

Since his team also found that women who had more positive past experiences with math tended to rate their numerical abilities higher than they really were, it is of note that positively reinforcing a woman's knack for mathematics, especially at a young age, could be valuable.

“Despite assumptions that realism and objectivity are always best in evaluating the self and making decisions, positive illusions about math abilities may be beneficial to women pursuing math courses and careers. Such positive illusions could function to protect women’s self-esteem despite lower-than-desired performance, leading women to continue to pursue courses in science, technology, engineering and maths fields and ultimately improve their skills.”

There is a sizeable gap between the number of men and women who choose to study and follow careers in the so-called STEM fields of science, technology, engineering and mathematics in the U.S. This study could be key in creating or designing programs for elementary school students to encourage them to see the world of mathematics in a positive light.