Gender, Race and Parenthood Impact Academic Productivity During the COVID-19 Pandemic: From Survey to Action.

Fernanda Staniscuaski,Rossana C Soletti,Charley C Staats,Pamela B Mello-Carpes,Zelia M C Ludwig,Alessandra S K Tamajusuku,Eugenia Zandonà,Adriana Seixas,Adriana Neumann,Leticia De Oliveira,Fernanda Reichert,Fernanda P Werneck,Camila Infanger,Eliade F Lima,Felipe K Ricachenevsky,Livia Kmetzsch,Ida V D Schwartz

doi:10.3389/fpsyg.2021.663252

Abstract

The coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic is altering dynamics in academia, and people juggling remote work and domestic demands – including childcare – have felt impacts on their productivity. Female authors have faced a decrease in paper submission rates since the beginning of the pandemic period. The reasons for this decline in women’s productivity need to be further investigated. Here, we analyzed the influence of gender, parenthood and race on academic productivity during the pandemic period based on a survey answered by 3,345 Brazilian academics from various knowledge areas and research institutions. Productivity was assessed by the ability to submit papers as planned and to meet deadlines during the initial period of social isolation in Brazil. The findings revealed that male academics – especially those without children – are the least affected group, whereas Black women and mothers are the most impacted groups. These impacts are likely a consequence of the well-known unequal division of domestic labor between men and women, which has been exacerbated during the pandemic. Additionally, our results highlight that racism strongly persists in academia, especially against Black women. The pandemic will have long-term effects on the career progression of the most affected groups. The results presented here are crucial for the development of actions and policies that aim to avoid further deepening the gender gap in academia.

Highlights

As COVID-19 spreads around the globe, countries are facing different degrees of lockdown and social distancing (World Health Organization, 2020)
The percentage of respondents from each region in Brazil followed the same pattern reported by the CNPq (6.3% from the North, 20.5% Northeast, 7.7% Center-west, 42.5% Southeast and 22.9% South), indicating that the sample of respondents is representative of the general academic population
Domestic labor was perceived as a factor influencing remote work for 88.7% of Black mothers, 86.1% of White mothers, 78.4% of Black fathers and 70.0% of

Summary

Introduction

As COVID-19 spreads around the globe, countries are facing different degrees of lockdown and social distancing (World Health Organization, 2020). The pandemic is altering the work dynamics of many academics and scientists, especially parents of young children (Myers et al, 2020; Staniscuaski et al, 2020), who face the additional challenge of balancing remote work and domestic labor, which includes full-time childcare responsibilities. Editors from a variety of respected scientific journals have warned the scientific community of the decreasing number of manuscript submissions authored by women despite the overall increase in total submissions driven by male authors (Viglione, 2020). The effect is even more striking for publications with women as first authors (Vincent-Lamarre et al, 2020). The aim of this study was to investigate whether gender, race and parenthood are associated with academic productivity during the COVID19 pandemic

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