Science, Technology, Engineering, Mathematics And Medicine Research Articles

Gender equality in STEMM: the legitimisation of existing inequalities through “resistance talk”

Purpose Despite some recent progress, gender inequality remains a persistent problem in science, technology, engineering, mathematics and medicine (STEMM) organisations. This article seeks to better understand resistance to gender equality (GE) in this context with the aim of shedding light on the workplace-based impediments to equality and unlocking remediation opportunities.Design/methodology/approachThe article draws on in-depth interviews with 20 STEMM leaders to examine how they talk about the problem of gender inequality in the organisations they lead. Because resistance is rarely expressed directly, we adopt an in-depth, granular approach to examining what we call STEMM leaders’ “resistance talk” by decoding expressions of GE resistance that may appear, ostensibly, as something else.FindingsWe found various ideas, arguments and other discursive practices which function to legitimate or justify the status quo. These are both described by leaders in relation to what they are dealing with in their own organisations and expressed themselves. While similar “legitimating discourses” operate in other gender-segregated workplaces, our findings show how they manifest specifically in STEMM contexts.Originality/value Our results provide much-needed granular level evidence of the discursive tactics deployed to legitimate the status quo and obstruct progress toward GE in STEMM. This extends understanding of barriers to GE in STEMM and, importantly, highlights where attention might be directed to both counter resistance and harness potentially changing attitudes to expedite the necessary change required for GE in STEMM.

“Why the Silence?”: Giving a Voice to the Lived Experiences of STEMM Librarians

Inclusion, diversity, belonging, and equity (IDBE) are tenets discussed and developed in many universities and university libraries. Although there were studies on IDBE in libraries in general, the authors of this study were particularly interested in what Science, Technology, Engineering, Mathematics and Medicine (STEMM) librarians were facing or not facing regarding IDBE. We were unable to locate any known study focusing on STEMM librarians' lived experiences regarding IDBE. Thus, our study aimed to explore this area further. A survey consisting of multiple-choice, Likert and short-answer questions was sent to STEMM librarians via specific listservs. In this study, we use a grounded theory approach and analyze three of the questions in the survey. This study would particularly interest librarians who would like to ascertain the climate of IDBE and the intersection with social justice in STEMM Librarianship. Also, we provide strategies to improve the climate and provide a more inclusive, diverse, equitable and belonging environment for STEMM Librarians. Our data analysis shows that STEMM librarians who identify as People of Color encounter negative behaviors, experiences, and attitudes at a much higher rate than STEMM librarians who are white. In addition, many STEMM librarians who identify as white report white privilege awareness.

The Notion of Truth in Sciences and Medicine, Why it Matters and Why We Must Defend It

Philosophers have described several approaches for scientific research, including causal inference and induction, the hypothetico-deductive method, inference of the best explanation, Bayesianism or causal network analysis. Prescriptive truth is dependent upon the values that one brings into scientific inquiry. One may oppose the writings of Bertrand Russell and Helen Longino. The former argues that values may negatively impact inquiry, while Longino argues that value-free research does not exist, and we must cope with it. However, Longino proposes a very stringent value-system which does not allow certain research to be conducted. The problem arises when prescriptive truth becomes hypertrophic, self-righteous, rigid, and unconnected to reality, which is the transformation into ideology. Ideological intrusion into science and medicine, such as with Social Justice Ideology (SJI), is indeed a problem in Western democracies. It derived from scholarship originating in the humanities (law, social sciences, branches of philosophy, etc.) and then transferred to Science, Technology, Engineering, Mathematics and Medicine (STEMM). The STEMM field was thought to be immune to SJI because of its rigorous methodology, but the hyper-specialization and absence of training in the humanities made it vulnerable to SJI. These intrusions into STEMM and the amplification in the last 2–3 years are potentially due to ‘concept creep,’ psychogenic contamination, herd behaviour and, for activists, strategical equivocation (motte-and-bailey fallacy).By denying truth and reality, science is reduced to a pointless, if entertaining game; a meaningless, if exacting exercise; and a destinationless, if enjoyable journey. (Theocharis and Psimopoulos 1987)Now the characteristic doctrine of modern irrationalists, as we have seen, are: emphasis on will as opposed to thought and feeling; glorification of power, belief in intuition ‘positing’ of propositions as opposed to observational and inductive testing. (Russell 1936)

