Gender Gap In Educational Attainment Research Articles

Impact of Cultural Norms and Social Expectations for Shaping Gender Disparities in Educational Attainment in Pakistan

This quantitative study explores the complex phenomenon between societal expectations and cultural norms for shaping gender discrimination and further investigates the factors that affect gender differences in educational attainment in Pakistan. There are still large gender differences in the educational environment in Pakistan, and these issues have been raised with time. The goal of this research is to present a thorough investigation of the underlying causes of these differences, with an emphasis on the influence of societal standards and cultural expectations. This study is based on a quantitative approach with pertinent primary data gathering through surveys. Data on attitudes, beliefs, and practices about gender and education have been collected through a survey of a representative sample of Pakistani families and educational institutions. In addition to this quantitative data for collecting the gender gaps, qualitative interviews with important stakeholders were also conducted. This research tries to discover significant drivers of gender gaps in educational attainment by examining the links between variables such as parental expectations, cultural attitudes regarding gender roles, access to resources, and educational results. The results of the study anticipated and concluded that social norms and cultural standards affect Pakistani students' decisions and performance in school. Additionally, the study recommended insightful information to educational institutions and policymakers for the purpose of creating focused interventions that will address these discrepancies and solve the gender equality issues in education.

Examining the Black Gender Gap in Educational Attainment: The Role of Exclusionary School Discipline & Criminal Justice Contact

Abstract Black men and women have different levels of average educational attainment, yet few studies have focused on explaining how and why these patterns develop. One explanation may be inequality in experiences with institutional punishment through exclusionary school discipline and criminal justice exposure. Drawing on intersectional frameworks and theories of social control, I examine the long-term association between punishment and the Black gender gap using data from the Children of the National Longitudinal Survey of Youth 1979 cohort (NLSY-C). Decomposition analyses reveal that about one third of the gender gap can be explained by gender differences in experiences with institutional punishments, net of differences in observed behaviors. These measures are predictive at key educational transition points, including finishing high school and earning a 4-year college degree. Though Black boys and girls have similar family backgrounds and grow up in similar neighborhoods, results suggest that Black girls have a persistent advantage in educational attainment due in part to their lower levels of exposure to exclusionary school discipline and the criminal justice system. In addition, I find that gender differences in early achievement, early externalizing behavioral problems, school experiences, and substance use in adolescence and early adulthood are associated with gender differences in educational attainment. Taken together, these results illustrate the importance of punishment disparities in understanding disparate educational outcomes over the life course of Black men and women.

Gender gap reduction and the one health benefits

Several factors including gender, age groups, cultures and social conditions may affect significantly the risk of diseases and their clinical evolution. Unfortunately, little research has been carried out on these aspects and, consequently few guidelines or interventions have been implemented. In particular, gender is considered a main determinant of inequalities in living conditions, access to health services and, thus, in health protection.Focusing on the gender gap, we propose an ecological approach to find relationships between quantitative indicators of the gender gap dimension, the environmental performance index and the life expectancy at birth as summary of human health index in 155 countries. We speculated on the consequences of wider gender gaps to the population and environmental health. We further explore these relationships considering gender gap and environmental aspect subindexes, to identify determinants that should be addressed to maximize the One Health effect. We found that the gender gap in educational attainment followed by the political empowerment were strongly correlated with life expectancy, environmental health, and ecosystem vitality.Addressing gender issues, particularly the education attainment and political empowerment, can provide positive impact beyond the social dimension and the population health, and gender should be component of the One Health approach. We recommend gender targeted interventions that integrate these aspects into One Health national policies.

