Women & math

Here's another one of those studies that explains that on average, women are as good as men in math and the sciences.

http://chronicle.com/wiredcampus/article/3191/girls-as-good-as-boys-at-math-study-finds?utm_source=at&utm_medium=en

Doesn't everyone who has really looked at this question agree with this conclusion? The real issue is not about averages but about performance at the extremes. Why are there so many more men at the very top of the math and science fields when on average women are just as good at these subjects than men?

The potential answers I've heard are three.

1) Men have a greater tendency to perform at the extremes, either very well or very poorly, so it shouldn't come as a surprise that women on average do as well in math as men but that men still predominate when it comes to tenured faculty.

2) There are cultural and social pressures that keep equally talented women from following up on their God-given abilities. This argument often comes in a "rampant discrimination" format, but not always.

3) There's also a biological argument that child-bearing just makes it problematic for as many women as men to become the completely work-obsessed types who often rise to the top of their fields. More positively phrased, some argue that women are more balanced and connected to the real world for the same reason.

As always, there's probably some truth in each argument, but I see precious few studies that try to analyze these more nuanced elements. Instead, we get more of these "biology is destiny" studies about whether men or women have particular genetic gifts. Sigh.

The Wall Street Journal and others seem to have analyzed this data much better than did the New York Times.

http://www.city-journal.org/2008/eon0728hm.html