The Student Room Group

How come the most gender equal countries have so few women going into STEM?

Sweden or Norway don't even pass the 25% mark on female students in engineering and even lower in the workforce. 40% of chinese engineers, 60% of former USSR engineers, 70% or iranian STEM students and 35% of engineering indian students are female. Only 7% on UK engineers are female. 7 bloody percent!!! Are you telling me Sweden, Norway or UK are more traditional/patriarchal/stuck in gender roles than the other countries mentioned? Of course not, they are centuries apart in terms of culture and values. You think the politburos of China or USSR had binders of women in them? Google image that ****, you'll be lucky to find a single woman. India is progressive and liberal when it comes to gender equality? Do you ever read the news? And don't even get me started about Iran!


So why , feminists? Why do women make such stereotypical feminine choices(and not just STEM related but also working part time, staying out of competitive industries/jobs etc) in the most liberal, progressive, gender equal, feminist countries that have ever existed anywhere in the known universe in the entire history of everything ? Why ?
(edited 9 years ago)

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Personally I find STEM subjects dull. If I'm gonna spend 3 years of my life studying, I'd rather do something I enjoy. Maybe in those other countries they don't have this privilege? Maybe they can only justify going to university if they study STEM subjects? I don't know. To be honest I don't really care.
Original post by LavenderBlueSky88
Personally I find STEM subjects dull. If I'm gonna spend 3 years of my life studying, I'd rather do something I enjoy. Maybe in those other countries they don't have this privilege? Maybe they can only justify going to university if they study STEM subjects? I don't know. To be honest I don't really care.



STEM subjects may be 'dull', but they're the ones that contribute to the world my friend :wink:
Original post by Incubator
STEM subjects may be 'dull', but they're the ones that contribute to the world my friend :wink:


Oh so I guess teaching and nursing are useless then?
Original post by Incubator
STEM subjects may be 'dull', but they're the ones that contribute to the world my friend :wink:


How would a knowledge of STEM help one with preventing WW2 had it been 1930? Calculate the probability of Germany voting for the Nazis? :wink:
Original post by LavenderBlueSky88
Personally I find STEM subjects dull. If I'm gonna spend 3 years of my life studying, I'd rather do something I enjoy. Maybe in those other countries they don't have this privilege? Maybe they can only justify going to university if they study STEM subjects? I don't know. To be honest I don't really care.


Hardly relevant giving a lot of men and some women find it interesting, you've still not answered the question why you and other females don't even consider it an option


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Original post by SerLorasTyrell
Hardly relevant giving a lot of men and some women find it interesting, you've still not answered the question why you and other females don't even consider it an option


Posted from TSR Mobile


Yeah some girls do. However most girls gravitate towards more arts based subjects if given the choice. What's wrong with that? Lots of girls in school tend to find maths and science lessons boring, thus they don't particularly apply themselves in those areas and have no interest in furthering their education in that sector. Whereas many boys are mechanically minded, it's just gender differences. They're more interested in cars and machines and how things work.

It's hardly 'anti feminist' if we're being given the choice and chose not to opt for STEM as much as men.
Reply 7
Original post by Incubator
STEM subjects may be 'dull', but they're the ones that contribute to the world my friend :wink:

My interests and skills are in mathematics, physics and chemistry. But I wouldn't want to live in a world without art, music, comedy or therapy.
Original post by LavenderBlueSky88
Yeah some girls do. However most girls gravitate towards more arts based subjects if given the choice. What's wrong with that? Lots of girls in school tend to find maths and science lessons boring, thus they don't particularly apply themselves in those areas and have no interest in furthering their education in that sector. Whereas many boys are mechanically minded, it's just gender differences. They're more interested in cars and machines and how things work.

It's hardly 'anti feminist' if we're being given the choice and chose not to opt for STEM as much as men.


"Boys are more mechanically minded"

Where is your source? That's quite a statement. How do you know it simply isn't reinforced gender stereotypes?

If this was also the case then why are most of the famous artists in history predominantly male?

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(edited 9 years ago)
Original post by LavenderBlueSky88
Personally I find STEM subjects dull. If I'm gonna spend 3 years of my life studying, I'd rather do something I enjoy. Maybe in those other countries they don't have this privilege? Maybe they can only justify going to university if they study STEM subjects? I don't know. To be honest I don't really care.

