Women in engineering

Gender stereotypes

Stereotype threat may contribute to the under-representation of women in engineering. Because engineering is a traditionally male-dominated field, women may be less confident about their abilities, even when performing equally.^[9] At a young age, girls do not express the same level of interest in engineering as boys, possibly due in part to gender stereotypes.^[10] There is also significant evidence of the remaining presence of implicit bias against female engineers, due to the belief that men are mathematically superior and better suited to engineering jobs.^[10] Women who persist are able to overcome these difficulties, enabling them to find fulfilling and rewarding experiences in the engineering profession.^[11]

Due to this gender bias, women’s choice in entering an engineering field for college is also highly correlated to the background and exposure they have had with mathematics and other science courses during high school. Most women that do choose to study engineering have significant experience with regarding themselves better at these types of courses and as a result, think they are capable of studying in a male-dominated field. ^[12]

Women’s self-efficacy is also a contributor to the gender stereotype that plays a role in the underrepresentation of women in engineering. Women’s ability to think critically that they can be successful and perform accomplishments is correlated to the choices they have when choosing a college career. Women that show high self-efficacy personalities are more prone to choose to study in the engineering field. Self-efficacy is also correlated to gender roles because men often present higher self-efficacy than women, which can also be a cause to why when choosing a major, most women opt to not choose the engineering major. ^[12]

Lower rates of female students in engineering degree programs

Over the past few years 40 percent of women are leaving the engineering field, there are many factors leading to why they don't go into engineering because of women being judged about going into a difficult major such as engineering, working in difficult workplace conditions. According to the Society of Women Engineers^[13] one in four female leave the field after a certain age.

Women are under-represented in engineering education programs as in the workforce (see Statistics). Enrollment and graduation rates of women in post-secondary engineering programs are very important determinants of how many women go on to become engineers. Because undergraduate degrees are acknowledged as the "latest point of standard entry into scientific fields", the under-representation of women in undergraduate programs contributes directly to under-representation in scientific fields.^[14] Additionally, in the United States, women who hold degrees in science, technology, and engineering fields are less likely than their male counterparts to have jobs in those fields.^[15]

This degree disparity varies across engineering disciplines. Women tend to be more interested in the engineering disciplines that have societal and humane developments, such as agricultural and environmental engineering. They are therefore well-represented in environmental and biomedical engineering degree programs, receiving 40-50% of awarded degrees in the U.S. (2014–15), women are far less likely to receive degrees in fields like mechanical, electrical and computer engineering.^[15][16]

A study made by the Harvard Business Review discussed the reasons why the rates of women representation in the engineering field are still low. The study discovered that rates of female students in engineering programs are continuous because of the collaboration aspects in the field. The results of the study chiefly determined how women are treated differently in group works in which there are more male than female members and how male members “excluded women from the real engineering work”. Aside from this, women in this study also described how professors treated female students differently “just because they were women”. ^[17]

Despite the fact that fewer women enroll in engineering programs across the nation, the representation of women in STEM-based careers can potentially increase when college and university administrators work on implementing mentoring programs and work-life policies for women. Research shows that these rates have a hard time increasing since women are judged as less competent than men to perform supposedly “masculine jobs”. ^[18]

Engineering culture

Autodidact computer chip designer and inventor, Jeri Ellsworth, at the Bay Area "Maker Faire" in 2009.

Another possible reason for lower female participation in engineering fields is the prevalence of values "associated with the male gender role" in workplace culture.^[16] For example, some women in engineering have found it difficult to re-enter the workforce after a period of absence. Because men are less likely to take time off to raise a family, this disproportionately affects women.^[19]

Males are also associated with taking leadership roles in the workplace. By holding a position of power over the women, they may create an uncomfortable environment for them. For example, lower pay, more responsibilities, less appreciation as compared to men.

Communication is also a contributing factor to the divide between men and women in the workplace. A male to male communication is said to be more direct,^[20] but when a man explains a task to a woman, they tend to talk down, or “dumb down” terms. This comes from the stereotype that men are more qualified than women for engineering, causing men to treat women as inferiors instead of equals.