‘If someone, somewhere had a plan’: Disavowal in the gender-equality resistance talk of STEMM leaders

Science, Technology, Engineering, Mathematics and Medicine (STEMM) leaders are expected to drive change towards gender equality. Little is known, however, about their capacity to do so. Drawing on 20 in-depth interviews with STEMM leaders, this article investigates how they resist gender equality efforts through disavowal within STEMM workplaces. By adopting a discourse analysis-based approach, we examine the discursive resistance tactics of disavowal, which are hitherto under-reported in this context. Disavowal includes denying the knowability of gender-based inequality as well as minimising its significance. By enhancing understanding of forms of gender-equality resistance, the article contributes to the scant literature on resistance to gender equality broadly, and specifically within STEMM. We argue that STEMM leaders who either deny that STEMM has a gender equality problem or look for ‘someone, somewhere’ to come up with a plan, need enhanced support and capability development to lead change.

Navigating a research career with a disability.

In recent years, we have seen an increasing focus in the academic environment on equity, diversity and inclusion. However, one broad group often left out of these discussions are disabled scientists/scientists with disabilities, who often face severe challenges entering the research profession and navigating their careers. Building on the success of the 2022 Young Embryologist Network's meeting, which included a session on 'Working in science with a disability' ( Morgan, 2023) we learn here from the lived experiences of five biologists who share the challenges and successes of undertaking a scientific career with a disability, as well as accommodations that can make science, technology, engineering, mathematics and medicine (STEMM) careers more accessible and inclusive.

Advancing understanding of discordant mentoring relationships in STEMM: A method and framework.

Having a diverse workforce in STEMM (science, technology, engineering, mathematics, and medicine) fields is essential for the United States to remain competitive in the global economy and to create a more just society. Faculty-mentored undergraduate research experiences have been identified as a high-impact practice for encouraging students from diverse backgrounds to pursue STEMM education and careers. Despite extensive research examining factors influencing the effectiveness of mentor-mentee relationships, there is still limited understanding of how differences or similarities in the social identities of mentors and mentees, which we term mentor-mentee discordance, impact undergraduates' research experiences and outcomes. In this perspective, we propose that mentor-mentee discordance should be conceptualized as a multidimensional, continuous construct and suggest a global index to measure varying degrees of discordance in mentoring relationships. We also offer a conceptual model that incorporates the Discordance Index to systematize the understanding of the effects of discordant mentoring relationships on student development across social contexts and over time. Finally, we provide recommendations for future researchers, STEMM educators, and program directors who are interested in using the Discordance Index.

Strategic Thinking for Bold Goals

Strategic Thinking for Bold Goals

Disparities in COVID-19 Impacts on Work Hours and Career Satisfaction by Gender and Race among Scientists in the US: An Online Survey Study

The impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on work–life balance may be unequal between female and male scientists. Further information is needed regarding whether the working conditions and career satisfaction for women and racialized scientists are disproportionately affected by the pandemic. This online survey collected data from 1171 scientists in science, technology, engineering, mathematics (STEM), and medicine (STEMM), public health, or other areas of science/engineering working in the US to examine potential disparities in changes in work hours and career satisfaction by gender and race/ethnicity. A significantly higher percentage of women reported increased work hours compared to men. Women, especially racialized women, experienced disproportionately higher increases in teaching and service than the other groups, which contributed to the increased total work hours for women. Satisfaction with the current career progress was lowest for racialized women compared to their counterparts. Our results indicate that the pandemic has inequitably affected allocation of workloads and career satisfaction by gender and race in scientific fields. Institutions of higher education and other research organizations should acknowledge the gender/race differences in science before and during the pandemic to better support the career development and achievement of all scientists, especially women and even more so racialized women.

