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[Atomic Playboy]

Title of the thread should be "Why are men shitty at reading?"

Yeah, the difference between girls and boys on math look to be generally within the margin of error and girls are ahead in some locations... but the boys are worse at reading across the board by enormous margins. Get it together boys!

This does help explain some of the texts my nephew sends me.

 

[Musician]

Lots of research is being done on cognitive differences in men and women. Right now I'd say the jury is still out.

I wouldn't be surprised if it turned out to be nature AND nurture, just like with almost anything that's being studied that deals with social or psychological subjects.

 

[Hari Seldon]

It is a cultural thing because there were plenty of Asian females in pure math at my university.

 

[Pau]

As a woman who wants to study math, constantly hearing this is pretty disheartening. And one of the things that kept me from even considering the field in the first place.

Each class I go in wondering if it's going to be the one that finally proves I'm not suited for the subject. And if I get anything less than a perfect score, I feel like I have no right to claim I'm good at it or even have the right to continue studying it.

 

[Oemenia]

Iran and China have far more females in STEM subjects than Sweden which has some of the lowest.

Does that means the patriarchy is at fault in Sweden?

 

[Tesseract]

isn't there a study where girls cry for help whereas boys help themselves before crying for help

i forget the name of the technique new teachers are deploying to counterbalance this, it's vip-vopping or something

 

[Toxi]

Because were made with two variables instead of one.

Okay I laughed.

 

[sirap]

Check your privilege OP.

 

[adamsapple]

Because they're too busy playing video games

 

[Haly]

As a woman who wants to study math, constantly hearing this is pretty disheartening. And one of the things that kept me from even considering the field in the first place.

Each class I go in wondering if it's going to be the one that finally proves I'm not suited for the subject. And if I get anything less than a perfect score, I feel like I have no right to claim I'm good at it or even have the right to continue studying it.

This is part of it I think. The pressure around the stereotype can be offputting in and of itself, which may skew numbers.

That this idea doesn't really exist in East Asian countries and both genders are held to (obscene) standards of academic performance indicates culture plays a huge factor.

 

[Bodacious]

Math is logical.

Spoiler

I'm kidding. Don't shoot.

zing.

 

[Musician]

Check your privilege OP.

The privilege of having a slight statistical edge at math?

 

[Sub_Level]

Thousands of years of dick measuring.

 

[Soriku]

I don't like math, does that make me a woman?

Thousands of years of dick measuring.

I would like you to use this formula to calculate the size of my dick. You have 10 minutes. Begin.

 

[daviyoung]

Need to be able to keep track of our wives

 

[Kinyou]

The comic is about anecdotal incidents, the stuff posted in the OP is from a study

 

[Zornack]

This is part of it I think. The pressure around the stereotype can be offputting in and of itself, which may skew numbers.

That this idea doesn't really exist in East Asian countries and both genders are held to (obscene) standards of academic performance indicates culture plays a huge factor.

But the gap in math scores is present in those countries as well.

 

[True Savior]

Probably partially due to gender roles, they have a big influence over people.

A lot of girls probably grow up being told they should prioritize things other than education.

Because of the power of socially enforced gender roles.

Also, because periods make it difficult to solve anything beyond the simplest quadratic equations.

I think there shouldn't be any logical reason for this, so im willing to guess it's a cultural thing in which girls at a young age have been discouraged from engaging math for several generations.

Gender roles. Girls are told they are bad at math from the beginning.

In WWII, women were very important as "computers", women are also very much a part of physics and chemistry.

The real question is, why Korea and Japan seem to ace everything?

Oh Finland too.

Basically cultural/gender roles context. But how does that have such a focus on logical problem solving ? Are women just abandoning math-learning for the sake of it ? They are better at most things in school. They are much more focused. They study more. But then it changes on...math. I think its a justification more than natural 30 years ago. In todays age the trends should have started to change and the discrepancy should be much lower , especially knowing women tend to be better than men at school.

When I was younger, I was told that females were usually smarter in math. I believed it because when I was taking the advanced math courses, the majority of the class were girls.

Your life is a lie.

Title of the thread should be "Why are men shitty at reading?"

No , because Math is the exception .

 

[A Fish Aficionado]

At least no one is bringing up deeply flawed fMRI studies or evo psych.

 

[SomedayTheFire]

I don't like math, does that make me a woman?



I would like you to use this formula to calculate the size of my dick. You have 10 minutes. Begin.

Impossible to read on DarkGAF. Women obviously use LightGAF, thus they're better at reading.

 

[Icefire1424]

I'm surprised no one has pointed out that this argument is the plot to an episode of the Simpsons. I'm almost certain the line OP used was actually quoted in the episode, actually.

 

[Haly]

But the gap in math scores is present in those countries as well.

Ah, I stand corrected then.

My brain shut off when I saw the headers were using Papyrus.

 

[BowieZ]

Go Finland, Japan and Korea!

 

[More Fun To Compute]

Maths was always my best subject because I'm bad at rote memorisation and unlike most other subjects maths actually makes sense.

 

[sirap]

As a woman who wants to study math, constantly hearing this is pretty disheartening. And one of the things that kept me from even considering the field in the first place.

