The Influence of Female Role Models on Women’s Implicit Science Cognitions

Abstract

Can female science professors benefit women? Women’s negative implicit cognitions about science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) disciplines impact performance in these fields, marking implicit associations as a space for potential change to improve women’s participation in STEM. Examining college student science majors ( N = 320, 63% women) enrolled in chemistry and engineering courses, our study investigates how meaningful contact with female role models impacts women’s implicit cognitions about STEM. We used the Implicit Association Test to measure attitudes toward science, identification with science, and gendered stereotypes about science, and we compared students with female versus male professors. Our study first demonstrates both direct and indirect paths between implicit cognitions and women’s career aspirations in STEM. Next, when female professors were seen as positive role models, women automatically identified with science and stereotyped science as more feminine than masculine. Moreover, viewing professors as positive role models was associated with pro-science career aspirations and attitudes (both implicit and explicit), for men and women alike. The findings suggest that female science professors benefit women provided students identify with them as role models. We conclude that female STEM professors not only provide positive role models for women, but they also help to reduce the implicit stereotype that science is masculine in the culture-at-large. We further discuss how shifting implicit gendered stereotypes about science can impact women’s investment in a science career.