Journal of Diversity in Higher Education 2011, Vol. 4, No. 2, 120 –129 © 2011 National Association of Diversity Officers in Higher Education 1938-8926/11/$12.00 DOI: 10.1037/a0022953 The Impact of the Workshop Activity for Gender Equity Simulation in the Academy (WAGES–Academic) in Demonstrating Cumulative Effects of Gender Bias Stephanie A. Shields, Matthew J. Zawadzki, and R. Neill Johnson Pennsylvania State University We report experimental evaluation of the Workshop Activity for Gender Equity Simulation in the Academy (WAGES–Academic), a brief, experiential simulation of the cumulative effects of unconscious bias in the academic workplace. We predicted that participants who played WAGES–Academic would demonstrate significantly increased knowledge and retention of gender equity issues in the academic workplace compared with participants in a control condition. Baseline information on general knowledge of workplace gender equity issues was obtained from 1,254 undergraduates. In the second phase, 144 were randomly assigned to complete either WAGES– Academic or a control task, and the immediate effects of the activities were measured. Participants were contacted 7–11 days later to complete an online measure of knowl- edge retention. Compared with a control condition, WAGES–Academic increased knowledge and retention. This effect occurred irrespective of prior level of sexist beliefs, participant gender, or whether the participant had been on the advantaged or disadvantaged team. Potential use and testing of WAGES–Academic with university faculty and administrators are discussed. Keywords: experiential learning, gender equity, intervention Women have made tremendous strides in at- taining the doctoral degree since the 1970s. Yet, across all academic fields the proportion of women tenured faculty remains below the pro- portion of women PhDs available, especially in scientific fields. Despite the fact that women have been at least half of all college undergrad- uates since 1978, according to the American Association of University Professors (2006), women represent only 25% of all tenured fac- ulty at doctoral-granting institutions, and only 19% of women have achieved the status of full This article was published Online First May 2, 2011. Stephanie A. Shields, Matthew J. Zawadzki, and R. Neill Johnson, Department of Psychology, Pennsylvania State University. This article is based on work supported by the National Science Foundation under Award 0820212 to Stephanie A. Shields. In-kind support was provided by The Schreyer Institute for Teaching Excellence, The Pennsylvania State University. We thank Elizabeth Demeusy, Jessica Esandrio, Lisa Makings, and Arielle Riutort for their invaluable as- sistance as experimenters/facilitators. Correspondence concerning this article should be ad- dressed to Stephanie A. Shields, Department of Psychology, Pennsylvania State University, University Park, PA 16802. E-mail: sashields@psu.edu professor at these universities. And, as has been the case historically, the proportion of women dramatically decreases as a function of aca- demic rank and institutional prestige. Various factors have been identified that contribute to creating the lag between wom- en’s success in obtaining the PhD and their successful advancement to tenure and senior leadership positions. One factor stands out, however, for its almost-invisible operation, namely the cumulative effect of stereotypes and the unconscious biases (i.e., systematic errors in judgment that are due to cognitive processes rather than conscious decision) they promote. Stereotypes are quick and uncon- scious generalization about an individual based on her or his group membership (Fiske, 1998). Because these judgments are made quickly and not deliberately, their operation is typically hard to notice, identify, or change without active monitoring. In other words, to counteract the effects of unconscious bias, the nature and consequences of that bias need to be made visible. In this article, we report experimental evalu- ation of the Workshop Activity for Gender