Each class I go in wondering if it's going to be the one that finally proves I'm not suited for the subject. And if I get anything less than a perfect score, I feel like I have no right to claim I'm good at it or even have the right to continue studying it.

I say just go in with a 'fuck it' attitude and forge your own way. Try not to let others dictate what you can or can't do. As a male (and first time author), plenty of women laughed and tried to discourage me from getting into romance. They told me I wasn't fit for it, and that I lacked the sensitivity needed to write the nuances of the genre.

One year later and I'm making hundreds of thousands in royalties, and I've had two books hit the NY Bestseller list. I'm glad I didn't listen to them.

 

[Oemenia]

Impossible to read on DarkGAF. Women obviously use LightGAF, thus they're better at reading.

GAF defaults to light, I'm starting to see a pattern emerging.

 

[True Savior]

Each class I go in wondering if it's going to be the one that finally proves I'm not suited for the subject. And if I get anything less than a perfect score, I feel like I have no right to claim I'm good at it or even have the right to continue studying it.

Why do you feel that ( the necessity to prove) ? Have you ever went through something that lead to it ? Or is just the abundance of men in those "environments" ?

As an Engineer working in a University this is a reality I'm in contact daily and its pretty disheartening.

 

[NH Apache]

Because were made with two variables instead of one.

Ok, this is good.


In the US it is even for math and girls are above boys in science and reading. However, IIRC, the US is behind other major countries for the level of math dealt with.

 

[Kieli]

Really? Last I heard, girls were doing better than boys on average in Math & Science. It's just there were less girls who did really well or really bad compared to boys.

 

[Kinokou]

When women are exposed to scientific theories that attribute women’s underachievement in math to genetic causes, women perform less well than they do when they are presented with scientific theories that attribute underperformance to experiential causes.
http://www.cirtl.net/node/5447

I was looking for something more recent, but I can't seem to find it at all. Anyway, from what I remember from the one I couldn't find it doesn't even have to be scientific, just telling women and girls that they are bad at math will cause them to perform worse.

And while looking for this I also found:

In Study 2, participants (n = 184) completed a math test and estimated the percent they had solved. They also reported their interest in pursuing math courses and careers. Again, men overestimated their performance more than women. This greater overestimation of performance in men accounted for their greater intent to pursue math fields compared to women. The findings suggest that gender gaps in STEM fields are not necessarily the result of women underestimating their abilities, but rather may be due to men overestimating their abilities.
http://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s11199-015-0486-9

 

[UnemployedVillain]

Maybe I'm misreading those charts but math and science look virtually equal for both genders. Reading seems to be the one subject to really have any significant difference and wonder about

 

[NH Apache]

Some info that the report states - these are 15 year olds, not adults as title implies.

And this is really interesting from the PDF:

 

[JeTmAn81]

I don't think women are worse at math. Math requires rigorous study of a lot of details and any lower test scores are probably due to a lack of emphasis on the subject.

 

[True Savior]

Maybe I'm misreading those charts but math and science look virtually equal for both genders. Reading seems to be the one subject to really have any significant difference and wonder about

They dont. There is a significant difference in the mean scores (even if its less accentuated than reading). And the most important thing , a trend. Which doesn't exist in Science.

And this is really interesting from the PDF:

There is a natural correlation. The thing is are the results the origin of that predisposition of is the predisposition that generates the results ?

 

[Brakke]

Gaf explain me. No better place on the web than Gaf to explain me women behavior.

shoulda been first post >.<

 

[Alx]

As a woman who wants to study math, constantly hearing this is pretty disheartening. And one of the things that kept me from even considering the field in the first place.

Each class I go in wondering if it's going to be the one that finally proves I'm not suited for the subject. And if I get anything less than a perfect score, I feel like I have no right to claim I'm good at it or even have the right to continue studying it.

Don't let statistics get in the way of your decisions, it's not about whether women are generally good at math, but whether YOU are.
I have studied maths to an advanced level, it's true that there were fewer women for whatever reason, but they were as good as anybody else in the class.

 

[Rayis]

I'm admittedly terrible at math, I acknowledge that I could perhaps be good at it if I were to study it in my own terms but the way it was taught at school wasn't helpful at all for me.

 

[Pau]

I say just go in with a 'fuck it' attitude and forge your own way. Try not to let others dictate what you can or can't do. As a male (and first time author), plenty of women laughed and tried to discourage me from getting into romance. They told me I wasn't fit for it, and that I lacked the sensitivity needed to write the nuances of the genre.

One year later and I'm making hundreds of thousands in royalties, and I've had two books hit the NY Bestseller list. I'm glad I didn't listen to them.

Congrats! That sounds awesome! You'd think a whole history of literature would be enough to show that men can write such things.

And a lot of it was stuff I heard when I was younger but I've mostly gotten past it.

Why do you feel that ( the necessity to prove) ? Have you ever went through something that lead to it ? Or is just the abundance of men in those "environments" ?

As an Engineer working in a University this is a reality I'm in contact daily and its pretty disheartening.

It tended to be small things that added up over time.

