Citation
Riegle-Crumb, C., King, B., Grodsky, E., & Muller, C. (2012). The more things change, the more they stay the same? Prior achievement fails to explain gender inequality in entry into STEM college majors over time. American Educational Research Journal, 49(6), 1048-1073.
Highlights
- The study explored whether U.S. students’ prior achievement in math and science contributed to higher enrollment rates for men versus women in physical science and engineering degree programs in the 1980s, 1990s, and 2000s.
- The authors analyzed data from the High School and Beyond Study (1980s), the National Education Longitudinal Study (1990s), and the Educational Longitudinal Study (2000s) to determine whether gender was correlated with college major choice, after controlling for three different measures of prior academic achievement.
- The study found that female students were approximately 20 percentage points less likely to declare a science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) major than male students. However, prior achievement in math and science, as measured by GPA, average standardized test scores, and position along the test score distribution, did very little to explain this gender gap.
- The study found that girls’ higher performance in English versus math and science only somewhat accounted for the gender gap in college major choice. Factors such as ethnicity and socioeconomic status were more influential.
Reviewed by CLEAR
March 2016