Gender Bias = Poor Maths

Just as boys tend to gravitate to toy trucks and girls usually prefer dolls, gender differences in math performance have more to do with culture than aptitude.

Just as boys tend to gravitate to toy trucks and girls usually prefer dolls, gender differences in math performance have more to do with culture than aptitude. New findings challenge the century-old idea that males are innately more capable than girls in mathematics. A UW-Madison team of oncology analysed studies on math performance along with gender inequality as measured by the World Economic Forum’s Gender Gap Index. Researchers knew that if men were born with math on the brain, so to speak, the gender difference in mathematical ability should be somewhat universal. But some countries showed a larger gap than others. Countries with low gender equality showed a greater gender gap in math. For example, India and Iran ranked low on gender equality and low on the percentage of females scoring high in the International Mathematical Olympiad. In the US, which scored high on gender equality, girls perform on average as well as boys on standardised math tests. And the percentage of US doctorates in the mathematical sciences awarded to women has climbed to 30 per cent this century, up from 5 per cent in the 1950s. But still, more boys than girls are identified in the higher echelons of the mathematically gifted. Researchers say this gap is narrowing.