Gender Gap in Mobile-Banking Use in Rural Northern Bangladesh

Mobile banking (M-bank), a newly introduced technology, can improve women’s access to financial services. This study empirically estimates the effect of a husband’s and wife’s socioeconomic characteristics, relative differences in age and education, and household characteristics on M-bank use in northern Bangladesh, exploring the presence and possible effect of the gender gap between husband and wife. A couple’s relative differences in age or education can function as a proxy to capture the wife’s M-bank use, thereby, her financial responsibilities in the household. The empirical evidence is based on a two-equation probit estimation that predicts the possible determinants of M-bank use by husbands and wives. M-bank use of husbands and wives differed remarkably, with wife to husband ratio of 4:15. Households were categorized into three subgroups: wife user, husband user, and nonuser. Results show that a husband’s level of education, having his own business, and having a migrant family member within the household have a statistically significant positive effect on the likelihood of him using M-bank. On the other hand, a wife with an education level higher than that of her husband’s has a significant positive effect on the likelihood of her using M-bank. A substantial gender gap in M-bank use, favoring husbands, was observed in most couples where the husband has more schooling than the wife and vice versa. The impact of M-bank use must be critically studied, focusing on the couple’s relative status due to the gender gap in educational attainment and positive relative characteristics of couples in patriarchal, Islamic, rural settings in Bangladesh.

Educational attainment, use of numeracy at work, and gender wage gaps: Evidence from 12 middle-income countries

Prior research on educational, numeracy, and wage gaps tends to focus on highincome, countries. However, achieving the United Nation’s Sustainable Development, goals for education and gender equality requires focusing on middle-income countries., In this study, we examine gender gaps in educational attainment, use of numeracy skill, in the workplace, and wage inequality in 12 middle-income countries. By analyzing, data from the World Bank’s Skills Toward Employment and Productivity (STEP) study, we find that educational attainment explains differences in numeracy skill use, as well, as independently influences the gender wage gap. Our analyses also indicate that in, four countries examined in this study, a one-unit increase in women’s engagement with, numeracy tasks is positively correlated with a 5% increase in women’s wage. In, addition, this study suggests that unlike in the OECD, in these middle-income countries, investigated, the roots of gender wage gaps lie in forces even before women entering, the labor market. In the context of Sustainable Development Goals, this paper provides, new evidence about the importance of improving gender equality in education and, skills across middle-income countries to fulfill SDGs 4 and 5.

Unwanted daughters: the unintended consequences of a ban on sex-selective abortions on the educational attainment of women

We study whether legal restrictions on prenatal discrimination against females leads to a shift by parents towards postnatal discrimination, focusing on the impact on educational attainment. We exploit the differentially timed introduction of a ban on sex-selective abortions across states in India. We find that a legal restriction on abortions led to an increase in the number of females born, as well as a widening in the gender gap in educational attainment. Females born in states affected by the ban are 2.3, 3.5, and 3.2 percentage points less likely to complete grade 10, complete grade 12, and enter university, respectively, relative to males. These effects are concentrated among non-wealthy households that lacked the resources to evade the ban. Investigating mechanisms, we find that the relative reduction in investments in female education was not driven by family size but because surviving females became relatively unwanted, whereas surviving males became relatively more valued, leading to an increasing concentration of household resources on them. Discrimination is amplified among higher-order births and among females with relatively few sisters. Finally, these negative effects exist despite the existence of a marriage market channel through which parents increase investments in their daughters’ education to increase the probability that they make a high-quality match. This suggests that policymakers need to address the unintended welfare consequences of interventions aimed at promoting gender equity.

Gender gaps in educational pathways in the Czech Republic

This article analyses gender inequalities in educational attainment in the Czech Republic from the novel perspective of multiple educational pathways, which are primary channels of study involving at least two educational transitions (secondary and tertiary) with qualitatively different tracks. We estimate gender gaps in the attainment of six major educational pathways in the Czech Republic across 9 five-year birth cohorts covering the full span of the communist period and the educational expansion of the post-communist period. Our results confirm that gender gaps have increased in recent cohorts, but that these gaps have remained relatively modest in size. The greatest gaps occur in educational pathways involving secondary grammar schools, while gaps involving other tracks of secondary education remain very small. These results suggest that gender gaps in educational attainment in the Czech Republic expose strong gender differences in attendance at secondary grammar schools, in the direction of girls.

