![A recent paper in the peer reviewed journal PLOS ONE, reports that gender bias still occurs within the sciences – even within female-rich disciplines, in […]](/wp-content/uploads/2011/10/News-image-01-620x300.jpg "Gender Bias is still occurring within the sciences – even within female-rich disciplines.")
A recent paper in the peer reviewed journal PLOS ONE, reports that gender bias still occurs within the sciences – even within female-rich disciplines, in particular, primatology.
The discussion of whether women are not recognised enough by their male colleagues or whether they are not assertive enough with their self-promotion is an active debate, with these two factors being difficult to distinguish. However in the situation of symposia where participants can either be invited to give a talk or can apply to present a poster, these factors can be separated.
It seems that women are more likely to choose to give a poster compared to giving a talk which can be linked with under assertiveness whereas men give more talks than posters. However the number of women who participate in primatology symposia is roughly double when organised by women, or women and men (around 60%) together compared with symposia organised by men alone (30%). These results are especially surprising as the discipline of primatology is now a female-dominated discipline.
This study considered the perceived scientific worth of posters and talks at symposia, and the general career level that would be likely to present either so that this information did not bias the findings as well as taking into account the increase of females within this profession. However there still seems to be an amount of gender blindness within primatology which could be due to homophily, which is a preferential interaction with those with similar attitudes or personal characteristics, or simply due to a glass ceiling which is still in place within academia.
