Recent Controversies
In January 2005, Harvard University President Lawrence Summers sparked controversy when, at an NBER Conference on Diversifying the Science & Engineering Workforce, he made comments suggesting the lower numbers of women in high-level science positions may in part be due to innate differences in abilities or preferences between men and women. He noted the generally greater variability among men (compared to women) on tests of cognitive abilities, leading to proportionally more males than females at both the lower and upper tails of the test score distributions. In his discussion of this, Summers said that "even small differences in the standard deviation will translate into very large differences in the available pool substantially out ".
In 2012, a journal article published in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (PNAS) reported a subtle gender bias among science faculty. Faculty were asked to review a resume from a hypothetical student and report how likely they would be to hire or mentor that student, as well as what they would offer as starting salary. Two resumes were distributed randomly to the faculty, only differing in the names at the top of the resume (John or Jennifer). The male student was rated as more competent, more likely to be hired, and more likely to be mentored. The median starting salary offered to the male student was greater than $3,000 over the starting salary offered to the female student. This study suggests bias may partly explain the persistent deficit in the number of women at the highest levels of scientific fields.
Read more about this topic: Women In Science