Historical comparison of gender inequality in scientific careers across countries and disciplines (1907.04103v1)

Abstract: There is extensive, yet fragmented, evidence of gender differences in academia suggesting that women are under-represented in most scientific disciplines, publish fewer articles throughout a career, and their work acquires fewer citations. Here, we offer a comprehensive picture of longitudinal gender discrepancies in performance through a bibliometric analysis of academic careers by reconstructing the complete publication history of over 1.5 million gender-identified authors whose publishing career ended between 1955 and 2010, covering 83 countries and 13 disciplines. We find that, paradoxically, the increase of participation of women in science over the past 60 years was accompanied by an increase of gender differences in both productivity and impact. Most surprisingly though, we uncover two gender invariants, finding that men and women publish at a comparable annual rate and have equivalent career-wise impact for the same size body of work. Finally, we demonstrate that differences in dropout rates and career length explain a large portion of the reported career-wise differences in productivity and impact. This comprehensive picture of gender inequality in academia can help rephrase the conversation around the sustainability of women's careers in academia, with important consequences for institutions and policy makers.

Gender Inequality in Scientific Careers: A Historical Bibliometric Analysis

The paper "Historical comparison of gender inequality in scientific careers across countries and disciplines" offers a comprehensive bibliometric analysis of longitudinal gender differences in scientific careers. It reconstructs the publication history of over 1.5 million gender-identified authors between 1955 and 2010, spanning 83 countries and 13 disciplines. The aim is to provide a robust understanding of gender disparities in academia concerning productivity, impact, and career length.

Key Findings

1. Increased Participation, Persistent Disparities: Over the past 60 years, the participation of women in science has increased, but this has been accompanied by widening gender gaps in both productivity and impact. By 2005, women consisted of 35% of all active authors, a rise from 12% in 1955.
2. Productivity Gaps: On average, male scientists publish 13.2 papers over their careers, whereas females publish 9.6, creating a 27% gender gap in productivity. The disparity is pronounced among highly productive authors, suggesting systemic barriers preventing women from achieving similar productivity levels.
3. Impact Gaps: Similarly, male scientists receive 30% more citations than their female counterparts, highlighting a gap in recognition and scholarly impact. This persists regardless of discipline or geographical region.
4. Consistent Annual Productivity: Notably, the paper identifies that male and female authors publish at a comparable annual rate—1.32 vs. 1.33 papers per year—indicating that the productivity gap is not due to differences in yearly output.
5. Career Length and Dropout Rates: The productivity gap is primarily attributed to differences in career length and dropout rates. Men have longer publishing careers (11.0 years vs. 9.3 years for women), with females facing a 19.5% higher dropout rate each year.

Implications

The authors argue the substantial gender gaps in academia are not merely the result of differences in annual productivity but are strongly tied to shorter career lengths for women. Addressing these gaps requires policy changes that focus not only on supporting junior female scientists but also on fostering sustainable academic careers for women throughout their professional lives.

Methodology and Robustness

The analysis integrates data from the Web of Science, Microsoft Academic Graph, and DBLP, ensuring that findings are not artifacts of a particular dataset. Gender assignment was conducted using a robust name-based method, and the research was replicated across different datasets to mitigate disambiguation errors, increasing the reliability of conclusions.

Conclusions and Future Directions

The paper's revelations prompt a reconsideration of how gender inequality in academia is addressed. Instead of only nurturing young female scientists, the focus should be on retaining women throughout their careers. This shift is crucial for promoting gender equality at senior academic levels, where role models are sparse for future generations.

Stemming the gender inequality in STEM disciplines necessitates a strategic approach involving institutional policy changes. By addressing systemic barriers, academia can work towards a diverse and inclusive workforce, leveraging the identified productivity invariants as a baseline for future interventions. This research provides a foundational understanding necessary for informed decision-making and further studies aimed at closing the gender gap in scientific fields.