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Perceived Lack of Work/Life Balance: A New Leakage in the Hard STEM Pipeline

Sat, August 16, 4:30 to 5:30pm, TBA

Abstract

Research on the science, technology, engineering and mathematics (STEM) “pipeline” has charted the loss of potential STEM talent throughout students’ secondary and postsecondary trajectories. One source of STEM talent loss that has been commonly suggested throughout the literature is the lack of family-friendly flexibility in STEM careers. This explanation has been offered as a reason why women especially are underrepresented in the STEM fields. We test these hypotheses using original survey data collected from 3,223 college students at each of the 16 North Carolina public universities. Our results indicate that a concern for the flexibility of one’s future career is associated with a decreased likelihood of majoring in the “hard” STEM fields (physical sciences, engineering, and mathematics) and an increased likelihood of leaving a STEM major for a non-STEM one. However, we did not find gender differences in this effect, suggesting that men and women who are concerned with the family flexibility of their future career are equally likely to be deterred from STEM.

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