Gender gaps in education: The long view1

Abstract Many countries remain far from achieving gender equality in the classroom. Using data from 126 countries, we characterize the evolution of gender gaps in low- and middle-income countries between 1960 and 2010. We document five facts. First, women are more educated today than 50 years ago in every country in the world. Second, they remain less educated than men in the vast majority of countries. Third, in many countries with low levels of education for both men and women in 1960, gender gaps widened as more boys went to school, then narrowed as girls enrolled; thus, gender gaps got worse before they got better. Fourth, gender gaps rarely persist in countries where boys attain high levels of education. Most countries with large, current gender gaps in educational attainment have low levels of male educational attainment, and many also perform poorly on other measures of development such as life expectancy and GDP per capita. Fifth, in the youngest cohorts, women have more education than men in some regions of the world. Although gender gaps in educational attainment are diminishing in most countries, the empirical evidence does not support the hypothesis that reducing the gender gap in schooling consistently leads to smaller gender gaps in labor force participation.

Vulnerable Boys: Short-term and Long-term Gender Differences in the Impacts of Adolescent Disadvantage.

The growing gender gap in educational attainment between men and women has raised concerns that the skill development of boys may be more sensitive to family disadvantage than that of girls. Using the National Longitudinal Study of Adolescent to Adult Health (Add Health) data we find, as do previous studies, that boys are more likely to experience increased problems in school relative to girls, including suspensions and reduced educational aspirations, when they are in poor quality schools, less-educated neighborhoods, and father-absent households. Following these cohorts into young adulthood, however, we find no evidence that adolescent disadvantage has stronger negative impacts on long-run economic outcomes such as college graduation, employment, or income for men, relative to women. We do find that father absence is more strongly associated with men’s marriage and childbearing and weak support for greater male vulnerability to disadvantage in rates of high school graduation. An investigation of adult outcomes for another recent cohort from the National Longitudinal Survey of Youth, 1997 produces a similar pattern of results. We conclude that focusing on gender differences in behavior in school may not lead to valid inferences about the effects of disadvantage on adult skills.

The effect of gender inequality on HIV incidence in Sub-Saharan Africa

ObjectiveWe aimed to quantify the extent to which country-level trends in HIV incidence in Sub-Saharan Africa (SSA) were influenced by gender inequalities, measured by gender gaps in educational attainment, income, and a Gender Inequality Index (GII). Study designWe examined the relation between gender inequality and HIV incidence using country-level panel data from 24 SSA countries for the period between 2000 and 2016. MethodsOur goal was to estimate the relation between within-country changes in gender inequality and HIV incidence. We compared results from fixed effects and random effects models for estimating the effect of gender inequalities on changes in HIV incidence. Based on the results of the Hausman test, the fixed effects model was selected as the preferred approach. ResultsHIV incidence decreased by nearly one-half over the period from 2000 to 2016. We estimated that a one percent increase in the GII was associated with a 1.6 percent increase in HIV incidence (95% confidence interval = [0.21%; 3.00%]), after adjusting by country-level socio-economic and governance variables. ConclusionsOur study suggests that addressing gender inequalities is a potential strategy to reduce HIV incidence in the SSA region. To control HIV infection, policymakers and public health practitioners should support relevant interventions for promoting gender equality. Further work is needed to identify specific interventions to improve gender inequality and to examine their impacts on changes in HIV incidence.

Gender Gap in Earnings in Vietnam Why Do Vietnamese Women Work in Lower Paid Occupations?