Quantitative datasets reveal marked gender disparities in Earth Sciences faculty rank in Africa

As in most disciplines of science, technology, engineering, mathematics and medicine (STEMM), gender disparity is prevalent in the ranking of Earth Sciences faculties at senior and advanced levels. (i.e., Associate and Full Professors). In this study, a robust database was mined, created, and analyzed to assess the faculty compositions of 142 Earth Science departments in 39 countries across Africa. The data were collected from verifiable online resources focusing on ranks and gender ratios within each department. The studied earth science departments cut across universities in northern, southern, central, eastern, and western Africa. Our data revealed that female faculty members are predominantly underrepresented in most of the departments documented and are markedly uncommon in senior positions such as Professors, associate Professors, and senior researchers compared to their male counterparts. On the contrary, female faculty members are predominant in the lower cadres, such as lecturers, teaching, and graduate assistants. The observed male to female ratio is 4:1. At the base of this gender gap is the lower enrolment of female students in Earth Science courses from undergraudate to graduate studies. To achieve gender equality in Earth Science faculty composition in Africa, we recommend increasing female students' enrollment, mentoring, awareness, timely promotion of accomplished female researchers, and formulation of enabling government policies. More work-related policies that guarantee work-life balance for female earth science academic professionals should be formulated to attract and retain more women into Earth Sciences careers.

Deindividualising Imposter Syndrome: Imposter Work among Marginalised STEMM Undergraduates in the UK

Imposter syndrome is the experience of persistently feeling like a fraud despite one’s achievements. This article explores student experiences of imposter syndrome, based on 27 interviews with marginalised STEMM (Science, Technology, Engineering, Mathematics and Medicine) undergraduates at two pre-1992 elite UK universities. We argue that imposter feelings are a form of unevenly distributed emotional work, which we call imposter work. Drawing on Sara Ahmed’s ‘diversity work’ concept we explore how marginalised students’ imposter feelings are often in response to, and reinforced by, the exclusionary atmosphere of university, resulting in more imposter work to survive and thrive at university. Three key themes are explored – the situated and relational nature of imposter feelings; the uneven distribution of imposter work; and the myth of individual overcoming – before concluding with suggestions for collective responses to addressing imposter feelings.

The Cyprus Institute of Neurology and Genetics, an emerging paradigm of a gender egalitarian organisation.

Females are underrepresented in the science, technology, engineering, mathematics and medicine (STEMM) disciplines globally and although progress has been made, the gender gap persists. Our aim was to explore gender parity in the context of gender representation and internal collaboration at the Cyprus Institute of Neurology and Genetics (CING), a leading national biomedical organisation accredited as an equal opportunity employer. Towards this aim we (1) explored trends in gender parity within the different departments, positions and qualifications and in student representation in the CING's postgraduate school and, (2) investigated the degree of collaboration between male and female researchers within the Institute and the degree of influence within its co-authorship network. We recorded an over-representation of females both in the CING employees and the postgraduate students. The observed female over-representation in pooled CING employees was consistent with a similar over-representation in less senior positions and was contrasted with an observed male over-representation in only one middle rank and culminated in gender equality in the top rank in employee hierarchy. In terms of collaboration, both males and females tended to collaborate with each other without any significant preference to either inter-group or intra-group collaboration. Further comparison of the two groups with respect to their influence in the network in terms of occupying the positions of highest centrality scores, indicated that both gender and seniority level (head vs non-head) were significant in shaping the authors' influence, with no significant difference in those belonging in the same seniority level with respect to their gender. To conclude, our study has validated the formal recognition of the CING's policies and procedures pertinent to its egalitarian culture through the majority of the metrics of gender equality assessed in this study and has provided an extendable paradigm for evaluating gender parity in academic organizations.

Why both sides of the gender equation matter.

