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QuickCheck: Do Men Have an Advantage in Learning Mathematics?
The Star ^ | Tuesday, 26 Sep 2023 | Jaayne Jeevita

Posted on 09/26/2023 1:56:41 PM PDT by nickcarraway

IT has been claimed for a long time that boys are inherently better at mathematics than girls, and this has led to intense debate on the issue.

According to gender stereotypes in mathematics, girls are less confident in their arithmetic skills and experience greater anxiety and this eventually lowers their test scores.

However, it is important to rely on scientific evidence and extensive research to determine whether this stereotype has any basis in reality.

Is it true that men have an advantage in learning mathematics?

Experts and research have found that there are only slight differences in the maths performance of boys and girls; these differences depend on several factors, including a pupil’s age and maths proficiency and the type of maths they are attempting.

A meta-analysis on gender differences in mathematics performance showed that males have an advantage when the mathematical concepts require more reasoning and are more spatial in nature.

This is in the context of solving problems in geometry and calculus, typically taught in the higher secondary-school grades.

It also found that females have an advantage in early primary-school years when mathematics consists of computational knowledge and speed.

Research also shows that at times, there were no differences and in some cases, an advantage for girls to do more basic numerical skills and math problems that have a set procedure for solving them.

Age and the type of math might have an impact on research findings simultaneously. For instance, two recent studies on the gender differences in children’s earliest numerical abilities found no gender differences in infants and children’s basic maths skills.

Findings also suggest that girls and boys learned math at similar rates, and boys did not have a higher aptitude for learning math or for processing numbers compared to their female counterparts.

No one is better in anything unless one has the desire to learn it and it is not gender that determines our interests but our habits that dictate what we are good at.

SOURCES

https://www.researchgate.net/publication/359013929_Understanding_the_Symbolic_Effects_of_Gender_Representation_A_Multi-Source_Study_in_Education

https://www.researchgate.net/publication/47642285_New_Trends_in_Gender_and_Mathematics_Performance_A_Meta-Analysis

https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/07370000903221809

https://www.nature.com/articles/s41539-018-0028-7

https://srcd.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/abs/10.1111/cdev.13044


TOPICS: Computers/Internet; Education
KEYWORDS:
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1 posted on 09/26/2023 1:56:41 PM PDT by nickcarraway
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To: nickcarraway

not me, my worst subject.


2 posted on 09/26/2023 1:59:55 PM PDT by BigFreakinToad (Remember the Biden Kitchen Fire of 2004)
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To: nickcarraway

Crock of gynofeminist crap.


3 posted on 09/26/2023 2:00:08 PM PDT by Secret Agent Man (Gone Galt; not averse to Going Bronson.)
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To: nickcarraway
Whether it's nature or nurture (including which things the kids are interested in learning) or a little of both, I can tell you from my family that yes, men seem to pick up on math a lot better than women. I've seen a few outliers in the software development field, both in my career and back when I was getting a computer science degree. But they were outliers. Nor do I remember one teenage girl when I was a teenage boy interested in any of the conversations us hobby programmers had -- including some of us who ourselves joined the hobby by hearing others talk about coding.

For whatever reason few people in general dig it and way way fewer of them women.

4 posted on 09/26/2023 2:01:04 PM PDT by Tell It Right (1st Thessalonians 5:21 -- Put everything to the test, hold fast to that which is true.)
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To: nickcarraway

5 posted on 09/26/2023 2:05:01 PM PDT by BenLurkin (The above is not a statement of fact. It is either opinion, or satire, or both.)
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To: nickcarraway

I recall very few females in my ordinary differential equations class.

Several years ago I found my text book in an attic box, literally and figuratively it was all Greek to me now.


6 posted on 09/26/2023 2:05:52 PM PDT by where's_the_Outrage? (Drain the Swamp. Build the Wall.)
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I dare the author to perform the same analysis along the politically perilous racial lines.


7 posted on 09/26/2023 2:08:12 PM PDT by Gene Eric (Don't be a statist!)
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To: nickcarraway
One of the cited studies:
Symbolic effects of bureaucratic representation assume that outcomes for citizen–clients change in response to the mere presence of bureaucrats with similar backgrounds. The social–psychological mechanisms in clients that may explain these changes are barely examined, though. Based on multi-source data on male and female high school students in the Netherlands, this study empirically tests a theoretical model that links student–teacher gender congruence to students’ performance in math and Dutch language through the mediating role of students’ gender-stereotypical beliefs and self-perceived abilities. The empirical analyses do not support the hypotheses. For student performance in math, no effects were found, while for Dutch language, a negative gender-representation effect was found for male students. In all, the results point at divergent relations between gender congruence, self-perceived abilities and performance for male and female students across subjects. The null results in this study suggest that symbolic effects of gender representation may be affected by national context and socio-economic status which should be considered as new frontiers for future research on representative bureaucracy.

If that doesn't convince you...

