Research reveals a gender gap in the nation’s biology labs

[LuckyTheDog]

Among the sciences, biology consistently attracts the greatest numbers of women to graduate school and academic careers. About half of all biology graduate students are women, and 40 percent of biology postdocs are female. However, those numbers drop dramatically among faculty members: Nationwide, only 36 percent of assistant professors and 18 percent of full professors are women.

A new study reveals a possible explanation for this discrepancy: In the labs of the highest-achieving male biology professors — winners of the Nobel Prize, the National Medal of Science, and other prestigious awards — women are greatly underrepresented, compared with their overall percentages in the field. Those labs serve as a major pipeline to junior faculty positions at top research institutions, the study found.

MORE HERE: http://wonkynewsnerd.com/gender-gap-in-the-nations-biology-labs/

[Vattel]

1. This is a good study. The root cause of the discrepancy at the best labs is still unknown though.

[winter is coming]

3. My first thought is snobbery/prejudice about where candidates got their degrees.

My second thought is that women aren't considered "serious" by some.

[Vattel]

5. As the invesitgatos point out, it may be sexism on the part of male professors at these labs.

Or it may be because top women candidates self-select and don't apply at labs run by men. Or it could be other factors. or it could be a combination of all of the above.

[redqueen]

2. Glad this is being studied.

Interesting numbers.

In the labs of male Nobel laureates, male grad students outnumbered female grad students by two to one, and male postdocs outnumbered female postdocs by more than three to one. In the labs of male HHMI investigators, only 31 percent of postdocs were female, compared with 38 percent for all other male professors.

“Looking at this small subset of labs, you get a very different picture than you do when you look at the field as a whole,” Sheltzer says.

However, Sheltzer and Smith found no such imbalances in labs run by elite female faculty members. Female HHMI investigators ran labs with 48 percent female postdocs, compared with 46 percent in labs run by other female scientists.

[kwolf68]

4. Interesting, but many dots to connect

Getting into a lab is incredibly informal so no way to get those numbers, at least not now. I do know profs do not go out of their way to roll out the red carpet, even if they have openings in their lab. You just have to persist and not give up, eventually you break through. Not saying women do not persist and give up, just saying it's a process to get into a lab.

I was able to get into a lab run by a female...but I had to 'bother her' for a while before she finally brought me in to meet everyone.