Hacker News Reader

Comment by matthewbauer | Hacker News Reader

That's an interesting study you link to but I don't think it fits in this discussion. The underlying problem is not that boys like "boy" toys and girls like "girl" toys, it's how our culture defines which toys are which. Buying a sewing machine for a girl and a video game system for a boy is somehow "normal" but switch those around and it's at least a little weird (at least 20-30 years ago it was). Some sort of quota system for women in tech might actually have an effect on that (certainly not guaranteed to, though).

View on HN

I think you missed the point of the study. "Normal" has nothing to do with it. Presented with a variety of toys to choose from, girls picked the stereotypical "girly" toys, even when encouraged to pick the "boy" toys by their parents. This means that you could give a Lego mindstorms kit to a girl and there's a good chance she just straight up wouldn't be interested in it, and would seek some other form of entertainment.

In light of that, we're left with an awkward situation. Should we force kids to play with certain toys and do certain activities even if they're not interested just so we can get to gender balance in lucrative fields? Maybe. Parents certainly do that sort of thing already with piano lessons and language classes. But if you don't think that's a good way to go, then you have to be open to the possibility that, left to their own choices, fewer girls will be interested in things that lead to a tech career than their male counterparts. Certainly it should be better than the (at best) 70/30 split we see now, but targeting 50/50 is not realistic.

Ok, I misunderstood what the study says. The underlying idea that boy and girl toys are social constructs could still be true, perhaps? Nothing seems to me inherently "male" about Lego mindstorms besides how we culturally define it. Maybe there are hormones involved in that girl's disinterest but more it's hard to believe that's significant enough. But it's definitely true that it's not an easy job to change culture.

Agreed, nothing is inherently male or female about one toy vs. another. However, there is evidence that preferences that eventually lead to a career in engineering and/or computer science might at least partially be due to gender and not to social norms. There's an excellent essay in [1] that sums up some additional research and also refutes some of the "it's all sexism" arguments that have been made. I recommend reading it and also the two comments to get a bit more data on the topic.

[1] http://slatestarcodex.com/2017/08/07/contra-grant-on-exagger...

And as an addendum, it's not just parents; girls and boys are often segregated, either forced (separate changing rooms, bathrooms) or intuitively (forming groups with their own genders), and then you get peer pressure, or you get ostracized for not being "like the others"

Being a geek at one point was like that, then it became cool.

Anyway point is, even if a parent raises their kid(s) gender-neutral or even pushes them towards STEM or whatever (for whatever reason), there's still peer pressure - but also support! - to either continue or move away from it.

In my personal experience, I got support from other kids that had computers at home (for example). I know my sister didn't have that, so while she'd use the computer at home, their friends had no interest in it. (she ended up doing biology, works at a hospital now)

I am reminded of this comic strip every time this comes up (despite it being from about 7 or 8 years ago): http://www.smbc-comics.com/?id=1883

Reply on news.ycombinator.com