Thats fine. Just be sure to tell that to the genderwarriors you bump into at uni, who claim you have been pushed away from stem by your parents and society in general, and remember it was your choice that put you into a lower paying profession when your friends start whining about a pay gap.
Just remember that your work life balance choices mean you will live up to 11 yrs longer than the men you love.
Swings and roundabouts.😊
Original post by Blues Clues
How would a knowledge of STEM help one with preventing WW2 had it been 1930? Calculate the probability of Germany voting for the Nazis? :wink:


Thank God there was all those experts in art history, music and comedy there to invent radar and the spitfire.
If it wasnt for them we would all be talking German now.
Reply 11
Its because your experiences growing up shape you as a person. As kids there is so much social pressure on us to confirm to gender norms. Boys are supposed to be tough strong etc like superhero toys etc and girls are supposed to like lovely doll sets. There is immense pressure on boys to follow this and calling a boy a girl is like an insult whenever they don't confirm to these norms.

Then latter growing up there are useless gender norms as to what men and women can wear, shampoo companies and perfume companies split products that should have no relation to gender at all so they can sell more products. We are trained by these companies as to what perfumes and shampoos are for which gender. When logically, biologically and chemically, women's shampoo is perfectly useable on a male.

When we grow up in such a society it messes our minds. And automatically even though we are "free" to chose what we want we automatically tend to chose different things due to this psychological manipulation since we are born.

There is no reason why it should not be socially acceptable for straight men to wear skirts, like flower based perfumes etc.

In countries like Iran we see an interessting phenomenon, since the sexism is very apparent to women, more women are in the rebellious mind set and want to prove that they are equal which is why you see them in STEM. Current developed countries and particularly English speaking countries tend to have brainwashed women and men into thinking that things are fair and equal when they are not. In fact psychological manipulation like we see with gender norms since birth are the worst kind. Just look at North Korea and see how everyone thinks Kim Jong Un is awesome. If I were in the EU or something I'd regulate on these corporations and ban marketting products as for a specific gender. There should be nothing like a girls and boys toys section.

If we lived in a society where it was acceptable for both men and women to wear what they like without it being considered weird, where toys and products that have nothing to do with gender were not marketted as such, things would be so much better.

Currently the worst insult to a man is to call question their sexuality tell them to man up, call them a pussy etc. This makes them sub-conciously think they are superior.
[video="youtube;3JDmb_f3E2c"]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3JDmb_f3E2c[/video]
(edited 9 years ago)
Original post by LavenderBlueSky88
Oh so I guess teaching and nursing are useless then?


You could say nursing is a stem degree given it would normally be in the school of health sciences or similar
Reply 13
Why work hard for a Bsc when you just need to get your Mrs?
Original post by manchesterunited15
You could say nursing is a stem degree given it would normally be in the school of health sciences or similar


Well in that case I have an STEM degree then!
This really is only a possible explanation and I have no data to back it up.

By the way, you cite some statistics in your question without sources. The question is obviously how rigorous has your data analysis been?

Anyway, your question was interesting and yes you wouldn't think it would work that way. Here are some possible reasons:

In the less economically developed countries you mention, China, Russia, India, Iran, there is much less of a service industry. Eg tourism, beauty, marketing, PR, those sort of higher economic activities are less common. Anecdotally, I remember talking to an Indian student in a placement and when asked what proportion of students study engineering he said about 90%!

So for woman (and men) work is more about the basic necessities for living, the basic stuff like engineering. think of the UK 100 years ago. Who studied fashion then.

In western Europe and the US, women yes have access to education but they also have more choice. And I am suggesting that they go with their instincts and study what interests them more. Of course, this is talking very generally. My daughter is studying chemical engineering. On her course 30% are female - which is actually quite high.

If men and women had limited choice, eg the big area which is going to help you make a successful career is engineering, then you will probably do engineering. But if you have a vast array of choice, then you get people making different choices.

Lets face it, in the UK, there are not enough MEN doing engineering.
I personally have little skill and little interest in the majority of STEM subjects so I couldn't help a great deal in relation to them even if I wanted to. We don't live in a world where people are desperate enough that I'm needed in the efforts. Women as a whole I'm not sure of; to be honest, I think (shock horror) it might be a coincidence.
Gender equality doesn't mean everything has to be split 50/50 between the genders; it just means there needs to be equal opportunities available so that this could happen if people wanted it to.
Reply 18
- WARNING! Sensibleness Alert! WARNING! -


Original post by TroyAndAbed
Gender equality doesn't mean everything has to be split 50/50 between the genders; it just means there needs to be equal opportunities available so that this could happen if people wanted it to.


:clap2:
(edited 9 years ago)
Original post by TroyAndAbed
Gender equality doesn't mean everything has to be split 50/50 between the genders; it just means there needs to be equal opportunities available so that this could happen if people wanted it to.


There in lies the problem. I have spoken to many feminists that arent happy with equality of opportunity, they demand equality of outcome.
If it means biased quotas and lowering standards to shoehorn women into these postions then so be it.

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