Science, Technology, Engineering, Mathematics And Medicine Research Articles

Women Authorship of Scholarly Publications in STEMM: Authorship Puzzle

The continued underrepresentation of women in scholarly activities slows down the scientific progress of any country. Several studies have analyzed the women representation in authorship of scholarly publications in Science, Technology, Engineering, Mathematics and Medicine (STEMM). Women account only 30% of overall authorship of scholarly articles. Prestigious authorships like first-, last- and corresponding authors also show significant underrepresentation of women. Women as first authors are significantly increasing since last decades; however, growth of last authors is not significant and share of corresponding authors not changed. Women show low overall impact of scholarly publications due to lower productivity but not for quality of publication. This gender authorship puzzle can be solved by adopting gender responsive planning and management. Therefore, systematic efforts to understand the gender disparities in scholarly publications, authorship citations and collaborations require for achieving significant positive change in the share of women in academic authorship, impact and career. The field is new, active, attractive and interesting area of research to achieve gender equality in scientific research and publications for social welfare.

ACS joins consortium to confront sexual harassment in the sciences

The American Chemical Society has joined more than 50 other academic and professional societies in forming the Societies Consortium on Sexual Harassment in STEMM (science, technology, engineering, mathematics, and medicine). The consortium aims to advance professional and ethical conduct, climate, and culture across the scientific fields. The initiative was announced on Feb. 15 at the annual meeting of the American Association for the Advancement of Science in Washington, DC, and is being led by AAAS, the Association of American Medical Colleges, and the American Geophysical Union. The commission “will provide research and evidence-based resources and guidance to address sexual harassment in the member societies’ operations and more broadly within the fields they represent,” an AAAS statement says. “Initial work will focus on model policies and procedures for society honors and awards.” “Sexual harassment in STEMM is something that impacts all of the scientific disciplines. Our goal is to leverage the

A sponsorship action plan for increasing diversity in STEMM.

There are numerous structural and cultural barriers to the progression of women and marginalized groups to leadership in academia, especially in Science, Technology, Engineering, Mathematics and Medicine (STEMM). A range of interventions have been described to address this inequity, with varying success. Here, we suggest that sponsorship could be one effective intervention and propose an institutional action plan to implement a sponsorship program in academia. We outline why sponsorship could be an effective strategy, especially if implemented through a deliberate program by an institution. We then detail the three components of an action plan to be considered in implementation: the elements of the program, the activities that sponsorship in academia likely encompasses, and the selection of sponsors and protégés. The plan could also be enacted by academic leadership in the absence of an institutional program and could serve as a guide to individuals in academia aspiring to address diversity and inclusion in STEMM.

Vertical Segregation: Issues and Challenges of Women Engineers in Australia

International research shows that 75 per cent of the fastest growing occupations require Science, Technology, Engineering, Mathematics and Medicine (STEMM) skills. However, a recent survey report said that almost a third of global women working in STEMM expect to leave the sector within the next five years. This loss is very significant and wastage of resources, talent and expertise with respect to every nation’s growth. Although number of national and international policies and programs have been implemented to promote and increase the inclusion of gender equity in the field of science and technology but there is significant gender gap about the participation of women at higher levels of science academic careers, referred to as ‘vertical segregation’. This leads to understand the interplay of inclusive policies, organizational, societal and personal factors that exclude women from pinnacle of the hierarchy in academic and research institutions. Challenges are more in hard sciences like mathematics, physics, engineering and computer science where there is no equity in numbers even at start level. This study engages with women engineers located particularly in the middle management level to record the impact of ongoing policies & programs and compare the findings to unfold some of their struggles which is linked to the leadership questions in ‘Women in Engineering’. Pay, progression and security issues are not only being barriers to women reaching the higher levels of science and technology professions but unconscious biases, stereotype, some myths, societal, cultural and institutional roots also impediments to support ‘Women in Engineering’. This indicates that no single strategy can entirely plug the leak and there is need of sharing the best practices among different nations through multi-faceted approach across all levels to break the glass ceiling.

Women in marine science in Australia

Two broad initiatives provide a backdrop to this special issue of Marine and Freshwater Research, which highlights women in marine science in Australia. The first is that Australia is currently piloting the Athena Swan accreditation framework from the United Kingdom, which is raising awareness of gender equity and diversity issues. The current focus of the Science in Australia Gender Equity (SAGE) initiative is on the Bronze Institutional award for higher education and research institutions. This initiative stemmed from recognition of the need for a more coordinated national approach to improving gender equity in STEMM (science, technology, engineering, mathematics and medicine) disciplines. Launched in 2015, to date there has been one round of awards to cohort 1 members, with a further two cohorts underway. Further, Australia has just released the Women in STEM (science, technology, engineering, and mathematics) decadal plan (Australian Academy of Science 2019). Both the Australian Academy of Science and the Australian Academy of Technology and Engineering authored this decadal plan, which was overseen by an expert working group. The plan recognises the strong demand for STEM skills and the need to maximise the attraction, participation and retention of both women and men in the workforce (Australian Academy of Science 2019).

“Undoing” Gender: how the School of Science, Engineering and Information Technology (SEIT) Women’s Group works across university and community lines to promote inclusive STEMM.