Despite efforts to increase gender diversity in science, technology, engineering, mathematics and medicine (STEMM), men continue to hold most tenured and leadership positions. Moreover, the specific population shifts and timelines which may be required to achieve gender parity have not been well delineated. It is obvious that if women are statistically underrepresented in a field, then men must be statistically overrepresented: however, male overrepresentation and related gender-based advantages are rarely mentioned in conversations about gender equality. It is important that actions to address both overrepresentation and underrepresentation are elements of any strategy that seeks to move STEMM fields closer to gender parity.

Gender representation in science publication: evidence from Brain Communications.

The persistent underrepresentation of women in Science, Technology, Engineering, Mathematics and Medicine (STEMM) points to the need to continue promoting the awareness and understanding of this phenomenon. Being one of the main outputs of scientific work, academic publications provide the opportunity to quantify the gender gap in science as well as to identify possible sources of bias and areas of improvement. Brain Communications is a ‘young’ journal founded in 2019, committed to transparent publication of rigorous work in neuroscience, neurology and psychiatry. For all manuscripts (n = 796) received by the journal between 2019 and 2021, we analysed the gender of all authors (n = 7721) and reviewers (n = 4492). Overall, women were 35.3% of all authors and 31.3% of invited reviewers. A considerably higher proportion of women was found in first authorship (42.4%) than in last authorship positions (24.9%). The representation of women authors and reviewers decreased further in the months following COVID-19 restrictions, suggesting a possible exacerbating role of the pandemic on existing disparities in science publication. The proportion of manuscripts accepted for publication was not significantly different according to the gender of the first, middle or last authors, meaning we found no evidence of gender bias within the review or editorial decision-making processes at Brain Communications.

Useful Teaching Strategies in STEMM (Science, Technology, Engineering, Mathematics, and Medicine) Education during the COVID-19 Pandemic

The impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic throughout the world continue. These impacts influence many aspects of life, work, healthcare, and education in the U.S., which are drastically affected by the COVID-19 pandemic. Thus, a considerable challenge to tertiary-level education has been how to adapt our teaching styles and modalities to keep all stakeholders (students, faculty, teaching assistants, and staff) safe in lectures and labs. This viewpoint presents 15 teaching lessons and tips for undergraduate and graduate STEMM (Science, Technology, Engineering, Mathematics, and Medicine) education for face-to-face, hybrid, and distance learning. The goal was to describe teaching strategies that could be adaptable to most STEMM courses, independent of the classroom size, which is valuable for those educational settings capable of migrating from a classroom to either a hybrid or strictly online teaching environment. Although some of these teaching tips were straightforward, we believe collectively that they (1) provide safety and stability to the students and the instructors; (2) help to improve communications between faculty and students that the pandemic had strained; (3) strengthen student attention; (4) facilitate the transition from the classroom to online teaching; (5) enable the use of new technologies; and (6) offer teaching practices we imagined for educational scenarios post-SARS-CoV-2. Finally, we hope these teaching strategies offer valuable insight as we continue to navigate STEMM education during the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic.

Development and Evaluation of a Faculty-Based Accredited Continuing Professional Development Route for Teaching and Learning.

This article characterizes and evaluates the development of an accredited, in-house, faculty-based teaching recognition scheme aimed at supporting clinicians and academics to achieve Advance HE Fellowship recognition. The scheme takes 6 to 24 months to complete and forms part of an institution-wide scheme. The evaluation covered 44 months, collecting data on participation rates across the school and 21 semi-structured interviews across 16 staff participants. We describe the outcomes measured alongside key perceived benefits and challenges to support the implementation of similar schemes elsewhere. Across 130 academic staff, there was 61% engagement. In interviews, 11 participants characterized benefits in terms of changes to their teaching, such as adopting new strategies for differing class sizes, and highlighted the benefit of accessible and context-specific development opportunities designed specifically for STEMM (science, technology, engineering, mathematics, and medicine) practitioners and clinicians. Motivations for participating were mainly intrinsic (69%), with international professional recognition also featured (61%, n = 10). Of the 23 participants who withdrew, the largest subgroup (39%) withdrew because they had left the institution, and 35% withdrew because of a lack of time, which encompassed a range of issues. We outline recommendations for implementing similar schemes including protected time, accessible development opportunities, and support for mentors.

