While performance differences between boys and girls have narrowed considerably, boys still outnumber girls by more than about 3-to-1 at extremely high levels of math ability and scientific reasoning.
At the same time, girls slightly outnumber boys at extremely high levels of verbal reasoning and writing ability.
Those are the findings of a recent study that examined 30 years of standardized test data from the very highest-scoring seventh graders. Except for the differences at these highest levels of performance, boys and girls are essentially the same at all other levels of performance.
The findings come from a study performed by Duke University’s Talent Identification Program, which relies on SAT and ACT tests administered to the top 5 percent of 7th graders to identify gifted students and nurture their intellectual talents. There were more than 1.6 million such students in this study.
3 thoughts on “Gender gap persists among top test takers”
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The important result of this Duke University study is that it confirms the Johns Hopkins study showing that the ratio of boys:girls identified as scoring above 700 on the SAT I math prior to age 13 years old dropped from 13:1 in the late 1970s down to 3:1 by the early 1990s. The fact that it hasn’t continued to drop can have several plausible explanations. The simpliest one is samply bias, i.e., fewer girls than boys bother to accelerate 3 or more years in mathematics in middle school, what is needed to achieve a 700 on the math SAT. This could be for social reasons. The study measures math performance in middle school, not innate ability. If fewer girls than boys bother to accelerate in math in school, fewer will be identified by this mechanism.
I would add that, at least one factor has to be early identification ALONG WITH accelerated programming. At least locally, girls are less frequently given the opportunity to accelerate in elementary school, thereby making it much less likely that they will be 3 or more years ahead by middle school. High potential only translates into high acheivement when it is appropriately fed, and it usually requires some belief in self. It is easy for girls to see themselves as not good at math when even those girls who are exceptional are overlooked. It doesn’t seem surprising that gaps in early identification for programming will go hand in hand with gaps in later acheivement.
There is definitely gender bias against girls when it comes to math. I have witnessed elementary school teachers, who perhaps were not interested in high level math themselves (and some even stated that they didn’t like math) do not recognize high math abilities in girls nor encourage these. Perhaps they identify with and project their own beliefs onto girls. Another problem that I’ve observed is that often it is the female parent who oversees their children’s school progress, and if these moms do not have math or science related careers (and most women don’t compared with their husbands) they too do not see the importance of encouraging math in their daughters (they didn’t need it so their daughter won’t need it) nor recognize or encourage their daughters in these areas. Time and time again, the mom’s that advocated for more math challenge in the younger grades were the moms of boys, although just as often I observed aptitude in girls as in boys. I don’t think this is done maliciously nor even consciously. Learned gender roles and traditions are just part of how we interact with the world, often without much thought.
The early years of elementary school is where the gap starts, and if industry or the government wants more females in the STEM fields, the place to start is by educating and encouraging the moms and female elementary teachers to recognize and encourage these skills in their daughters and female students.