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Where Did All The Great Women Go!

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Where Did All
The Great Women Go?

The Matilda Effect and The Repercussions of Lost Women in History

By Isabel Stoddart

The Matilda Effect is a bias against acknowledging the achievements of those women scientists whose work is attributed to their male colleagues.

Margaret W. Rossiter coined the term in 1993, in her article “The MathewMatilda Effect in Science”. Rossiter named the term after Matilda J. Gage, who was a women’s suffragist and abolitionist in the 19th century. Gage criticized men’s tendency to rob women of their scientific and technological inventions and advancements in her 1870 essay “Woman as Inventor”.

Click on a woman to discover her story

Countless women have been victims of The Matilda Effect and there are certainly many women who haven’t been discovered yet.

Rosalind Franklin was an important contributor to the discovery of the double helix structure of DNA in 1953 but did not receive the Nobel Prize for her work, while her male colleagues did.

Lisa Meitner’s work in nuclear physics laid the groundwork for the atomic bomb when she discovered that nuclear fission could create large amounts of energy. Her work was not recognized, and her male colleague won the Nobel Peace Prize while she did not.

Emilie du Châtelet made important contributions to Isaac Newton’s Principia where she added a 180-page commentary of Newton’s work in the language of calculus helping to articulate and popularize his theories. Newton is taught in every classroom, while Emilie is not.

Although the stealing of women’s scientific achievements is not particularly prevalent today, the consequences of these women’s achievements going widely unnoticed is.

Because of these women's contributions to science going unnoticed and credited to men, when it comes to teaching students about pioneers in the science world, female scientists aren't taught about nearly as much as male scientists.

Looking at 5 children's education websites, male scientists are included on lists of scientists to teach students about at a disproportionately larger level than women.

Women only account for about 20% of the scientists deemed to be worthy of teaching about in the classroom.

When girls grow up mostly learning about male scientists is it possible for them to envision becoming scientists themselves?

A 2020 study conducted at Universidad CEU San Pablo in Spain asked the question of whether having female role-models in STEM makes girls want to go into STEM themselves. STEM standing for Science, Technology, Engineering, and Math. This study showed that a top way to encourage girls to pursue science and technology studies is to expose them to actual successful female role models.

The study found that girls enjoyment in math, perceived importance of math, expectations of success in math, and choice of going into STEM fields increased significantly after being introduced to female role models. Stereotypes around females in STEM were also shown to decrease when girls were introduced to female role models.

The 304 girls from 12-16 years of age were given a survey to rate these variables on a scale of 1 to 7 before and after the role model sessions. The mean rating of enjoyment in STEM (specifically Math) went up by 0.77.

This difference in means has a t statistic of 6.34 and a p value less than 0.05, showing a significant difference.

The mean rating of importance attached to STEM (specifically Math) went up by 0.77.

The difference in means has a t statistic of 6.94 and a p value less than 0.05, showing a significant difference.

The mean rating of gender stereotypes around the higher math abilities and motivation of boys compared to girls went down by -0.42.

The difference in means has a t statistic of -5.59 and a p value less than 0.05, showing a significant difference.

The mean rating of expectations of math success went up by 0.5.

The difference in means has a t statistic of 3.77 and a p value less than 0.05, showing a significant difference.

The mean rating of likelihood of choosing a university degree across the following four STEM disciplines: math, physical science, computer science, and engineering went up by 0.79.

The difference in means has a t statistic of 7.69 and a p value less than 0.05, showing a significant difference.

The journey to increasing females in STEM bachelor programs, females in the workforce, and females receiving high STEM prizes starts at a young age. Girls can’t go into STEM programs and propel their careers if they don’t learn about STEM and the potential life they can have working in it.

Let's take a look at what women in STEM currently looks like.

Low percentages of women receive bachelors degrees in STEM fields.

The percentages of women receiving STEM degrees has increased steadily over the years in all fields except for Computer Science that peaked in the 80s and has been decreasing ever since.

Despite the steady increase of women receiving STEM degrees, women still only account for 36% of degrees earned in STEM fields overall.