Research on gender and education in industrialised and developing countries suggests that schools and universities are sites of ‘doing’ rather than ‘undoing’ gender. Deutsch (2007) contends that ‘doing gender’ refers to social interactions that reproduce conventional and limiting notions of gender construction and that ‘undoing gender’ refers to social interactions that reduce gender difference and open up other possibilities. In this paper we consider how educational institutions can be strategic sites of influence in undoing gender and we investigate some ways that gender is ‘undone’ through the example of the work of the Science, Engineering and Information Technology Women’s Group (SEITWG) located in the Faculty of Science and Technology at Federation University Australia. For this purpose, a self-study methodology understood as a professional reflection was used. The paper explores how the informal coalition of SEITWG works as ‘wilful subjects’, on the one hand, coming up against some of the ‘brick walls’ of dominant discourse that attempt to limit women’s participation in STEMM (science, technology, engineering, mathematics, and medicine). On the other hand, SEITWG attempts to move beyond the restrictions of conventional gender narratives to encourage more women to participate in STEMM by foregrounding the presence of women already active in the area; mentoring women students and staff; supporting a range of their colleagues’ endeavours to research and teach for inclusion; embedding gender analysis into the curriculum; and promoting workplace cultural change.

Exploring research relationships and other ethical challenges of participatory visual research in remote environments

This critical reflection provides fellow researchers with insights into the ethical challenges of using visual methods in remote environments. We draw on Fine’s notion of ‘working the hyphens’ to explore the complexities of studying a leadership program for women in science, technology, engineering, mathematics and medicine (STEMM) on a ship in Antarctica. We reflect on how our researcher identities and relationships with participants shaped the research process and emergent ethical tensions. For instance, we discuss ethical issues that arose in relation to the contextual and relational aspects of the environment including psychological and physical demands of research participation in Antarctica, privacy and isolation in remote environments, and rapport. We also discuss issues related to participant-produced video diaries specifically including consent, confidentiality and participant safety. To conclude, we highlight implications for visual research in other remote settings.

‘I was completely oblivious to gender’: an exploration of how women in STEMM navigate leadership in a neoliberal, post-feminist context

ABSTRACTWomen are under-represented in science, technology, engineering, mathematics and medicine (STEMM) fields worldwide, particularly in leadership positions. We explore this phenomenon by examining the leadership experiences of 25 women who were actively seeking to enhance their leadership capacities in STEMM fields from five countries in the Global North. We argue that women in this study seemed to be caught in an ‘ideological dilemma’ between recognizing sexism and gender bias in their organizational contexts and seeing their organizations as gender neutral. We argue that a post-feminist climate and a neoliberal ethic of meritocracy in science render inequality difficult to articulate and address. Considering this dilemma through the lens of ‘cruel optimism’, we suggest that women are problematically bound to a fantasy of success in STEMM in which leadership is attainable through arduous effort.Abbreviation: STEMM; Science, Technology, Engineering, Mathematics, and Medicine

Guiding Low Spatial Ability Individuals through Visual Cueing: The Dual Importance of Where and When to Look.

Research suggests that spatial ability may predict success in complex disciplines including anatomy, where mastery requires a firm understanding of the intricate relationships occurring along the course of veins, arteries, and nerves, as they traverse through and around bones, muscles, and organs. Debate exists on the malleability of spatial ability, and some suggest that spatial ability can be enhanced through training. It is hypothesized that spatial ability can be trained in low-performing individuals through visual guidance. To address this, training was completed through a visual guidance protocol. This protocol was based on eye-movement patterns of high-performing individuals, collected via eye-tracking as they completed an Electronic Mental Rotations Test (EMRT). The effects of guidance were evaluated using 33 individuals with low mental rotation ability, in a counterbalanced crossover design. Individuals were placed in one of two treatment groups (late or early guidance) and completed both a guided, and an unguided EMRT. A third group (no guidance/control) completed two unguided EMRTs. All groups demonstrated an increase in EMRT scores on their second test (P < 0.001); however, an interaction was observed between treatment and test iteration (P = 0.024). The effect of guidance on scores was contingent on when the guidance was applied. When guidance was applied early, scores were significantly greater than expected (P = 0.028). These findings suggest that by guiding individuals with low mental rotation ability "where" to look early in training, better search approaches may be adopted, yielding improvements in spatial reasoning scores. It is proposed that visual guidance may be applied in spatial fields, such as STEMM (science, technology, engineering, mathematics and medicine), surgery, and anatomy to improve student's interpretation of visual content. Anat Sci Educ. © 2018 American Association of Anatomists.

What do postdocs need to succeed? A survey of current standing and future directions for Australian researchers

AbstractWhen discussing the postdoctoral period in a researcher’s life, a lack of career progression often boils down to “is it you, or is it me?” Is it a reduction in the quality of candidates, or the fact that there are now too many candidates for a rapidly shrinking pool of jobs? Australia provides an ideal case study, as a large and decentralized country with a government mandate to build the STEMM (Science, Technology, Engineering, Mathematics and Medicine) workforce. The goal of the present study was 1) to provide a baseline for postdoctoral experiences and career aspirations in Australia, and 2) to identify gaps in postdoctoral training. When undertaking a capacity building programme it is important to know where efforts should be focused. To better understand the demographic and career progression of Australia’s current cohort of postdoctoral researchers, a national survey was undertaken from 2014–2015. More than 280 postdoctoral researchers from government, industry and academic institutions responded. Our results indicate that although postdoctoral researchers work more than the legal maximum of a 38-hour a week (on average) and have a long-term plan to stay in research, there is significant concern over the long-term viability of research careers due to job insecurity and a shortage of funding.