Gender stereotypes about intellectual ability emerge early and influence children’s interests

By Lin Bian, Sarah-Jane Leslie, Andrei Cimpian. Science, 2017

1,037 citations recorded by the source corpus.

Emergent attitudes toward brilliance The distribution of women and men across academic disciplines seems to be affected by perceptions of intellectual brilliance. Bian et al. studied young children to assess when those differential perceptions emerge. At age 5, children seemed not to differentiate between boys and girls in expectations of “really, really smart”—childhood's version of adult brilliance. But by age 6, girls were prepared to lump more boys into the “really, really smart” category and to steer themselves away from games intended for the “really, really smart.” Science, this issue p. 389 By age 6, girls become less likely to associate brilliance with their own gender and tend to avoid intellectually challenging activities. Common stereotypes associate high-level intellectual ability (brilliance, genius, etc.) with men more than women. These stereotypes discourage women’s pursuit of many prestigious careers; that is, women are underrepresented in fields whose members cherish brilliance (such as physics and philosophy). Here we show that these stereotypes are endorsed by, and influence the interests of, children as young as 6. Specifically, 6-year-old girls are less likely than boys to believe that members of their gender are “really, really smart.” Also at age 6, girls begin to avoid activities said to be for children who are “really, really smart.” These findings suggest that gendered notions of brilliance are acquired early and have an immediate effect on children’s interests.

Subfields: Experimental and Cognitive Psychology, Social Psychology

View Paper: https://www.semanticscholar.org/paper/3c292f5527d147ee5825cc2d4dc745a7745d3033

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Citations in the corpus

Adults and children implicitly associate brilliance with men more than women (2020, background): “Consistent with this evidence, other studies have found a genderbrilliance stereotype favoring men when assessing participants' explicit judgments of unfamiliar women and men (Bian et al., 2017; Bian, Leslie, & Cimpian, 2018; see also Raty & Snellman, 1997; Rivera & Tilcsik, 2019).”
Scaling Down Inequality: Rating Scales, Gender Bias, and the Architecture of Evaluation (2019, background): “As noted earlier, prior research has documented common stereotypes that link brilliant, extraordinary performance with men more than women (Bian et al. 2017), a general finding that is borne out in research on faculty evaluations, especially in male-dominated fields (e.”
Segregation, Stereotypes, and STEM (2018, background): “One recent study found that, by age six, girls are less likely than boys to believe that members of their gender are “really, really smart,” and that they begin to avoid activities believed to be for children who are “really, really smart” (Bian et al. 2017).”
The gender gap in science: How long until women are equally represented? (2018, background): “We suggest that efforts to recruit and retain women in STEMM must be wide-ranging and could include dispelling the common but poorly evidenced belief that there are innate gender differences in STEMM aptitude [27,28]; reforming academic publishing and peer review [21]; ensuring women have equal acce”
“I’m Not a Science Nerd!” (2018, background): “The genius stereotype may affect women more than men because brilliance is often stereotyped as a masculine trait (Bian et al., 2017; Leslie et al., 2015), and the nerd stereotype might affect women more because many societies place high value on women having a romantic partner, being sociable, and…”
Messages about brilliance undermine women's interest in educational and professional opportunities (2018, neutral): “…model predicts that messages that link success in a eld tofi brilliance will undermine women's interest in that eld, in part becausefi of the cultural association between brilliance and men (e.g., Bian et al., 2017; Kirkcaldy et al., 2007).”
Men, women and STEM: Why the differences and what should be done? (2020, background): “Certainly, several studies suggest that people see extreme brilliance as a male trait more than a female one (Bian et al., 2017, 2018).”
Gender Stereotypes Influence Children’s STEM Motivation (2021, background): “Across ages and cultures, success in STEM fields and natural brilliance are typically seen as more for boys than girls (Bian et al., 2017; Cvencek, Kapur, & Meltzoff, 2015).”
Gender bias and stereotypes in Large Language Models (2023, background): “The effects of stereotyping have been shown to affect children at very young ages, influencing how they perceive their own abilities, and leading to differences in chosen hobbies, interests, and eventually also academic paths and occupations [11, 55, 63, 67, 82].”
The Ugly Truth About Ourselves and Our Robot Creations: The Problem of Bias and Social Inequity (2017, background): “For example, Bian et al. (2017) claim that girls even as young as six may fall prey to the stereotype that they are not as intelligent as boys their own age.”