Women, it seems, often get a raw deal in science — so how can discrimination be tackled?

Nature 445, 566 (February 2007)
Recruitment Bias Cut
Women, it seems, often get a raw deal in science — so how can discrimination be tackled?
Lutz Bornmann
(He is a researcher at the Professorship for Social Psychology and Research on Higher Education at the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology, Zurich.)

http://ealerts.nature.com/cgi-bin24/DM/y/ecJA0SpU7m0HjB0BLFD0Eb
When it comes to applying for grants, woman seem to be at a disadvantage — they are potentially less likely to succeed than their male counterparts. So suggests a meta-analysis of 21 studies conducted by my colleagues Rüdiger Mutz and Hans-Dieter Daniel and I (see http://arxiv.org/abs/math.ST/ 0701537). The cause of this discrepancy is unknown. It could be that fewer women principal investigators apply for grants. Gender bias — whether implicit or explicit — could come into play. Or the explanation could be institutional; there are more men than women in high-ranking positions, meaning fewer women have a chance to make decisions.

There has been widespread acknowledgement of how gender affects scientific careers. A comprehensive review of the literature on gender differences in the careers of academic scientists by the US National Science Foundation (NSF), concludes: "Taken as a whole, the body of literature we reviewed provides evidence that women in academic careers are disadvantaged compared with men in similar careers. Women faculty earn less, are promoted less frequently to senior academic ranks, and publish less frequently than their male counterparts."

But the NSF doesn't address peer review as a component of this discrepancy. Conventionally, peer review is regarded as a sure guarantee of good science. It reassures us about the quality of scientific work and that tax-payers' money is well spent. Our meta-analysis suggests that there are robust gender differences in grant peer-review procedures, and our results line up with the NSF's broader conclusion on gender differences in the careers of academic scientists.

Whatever the cause, our paper also reports some ways to rule out gender bias — whether intentional or unintentional. One possible way to avoid bias in the grant peer-review process is to mask applicants' gender. In journal peer review, masking authors' gender has proved to be a satisfactory precaution against bias. But masking is not equally suitable for all types of submission. It is impossible to pass valid judgment on a short-communication manuscript without some personal knowledge of the author.

It is questionable, as well, whether the gender of the applicant in grant peer review should be masked. Apart from assessment of the proposed research, decisions are also based on the applicant's track record. The European Molecular Biology Organization (EMBO) in Heidelberg, Germany, is planning an experiment in which the committee in the research-fellowship selection process will be totally gender-blinded, according to EMBO's programme manager, Gerlind Wallon.

The first step to identify bias and tackle its potential sources is a continuous, professional evaluation of the selection process and its outcomes. A few years ago, our team analysed the peer-review selection process for the Boehringer Ingelheim Fund (BIF) fellowships (see Nature 430, 591; 2004). Although the selection process proved highly valid in identifying the most promising junior scientists, and there was no gender difference at postdoctoral level, we did find a slight gender bias in the selection of PhD students. The results were thoroughly discussed by the review committee and the foundation continued to monitor its selection process closely. This allowed the BIF to see a considerable increase in female applicants and scholars in the next few years, with nearly 50% of the 2006 PhD scholarships awarded to women. But according to Hermann Fröhlich, managing director of the BIF, the growing number of young women participating and succeeding in one of the most competitive selection processes for scholarships may be due to social change. And as the BIF evaluates young researchers and their projects at the earliest possible phase in the scientific career, its figures may indicate that large numbers of women have started to reach for the top in science.

The Pioneer Award for innovative research given by the US National Institutes of Health (NIH) shows that there are other effective measures against gender bias. In 2004 there were no women among the 9 scientists chosen, but in 2005, 6 of the 13 winners were women, and in 2006, 4 of 13. After the first round, the NIH specifically encouraged women to apply, accepted only self-nominations rather than institutional submissions and spent more time training its reviewers.

Women did very much better when only self-nominations were accepted, not institutional submissions.

Changes such as widening submission policies, 'masking' fellowship applicants and regularly evaluating the peer-review process have started closing the gender gap in grant success. Other moves will help women rise to higher levels of leadership in science and erase unintentional gender bias. The Committee on Science, Engineering, and Public Policy of the US National Academies proposes setting up programmes to provide women with mentoring and support. It also aims to restructure hiring and promotion procedures to reduce bias and encourage diversity. This will include training search committees and heads of department to recognize bias, and to reduce it.

Gender: missing the prizes that can inspire a career

Nature 442, 868(24 August 2006)Published online 23 August 2006
http://www.nature.com/nature/journal/v442/n7105/full/442868a.html

Gender: missing the prizes that can inspire a career
Annette C. Dolphin1

Sir:
I congratulate Ben A. Barres on his excellent Commentary "Does gender matter?" (Nature 442, 133–136; 2006). I was struck by the paucity of female plenary lecturers at the Bioscience 2006 meeting of the UK Biochemical Society. Spurred on by Barres's comment that too few women academics speak out against prejudice, I decided to do a little research on the matter.

There have been three meetings of the Biochemical Society in the new annual meeting format (Biosciences 2004, 2005 and 2006) and at these 1 of 10, 0 of 10 and 0 of 7, respectively, of the plenary lectures were given by a woman. Some of these plenary lecturers were recipients of prizes and medals, and I was so shocked by these statistics that I made a rough count of the proportion of women who have received these prizes over the years, as published on the society's website at http://www.biochemsoc.org.uk. Recipients' initials, rather than first names, are given, so I may conceivably have misattributed the male gender to some of the earlier names.

The prizes include the annual Colworth medal, given to a promising scientist under 35: only one has been awarded to a woman, out of 44 recipients, between 1963 and 2007. The statistics for the other prizes, up to 2007, are the Novartis medal, 2 of 39; Jubilee lecture, 1 of 23; Wellcome Trust award for research in biochemistry related to medicine, 1 of 11; AstraZeneca prize, 1 of 5; Frederick Gowland Hopkins memorial lecture, 0 of 24; Keilin memorial lecture, 0 of 21; Morton lecture, 0 of 14; Biochemical Society medal, 0 of 3; and GlaxoSmithKline medal, 0 of 2. This translates into 3.2% of the prizes being given to women, a truly lamentable record.

Furthermore, the statistics have not improved. In the past ten years, none of the Colworth medals has been awarded to women — and it is prizes such as these, given to scientists early in their career, that influence their future success. The results speak for themselves: that people will always give prizes to others in their own image, unless forced to take sexual and racial bias into account. I wonder if the record of other scientific societies is much better in this regard.

I should also point out that UK Biochemical Society meetings are supported by funds from the Biotechnology and Biological Sciences Research Council and by the European Molecular Biology Organization. Why do research funding bodies not assert leverage on this matter, by insisting that sexual and racial bias in speaker selection must be addressed at any meeting for which their financial support is given?

See Nature 442, 510 (2006) for other letters on this topic. Readers are encouraged to add their comments on the Nature News Blog at: http://blogs.nature.com/news/blog/2006/07/
does_gender_matter.html