Why have eight researcher women in STEMM left academic research, and where did they go?

ABSTRACT The workplace for early-career researchers (ECRs) in STEMM (science, technology, engineering, mathematics and medicine) is highly competitive; ECRs urgently need to publish and attract funding to secure their next job. The literature suggests this environment is more difficult for women than for men. They start the postdoctoral period in equal numbers; however more women leave academia than men and women are under-represented at the senior levels. Interviews of eight women who had recently left academic research explored their reasons for the change, providing insight into the difficult decision-making processes and the largely beneficial outcomes of their choices of new careers.

SAGE Ltd: Continuing the Journey to Transform Gender Equity, Diversity and Inclusion in Australia’s Higher Education and Research Sector

Science in Australia Gender Equity (SAGE) began as a Pilot program in 2015. It was modelled on the UK’s Athena Swan Charter (Advance HE), a framework for improving gender equity and diversity in science, technology, engineering, mathematics and medicine (STEMM); specifically, within higher education and research.

Reimagining educational equity through strategic alliance partnerships in response to the USA STEM-M diversity gap.

Addressing the USA diversity gap in science, technology, engineering, mathematics and medicine (STEM-M) through strategic alliance partnerships (SAPs) is an innovative solution toward combating the educational inequalities presented in K-12 education for marginalized youth interested in STEM-M professions. We present a model that unites multiple stakeholder s committed to diversifying the workforce in STEM-M, through the implementation of a multi-year high school pipeline program designed to better achieve STEM-M equity, access and opportunity at the secondary school level. We developed a unique model based on an SAP in a large metropolitan area in the Midwest that joins an Academic Medical Center and a local Public High School. Our results involving 46 students over 8 years demonstrate 100% high school graduation rates; 97% college attendance with full or partial scholarship support, and early evidence of post-graduation aspirations in STEM-M careers. Our early progress calls for more rigorous study against standard educational practices. If our program is proven to be more effective, then potentially more strategic public-private partnerships to foster K-12 pipeline programs to better achieve equity through educational access, opportunities and resources should be developed and targeted for those marginalized youth that have been historically denied STEM-M opportunities. After 10 years of dedicated effort, we see evidence of potential benefits of this SAP to develop K-12 pipeline programs with similar aims of STEM-M diversification, particularly by way of more-equitable provision of educational opportunities to students belonging to minority racial and ethnic groups.

Urban high school students’ perceptions of race, gender, and benefits from participating in a STEMM pipeline programme: a sociocultural case study

ABSTRACT Motivated by lack of diversity in Science Technology Engineering Mathematics and Medicine (STEMM) professions, this case-study explores a group of 25 high achieving, low SES, mostly female, majority-minority high school students’ perception of race, ethnicity, and gender as factors for success in their future as STEMM professionals. Additionally, the study elucidates the benefits of participating in a pipeline programme designed to promote high skill and high wage jobs in the medical and health fields. Emergent themes of race and merit prominently surfaced. Responses to the effect of race and gender varied by subgroup, with the themes of the ‘power of personal merit’ over sociocultural factors emerging as the most striking theme. Participants’ perceived benefits aligned with the programme goals: broadening of STEM knowledge, access to role-models, and hands-on experience. Teachings on social inequality and more access to female, minority role-models are suggested to prepare participants for their entrance into the STEMM field.

Intentional mentoring: maximizing the impact of underrepresented future scientists in the 21st century.

ABSTRACTMentoring is a developmental experience intended to increase the willingness to learn and establish credibility while building positive relationships through networking. In this commentary, we focus on intentional mentoring for underrepresented mentees, including individuals that belong to minority racial, ethnic and gender identity groups in Science, Technology, Engineering, Mathematics and Medicine (STEMM) fields. Intentional mentoring is the superpower action necessary for developing harmony and comprehending the purpose and value of the mentor/mentee relationship. Regardless of a mentor's career stage, we believe the strategies discussed may be used to create a supportive and constructive mentorship environment; thereby improving the retention rates of underrepresented mentees within the scientific community.