Through out highschool our teachers would bring up statistics like this all the time, and they would try to push me to study more traditional feminine topics (like English). Only once did a teacher ever look at my math grades and exams scores and go: "Hey, you should consider doing this at a higher level." Otherwise if I expressed interest, I was told that math was really hard or asked how I could possibly be interested.

I was the top performaner in math for my year (although I tended to take classes with older students) but if any guy managed to get near my score he was a natural genius, while I just must have worked very hard. The same guys would constantly tell me that they were "naturally" better and when, as I previously mentioned, teachers would cite these kind of statistics, they felt vindicated and in discussions would say I was just an anomaly or that I compensated by studying more, as girls do. And the few times I slipped (like coming in second instead of first) it was: "Well, you know guys are better anyways..."

Fun times, highschool. I don't hear it at the university level except for like one or two questionable rants by teachers. And our math/stat department has a good ratio of female students.

 

[Askherserenity]

Girls are really told that they're bad at math since they're young? Never heard of this till now.

 

[dreams]

Uh, seems to me the OP should be more focused on how terrible men are at reading, apparently.

 

[Angry Grimace]

I don't think saying "gender roles" is a meaningful response in and of itself without something else to explain why because the concept that "women aren't told to be good at academics" doesn't seem to follow given women achieve better grades on average and graduate in the top 10% of their classes on average. In fact, girls are over-represented in high level AP math courses vs. boys.

We would need a much bigger breakdown of the data (that probably doesn't exist because these tests rarely look at much more than stuff that can filled into bubbles, and don't include socio-economic backgrounds, etc.) to actually determine a meaningful answer. Just saying "gender roles" is a politically correct explanation, but I think trying to posit that without having a more concrete explanation harms that argument more than it helps because when someone tries to dig deeper, the actual answer is just speculation.

 

[appaws]

Because were made with two variables instead of one.

Hilarious

 

[NoblesseOblige]

Everybody sucks at math and needs to get better. It's sad I can't ask for a third a pound of sliced ham at the deli without getting a confused look followed by half a pound being handed to me.

 

[True Savior]

I was the top performaner in math for my year (although I tended to take classes with older students) but if any guy managed to get near my score he was a natural genius, while I just must have worked very hard. The same guys would constantly tell me that they were "naturally" better and when, as I previously mentioned, teachers would cite these kind of statistics, they felt vindicated and in discussions would say I was just an anomaly or that I compensated by studying more, as girls do. And the few times I slipped (like coming in second instead of first) it was: "Well, you know guys are better anyways..."

Fun times, highschool. I don't hear it at the university level except for like one or two questionable rants by teachers. And our math/stat department has a good ratio of female students.

That sounds insane. They would bring statistics about the gender gap in school performance ?

Congrats on not hearing them though Cause if there's on thing i know my field needs , is more women.

We would need a much bigger breakdown of the data (that probably doesn't exist because these tests rarely look at much more than stuff that can filled into bubbles, and don't include socio-economic backgrounds, etc.) to actually determine a meaningful answer. Just saying "gender roles" is a politically correct explanation, but I think trying to posit that without having a more concrete explanation harms that argument more than it helps because when someone tries to dig deeper, the actual answer is just speculation.

There is a LOT of data though

http://www.oecd.org/pisa/keyfindings/pisa-2012-results.htm

You have 7 volumes just to go through it eheh. They correlate a lot of indicators and breakdown loads of data.

 

[PumpkinSpice]

The real question is, why Korea and Japan seem to ace everything?

Oh Finland too.

I don't know about Finland, but in this case at least in Korea and Japan a lot of kids are made to study like non-stop. Tests are treated as the most important thing ever, and lots of kids have a ton of pressure to do very, very well. It's not really a great way to raise kids (not much of a childhood) but it sure does help these kind of scores.

 

[-Plasma Reus-]

You'd almost think it was because society tends to push one gender in one direction and the other in another one.

 

[Mentat]

As a man who's always wanted to be a good reader this is pretty disheartening. Maybe if society stopped telling me reading isn't manly I wouldn't be forced to give up my dream.

 

[atr0cious]

Because were made with two variables instead of one.

Thanks, already stole this joke.

 

[JRT]

You will find men are better at most things

 

[Alcoremortis]

For me, in elementary school and high school, a lot of the teachers just made math so boring that if I hadn't been totally obsessed about getting perfect scores, I probably would have also done poorly. It wasn't until calculus that I actually started appreciating and enjoying the subject because it finally started having real world applications and was easier to visualize what was going on. But it was a long slog to get there and most people won't stick with it that long.

I think that women tend to want to relate to a subject more in order to understand it. A lot of women, therefore, wouldn't have trouble relating to science, because it's based in physical observations, but math, which is entirely abstract, is harder to relate to and therefore harder to care about. I think that if math were taught in a way more based in concrete problem-solving (such as starting out with a logic puzzle and then learning how to mathematically model the solution so it can apply to similar puzzles) then it would become a more attractive subject to women because they'd be able to directly see the applications. It would also probably reduce the "boring" stigma, too. It would probably also help if there were a greater focus on *how* math was developed, to make the process of inventing new math more human and accessible.