Men also exceed women in employment in STEM fields.

As of 2019, men exceeded women in employment in all STEM fields except for social scientists.

The biggest gaps exist in computer and engineering occupations with men exceeding women by more than double in both cases.

For sake of spacing, healthcare occupations was omitted from the graph but males in healthcare professions also exceed women by well over double with 7,805,668 men and only 2,631,691 women.

Women receive high level STEM awards at lower percentages than men.

The Turing Award is an annual prize given for achievements in the computer field.

Only 3 of the 70 Turing Awards given since 1966 were awarded to women.

Frances ("Fran") Elizabeth Allen was awarded The Turing Award in 2006 for her work optimizing compiler techniques that translate code from one language into another which laid the foundation for automatic parallel execution.

Barbara Liskov was awarded The Turing Award in 2008 for her work in programming languages and system design, specifically for her work in data abstraction, fault tolerance, and distributed computing.

Shafi Goldwasser was awarded The Turing Award in 2012 for her work that paved the way for the study of Cryptography.

The Fields Medal is an award for excellence in Mathematics awarded every 4 years.

Only 1 of the 60 Fields Medals given since 1936 were awarded to women.

Maryam Mirzakhani was awarded The Fields Medal in 2014 for her work in the geometry of Riemann surfaces becoming the first woman to ever win a Fields Medal.

The Nobel Prize consists of 5 different prizes that are awarded once a year to those that have benefited mankind in the areas of Physics, Chemistry, Medicine, Literature, and Peace.

23 out of the 622 Nobel Prizes awarded in STEM (Physics, Chemistry, and Medicine) since 1901 have been awarded to women.

The first Nobel Prize awarded to a woman was in 1903 to Marie Curie. Since then 3 other women have won a solo Nobel Prize and 19 have shared the prize with other recipients.

Female Recipients

Marie Curie (1903) - Nobel Prize in Physics

Maria Goeppert Mayer (1963) - Nobel Prize in Physics

Donna Strickland (2018) - Nobel Prize in Physics

Andrea Ghez (2020) - Nobel Prize in Physics

Marie Currie (1911) - Nobel Prize in Chemistry

Irène Joliot-Curie (1935) - Nobel Prize in Chemistry

Dorothy Crowfoot Hodgekin (1964) - Nobel Prize in Chemistry

Ada E. Yonath (2009) - Nobel Prize in Chemistry

Frances H. Arnold (2018) - Nobel Prize in Chemistry

Jennifer A. Doudna (2020) - Nobel Prize in Chemistry

Emmanuelle Charpentier (2020) - Nobel Prize in Chemistry

Gerty Theresa Cori, née Radnitz (1947) - Nobel Prize in Medicine

Rosalyn Yalow (1977) - Nobel Prize in Medicine

Barbara McClintock (1983) - Nobel Prize in Medicine

Rita Levi-Montalcini (1986) - Nobel Prize in Medicine

Gertrude B. Elion (1988) - Nobel Prize in Medicine

Christiane Nüsslein-Volhard (1995) - Nobel Prize in Medicine

Linda B. Buck (2004) - Nobel Prize in Medicine

Françoise Barré-Sinoussi (2008) - Nobel Prize in Medicine

Carol W. Greider (2009) - Nobel Prize in Medicine

Elizabeth H. Blackburn (2009) - Nobel Prize in Medicine

May-Britt Moser (2014) - Nobel Prize in Medicine

Tu Youyou (2015) - Nobel Prize in Medicine

Women are represented in the STEM fields at all levels at a significantly lower rate than men.

As the case study shows, being introduced to females in STEM leads girls to stronger perceptions of it and a better chance of wanting to go into it themselves.

The importance of uncovering the lost women in history lies in more than just bringing their stories to light. Learning about these women’s contributions to STEM and teaching them to girls in grade school can influence girls positively and influence them to go into STEM themselves. Seeing more women in STEM can change the perceptions around it and put the world on a positive trajectory to increasing the amount of women in science, technology, engineering, and math.

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Organizations That are Working Towards Uncovering
Women in History