Part of the male dominance in the engineering field is explained by their perception towards engineering itself. A study in 1964 found that both women and men believed that engineering was in fact masculine. ^[21]

The masculinity dominating engineering majors and fields proves the issues that men themselves believe that they “naturally” excel in fields related to mathematics and sciences while women “naturally” excel in linguistics and liberal arts. In the past few decades, women’s representation in the workforce in STEM fields, specifically engineering, has significantly improved. In 1960 women made up around 1% of all the engineers and by the year 2000 women have made up 11% of all engineers. ^[18]

Several colleges and universities nationwide want to decrease the gender gap between men and women in the engineering field by recruiting more women into their programs. The strategies used for recruiting more female undergraduate students are: increasing women’s exposure to stem-courses during high school, planting the idea of positivism relating gender from the engineering culture, producing a more female-friendly environment inside and outside the classroom. These strategies have helped institutions encourage more women to enroll in engineering programs as well as other STEM-based majors. For universities to encourage women to enroll in their graduate programs, institutions have to emphasize the importance of recruiting women, emphasize the importance of STEM education in the undergraduate level, offer financial aid, and develop more efficient methods for recruiting women to their programs. ^[22]

United States

Females are underrepresented as both graduate students in engineering and working engineers.^[23][24] The number of Bachelor's degrees awarded to women dropped from 20.4% in 2003, down to 17.8% in 2009, and back up to 18.9% in 2012.^[25] Women’s underrepresentation in the engineering workforce varies by field. In the year 2008 women Mechanical Engineers made up 6.7%, Electrical and Electronics made 7.7%, Aerospace and Civil made 10.4%, Chemical made 13.1% and Computer and Software Engineers made up 20.9% of the workforce. These values are even more outnumbered while quantifying the number of women who hold doctorates. ^[18]

The percentage of master's degrees awarded to women has not changed much from 2003 (22.3%) to 2012 (23.1%).^[25] The percentage of doctoral degrees awarded to women in engineering increased from 11.6% in 1995, to 17.4% in 2004,^[26] to 21.1% in 2008,^[27] then to 22.2% in 2012.^[25]

Since 1997, the percentage of Asian females enrolling in engineering majors has risen from about 30% to 34% but somehow also dropped in 2002. African American females have increased their representation in engineering from 21% to 33% in the same time frame. Mexican American (Chicana) and Puerto Rican females have had an increase in their representation from 25% to 31%. Even if ethnicities are included in these statistics, men from all ethnicities still outnumber the proportion of women who enroll in engineering bachelor programs. ^[22]

There is a significant drop-off rate regarding the number of women who earn a bachelor's degree and the women who afterward enroll in graduate school. Over the last 35 years, women have been more likely than men to enroll in graduate school right after receiving their bachelor's degree. Women who do not enroll in a graduate program right after earning their bachelor's degree tend to be caregivers who face work-family conflicts in the context of family women. ^[28] The workforce remains the area of lowest representation for women. In 2009, women comprised 48% of the total workforce, but only 14% of the engineering workforce.^[15]

Australia

Only 14% of engineers in Australia are women.^[29] The retention of female engineers is also disproportionally low; in 2006, 62.6% of qualified male engineers were employed in engineering professions, as opposed to 47.1% of qualified female engineers.^[30]

Canada

Though women tend to make up more than half of the undergraduate population in Canada, the number of women in engineering is disproportionately low.^[31] Whereas in 2001, 21 percent of students in engineering programs were female, by 2009, this had fallen to 17 percent.^[31] One commentator attributed this drop to a number of factors, such as the failure of higher education programs to explain how engineering can improve others' lives, a lack of awareness of what engineers do, and discomfort of being in a male-dominated environment and the perception that women must adapt to fit in.^[31]

In the 1990s, undergraduate enrollment of women in engineering fluctuated from 17 to 18%, while in 2001, it rose to 20.6%.^[32] In 2010, 17.7% of students in undergraduate engineering were women.^[33]

Female undergraduate enrollment was highest in 2010 in environmental, biosystems, and geological engineering.^[33]

The number of women enrolled in undergraduate, graduate, and doctoral engineering programs tends to vary by province, with the highest number in Saskatchewan, Alberta, and British Columbia.^[33]

On average, 11% of engineering faculty are women and the percentage of leadership roles held by women is an average of 9%.^[33] The University of Toronto has the highest female faculty rate in Canada at 17% and École Polytechnique de Montréal, University of British Columbia, and Dalhousie University all have a female faculty rate of 13%.^[33]

In 2011, the INWES Education and Research Institute (ERI) held a national workshop, Canadian Committee of Women in Engineering (CCWE+20), to determine ways of increasing the number of women in the engineering field in Canada.^[35] CCWE+20 identified a goal of increasing women's interest in engineering by 2.6 percent by 2016 to a total of 25 percent through more incentives such as through collaboration and special projects.^[35] The workshop identifies early education as one of the main barriers in addition to other factors, such as: "the popular culture of their generation, the guidance they receive on course selection in high school and the extent to which their parents, teachers, and counselors recognize engineering as an appropriate and legitimate career choice for women."^[35] The workshop report compares enrollment, teaching, and professional statistics from the goals identified in 1997 compared to the actual data from 2009, outlining areas of improvement (see table, right).