Becoming an Aerospace Engineer: A Cross‐Gender Comparison

Abstract

We conducted a mail (self-reported) survey of 4300 student members of the American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics(AIAA) during the spring of 1993 as a Phase 3 activity of the NASA/DoD Aerospace Knowledge Diffusion Research Project. The survey was designed to explore students' career goals and aspirations, communications skills training, and their use of information sources, products, and services. We received 1723 completed questionnaires for an adjusted response rate of 42%. In this article, we compare the responses of female and male aerospace engineering students in the context of two general aspects of their educational experience. First, we explore the extent to which women and men differ in regard to factors that lead to the choice to study aerospace engineering, their current level of satisfaction with that choice, and their career-related goals and aspirations. Second, we examine students' responses to questions about communications skills training and the helpfulness of that training, and their use of and the importance to them of selected information sources, products, and services. The cross-gender comparison revealed more similarities than differences. Female students appear to be more satisfied than their male counterparts with the decision to major in aerospace engineering. Both female and male student respondents consider communications skills important for professional success, but females place a higher value than males do on oral communications skills. Women students also place a higher value than men do on the roles of other students and faculty members in satisfying their needs for information.

Student Choice and Persistence in Aerospace Engineering

“…Pieronek and Pieronek posited that are were significant gender differences in reasons to pursue degrees, satisfaction levels throughout undergraduate experience, and postgraduation goals for ASE students [45]. Furthermore, women are more influenced by other people, especially parents, to pursue ASE [45,46]. Gender differences, especially social ones, may also vary by race and/or ethnicity.…”

Women and Men Engineering Students: Anticipation of Family and Work Roles

“…23-25 However, practicing men and women engineers probably hold more similar work attitudes than do student engineers, suggesting that gender attitudes are not the sole explanation for the disparate career development of men and women in engineering. [26][27][28]…”

The Retention of Women in Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics: A Framework for Persistence

“… More similarities in career aspirations are found in STEM (men and women) than the general student population [13], [10].  Attrition rates are larger for women than men [13] and particularly during the second year of college and beyond [7], [14], [15].  Women exhibit lower self-confidence than males even when academic preparation and performance are equal or superior [16].…”

“… Women may need assistance to function in mixed-gender teams, especially when dominated men [10]- [12].  More similarities in career aspirations are found in STEM (men and women) than the general student population [13], [10].  Attrition rates are larger for women than men [13] and particularly during the second year of college and beyond [7], [14], [15].…”

“…While motivation to improve the representation and retention of women is strong, it must be emphasized that many of the underlying discipline-specific causes have not been fully examined such as in physics [19] mathematics [20], and engineering [21]. This is true even when longitudinal studies have provided critical data about some of the problems and issues [15], [13]. Since the retention and graduation rates of women in STEM will vary based on discipline, this becomes a critical component for investigation.…”