Differences in earnings between male and female workers persist in developed and developing countries despite a narrowing of gender gaps in educational attainment over the past half-century. This paper examines the gender wage gap in Vietnam and shows that a nontrivial part of the gap is associated with occupational sorting. The paper considers three explanations for why occupational sorting emerges. First, it explores whether women sort into occupations with better nonmonetary characteristics, such as paid leave and shorter hours. The data from Labor Force Surveys support this hypothesis. Second, it checks if occupational sorting among the adult labor force is driven by social norms about gender roles learned and internalized at an early age. To do so, the paper checks for evidence of sorting in the aspirations of 12-year-old children. Specifically, the analysis simulates what the gender wage gap would be if boys and girls pursued the occupations they aspired to at age 12, and the distribution of salaries remained unchanged. The paper does not find support for the hypothesis that gender norms drive occupational sorting by inducing aspirational sorting at an early age. Finally, for individuals with higher education, the paper checks if occupational sorting occurs during the school-to-work transition, when women face higher barriers in finding a job in their field of study. The analysis does not find evidence to support this last hypothesis. Overall, the findings suggest that in Vietnam gender-specific preferences for nonmonetary job characteristics play a key role in the emergence of occupational sorting.

Vulnerable Boys: Short-Term and Long-Term Gender Differences in the Impacts of Adolescent Disadvantage

The growing gender gap in educational attainment between men and women has raised concerns that the skill development of boys may be more sensitive to family disadvantage than that of girls. Using the National Longitudinal Study of Adolescent to Adult Health (Add Health) data we find, as do previous studies, that boys are more likely to experience increased problems in school relative to girls, including suspensions and reduced educational aspirations, when they are in poor quality schools, less-educated neighborhoods, and father-absent households. Following these cohorts into young adulthood, however, we find no evidence that adolescent disadvantage has stronger negative impacts on long-run economic outcomes such as college graduation, employment, or income for men, relative to women. We do find that father absence is more strongly associated with men's marriage and childbearing and weak support for greater male vulnerability to disadvantage in rates of high school graduation. An investigation of adult outcomes for another recent cohort from the National Longitudinal Survey of Youth, 1997 produces a similar pattern of results. We conclude that focusing on gender differences in behavior in school may not lead to valid inferences about the effects of disadvantage on adult skills.

Gender segregation in higher education: an empirical test of seven explanations

Gender segregation in higher education (GSHE) is recognized as a key factor to explain the persistence of gender inequalities in the labor market despite the reversal of gender gap in educational attainment. Women are systematically overrepresented in fields of study, such as social sciences and the humanities, which offer relatively poor labor market prospects; at the same time, they are underrepresented in fields that perform above the average, as engineering and ICT. Several explanations for GSHE have been proposed in the literature, but their explanatory power has to be assessed yet. Using a rich longitudinal dataset on a recent cohort of Italian upper secondary school leavers, in this paper we jointly test seven potential mechanisms for GSHE. Our results show that rational choice explanations—such as skill-based explanations and gender differences in career preferences—fail to account for GSHE. On the contrary, expressive motivations related to preferences for school subjects and for specific occupations are found to mediate to a significant extent GSHE. However, our most important result concerns the key role of curricular track choice at upper secondary level which, alone, mediates two third of the gender difference in access to the humanities and social sciences and one third of the gender difference in access to engineering and ICT.

Social class background and gender‐(a)typical choices of fields of study in higher education

By employing a Bourdieu-inspired class scheme that differentiates between classes' volume and composition of capital, and by analysing Norwegian administrative register data for birth cohorts between 1987 and 1992, this paper examines the relationship between social class background and gender-(a)typical choices of higher education. Fields of study in higher education in much of the Western world remain segregated by gender despite the gender gap in educational attainment having been reversed. However, some changes have taken place due to the influx of women into male-dominated, high-status fields. Few recent studies have examined the relationship between social class background and gendered educational choices in light of these changes; furthermore, the focus of previous research has been limited to the vertical dimension of class. The results presented in this article suggest that men and women are more likely to make gender-atypical choices when this leads to social mobility and that focusing solely on the vertical dimension of class may mask horizontal differences.

