Sex Differences and Schooling

• In Event: Gender in the Classroom: Issues and Answers

Abstract

Gender gaps in academic performance have been with us for decades, but are coming under intense scrutiny as the college enrollment of men has steadily fallen relative to women. Whereas males constituted the majority of undergraduates until the late 1970s, their proportion in U.S. colleges has declined to around 43%. This so-called “boy crisis” is counterbalanced by the persistent under-representation of women entering STEM (science, technology, engineering and math) careers and glass ceiling issues in many fields.
This paper will lay out pertinent data on sex differences in academic achievement, cognitive ability, and the non-cognitive skills that impact school performance and career choice. While the average scores of males and females do differ on many such measures, most of these differences fall in the statistically “small” range, meaning that group differences are swamped by the much wider range of skills and achievement within either gender. Research on sex differences also indicates that academic and cognitive gaps (e.g., reading, writing, math and spatial skills) start out small in early childhood and elementary school but grow larger with development and socio-educational experience.
In recent years, sex differences in the brain have been often invoked to explain gender gaps in academic performance, erroneously suggesting that because such differences are “biological” they are necessarily innate or “hardwired.” However, the brain, too, is altered by socio-educational experience and since most data on brain sex differences come from studies of adults, such research cannot inform us about the genesis of sex differences. Other biological research indicates a role for prenatal hormones in shaping non-cognitive gender-typical behaviors, such as physical activity level. Here again, however, the effect size is not large, and most evidence suggests that sex differences are strongly magnified through experience and gender enculturation.
A better understanding of the development and true magnitude of boy-girl differences can help teachers and administrators work towards minimizing them. Just as girls have made tremendous advances in athletic and STEM achievement due to policies that discourage sexism and stereotyping, and encourage practice and self-efficacy, boys stand to benefit from a more optimistic appraisal of their verbal and social-emotional intelligence and greater opportunities to practice reading, writing, self-regulatory and interpersonal skills. Educators should take note of gender differences at the programmatic level, but must retain their gender-blinders when interacting with individual boys and girls. Overall, boys and girls are far more similar than different in academic potential and can benefit a great deal from learning together.

Authors

• Lise Eliot, Rosalind Franklin University

• Janet S. Hyde, University of Wisconsin - Madison