8 posted on 09/26/2023 2:09:59 PM PDT by heartwood (Someone has to play devil's advocate.)
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To: nickcarraway

Unlike the obvious and undeniable physical differences between men and women, these types of differences are most likely purely societal based.

Most colleges have a nearly 2 to 1 girl to guy ratio now, and things like this gender math gap are dramatically changing.


9 posted on 09/26/2023 2:10:44 PM PDT by TexasFreeper2009
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To: nickcarraway

Unearned math privilege ping.


10 posted on 09/26/2023 2:11:04 PM PDT by Jonty30 (If liberals were truth tellers, they'd call themselves literals. )
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To: nickcarraway

Math was Not a favorite of mine I hated school just because it.

What didn’t help was when the schools went to that New Math crap. So I was confused even more and it seemed to me that No two Teachers were using the same instruction playbook.


11 posted on 09/26/2023 2:13:46 PM PDT by puppypusher (The world is going to the dogs.)
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To: nickcarraway

First... Define a man.

Academia these days can’t even tackle that one.


12 posted on 09/26/2023 2:13:52 PM PDT by Bullish (...And just like that, I was dropped from the ping-list)
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To: nickcarraway
The previous 100 years of testing data on the subject has consistently shown that the population of males has more extreme tails on grafts. The upper and lower 10% are dominated by males (the more extreme top and bottom, the more male it becomes). Of course these articles aren't complaining that women are under-represented in the bottom.
13 posted on 09/26/2023 2:15:11 PM PDT by Varda
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To: nickcarraway
Because they can count to 11 on two hands?

-PJ

14 posted on 09/26/2023 2:15:34 PM PDT by Political Junkie Too ( * LAAP = Left-wing Activist Agitprop Press (formerly known as the MSM))
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To: TexasFreeper2009
Women compete separately from men even in something as cerebral as chess.

I think it has been pretty well established that there are clear differences between men and women when it comes to translating spatial/visual information. That’s why men are generally superior drivers and navigators (for example).

15 posted on 09/26/2023 2:16:25 PM PDT by Alberta's Child (If something in government doesn’t make sense, you can be sure it makes dollars.)
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To: nickcarraway

I believe that men and women are wired differently in their brains, and that each sex has an advantage over the other in various areas.

But that doesn’t mean they cannot be normalized or overcome, but I believe males and females process various things differently at a fundamental level.

Sometimes to advantage for each.

Sometimes to disadvantage to each.

But in most cases, disparities can be compensated for by hard work, desire, and interest.

Also, it is interesting to note IQ distribution across the curve for men and women. I have heard that men can disproportionally inhabit the highest IQ sectors of the curve, but...can also be found disproportionally at the lower IQ sectors of the curve.

Women tend to aggregate a little closer to the mean than men do.

At least, this is what I have gathered from various sources, and my experiences in life somewhat support these views.


16 posted on 09/26/2023 2:16:26 PM PDT by rlmorel ("If you think tough men are dangerous, just wait until you see what weak men are capable of." JBP)
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To: TexasFreeper2009

“these types of differences are most likely purely societal based”

No, they’re not. You don’t get a different distribution curve on IQ tests based on societal differences, and we see that when we compare men and women. Women tend to be grouped more in the center, while men have more outliers at both ends of the curve. Those outliers on the upper end are the ones who can learn higher level math. So there are still very few men who can do it, but that’s still many times more than the number of women who can do it.

“Most colleges have a nearly 2 to 1 girl to guy ratio now...”

Not in STEM departments.


17 posted on 09/26/2023 2:21:14 PM PDT by Boogieman
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To: Varda
Yes...I didn't see your post, but this is what the body of information I have seen indicates.

LOL, of course, any man who has watched the "Jackass" movies knows full well that what is seen there is not out of the realm of possibility for nearly any young guy...but it is not the ONLY reason that men generally die younger...

(The last one is my favorite)

18 posted on 09/26/2023 2:21:54 PM PDT by rlmorel ("If you think tough men are dangerous, just wait until you see what weak men are capable of." JBP)
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To: nickcarraway

Somebody has to say it. Men are better at math than women.

I still can’t figure out how long it takes the hawk to catch the pigeon and I’d like to waterboard the guy who put that question on the test. 😏


19 posted on 09/26/2023 2:22:57 PM PDT by Georgia Girl 2 (The only purpose of a pistol is to fight your way back to the rifle you should never have dropped)
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To: nickcarraway

“A meta-analysis on gender differences in mathematics performance showed that males have an advantage when the mathematical concepts require more reasoning and are more spatial in nature.”

Three things.

First, I believe the above is true.

Second, boys have a larger standard deviation on most traits. That means that more of the boys will be vastly overrepresented at the extreme levels, both better and worse.

Three, more girls in college earning degrees does not mean they are going to surpass boys in mathematics.

As always anything in the msm focus on spinning equivalency.


20 posted on 09/26/2023 2:24:18 PM PDT by alternatives?
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