The effect of educational attainment on cognition of older adults: results from the Mexican Health and Aging Study 2001 and 2012

Objective: This paper seeks to document changes in the effect of educational attainment on cognitive function of older adults in Mexico, and measure gender differences using data from two time periods.Methods: The data come from the Mexican Health and Aging Study (MHAS), taking the cross-sections of adults aged 60 years or older interviewed in 2001 and 2012. We perform an OLS regression using standardized z-scores for five individual cognitive domains and for total cognition.Results: Total cognitive scores and educational attainment were higher for men than women in both years. When cognitive components were analyzed separately, women had higher verbal memory and verbal recall scores than men. The gender gap in overall cognition score was smaller in 2012 compared to 2001, while the gender gap in educational attainment was larger in 2012 than in 2001. Even though men had higher educational attainment than women, the effect of educational attainment on cognition was higher for women. Similarly, the difference between total scores for each task for men compared to women decreased between 2012 and 2001, except for verbal learning and verbal recall where the gender difference widened.Conclusions: If younger cohorts of women continue to progressively achieve higher levels of education, the gender gap in old-age cognition should close. Additional work should determine the mechanisms through which added formal education seems to translate into higher cognitive gains for women compared to men.

Birth order and the gender gap in educational attainment

While studies of birth order effects on human capital formation for developed countries abound, less is known about these effects in a developing country context. Harnessing rich childbearing history data on senior parents in China, I provide within-family estimates of the impact of birth order on adult children’s completed schooling, emphasizing heterogenous effects across gender. I find evidence that, holding the size of the family fixed, a daughter’s schooling decreases with the number of younger siblings, while a son’s schooling increases with the number of younger siblings. Birth order differences in age at marriage and provision of intergenerational support to parents are possible explanations for the observed patterns in schooling. My findings suggest that the one-child policy, despite having contributed to worsening the sex-ratio imbalance in China, could have helped reduce the gender gap in educational attainment.

Gendered language and the educational gender gap

Languages differ in the degree to which they employ gender distinctions for nouns and pronouns. Speaking a gendered language may highlight gender roles. We find that speaking a gendered language is associated with a greater gender gap in educational attainment.

Progress without Progressives? The Effects of Development on Women's Educational and Political Equality in Cultural Context, 1980 to 2010

Researchers often attribute diminishing gender inequality to economic development. When different aspects of gender inequality are examined, however, evidence points to both cross-national convergence as well as persistent (or even growing) heterogeneity in women's status. To make sense of this contradiction, we examine the extent to which culture moderates the relationship between economic development and gender inequality. We consider two dimensions of gender inequality, gender gaps in educational attainment and women's share of parliament, using data for 150 countries between 1980 and 2010. We find convergence toward greater equality in education, independently of economic development. But cross-cultural differences in female political representation persist or even grow as a function of economic development. Our results imply that economic development is not a direct pathway to greater gender equality. Rather, cultural legacies play an important role in shaping developmental trajectories.

Harmattan Winds, Disease and Gender Gaps in Human Capital Investment

Epidemics can worsen social inequality by increasing gender gaps in educational attainment through raising the direct and opportunity costs of investing in girls, particularly in poorer countries. We investigate this hypothesis by examining the effects of sudden exposure to the 1986 meningitis epidemic in Niger on the gender gap in education. We document a significant reduction in years of education for school-aged girls relative to boys following the epidemic. We explore several channels underlying the results and find evidence highlighting income effects of epidemics on households and increased early marriage of girls.

Voting patterns and the gender wage gap

Striving for gender equality presents major challenges but the benefits are vast, ranging from reduced conflict, both within and between communities, to higher economic growth. Unfortunately, Israel’s gender wage gap remains one of the highest among developed countries, despite a growing reverse gender gap in educational attainment. Investigating the gender wage gap for the Jewish majority and for the Arab minority, we find evidence of gender segregation by industry and occupations in addition to a glass ceiling effect for Jewish and Arab women. Using data from the Israeli Household Income Survey and electoral data from the Israeli parliamentary elections (2009), this paper provides novel evidence of the role of voter preferences in explaining the persistence of gender pay gaps. Importantly, we find strong evidence of an association between a higher share of votes allocated to nationalist parties, in a given locality, and a larger, (adjusted), gender wage gap for both Jewish-Israelis and Arab-Israelis.