Girls and science careers: The role of altruistic values and attitudes about scientific tasks

Making STEM “Family Friendly”: The Impact of Perceiving Science Careers as Family-Compatible

“…Interventions that incorporate other communal goals have been successful with adolescent girls and young women (Weisgram and Bigler 2006). Thus, interventions that include portrayals of scientists as multidimensional individuals who are both scientists and parents may increase girls' and women's positive attitudes and break down stereotypes about scientists.…”

“…Especially important is evidence demonstrating that beliefs about communal goal affordances in STEM are malleable. Interventions that frame science careers as affording altruistic and collaborative goals succeeded in increasing positivity toward STEM careers, particularly among young girls and women (Diekman et al 2011;Weisgram and Bigler 2006).…”

“…To assess whether participants perceive science jobs as affording family values, participants answered four items derived from Weisgram and Bigler's Occupational Values Scale (Weisgram and Bigler 2006). Participants were given the prompt of "Being a scientist is a job that .…”

“…This list of 25 scientific tasks was developed by Weisgram and Bigler in consultation with female scientists (Weisgram and Bigler 2006). Participants were asked to indicate how interested they were in performing each task with response options ranging from (1) "Not at all" to (4) "Very Much."…”

Parental Support and Acceptance Determines Women’s Choice of Engineering as a Major

“…The rationale behind these trends by engineering major may be linked to altruistic values. 4 Girls may not perceive certain fields as advancing communal goals such as helping other people, 5 and therefore may not be strongly drawn into certain fields. In recruiting, inspirational messages like "engineering is essential to our health, happiness, and safety," may especially appeal to women.…”