Seems a pretty childish analysis... The question is - why do girls "not want to" by the time they reach age 18?
For the same reason not many men become maternity nurses or kindergarten teachers?
Frankly, you couldn't have kept me away from IT if you'd tried. Despite low wages (when I started, at least), poor conditions, working on short-term contracts, being required to educate myself, putting up with being treated like some kind of idiot savant, etc, etc -- still, I wanted it very, very badly.
Now, for people who don't feel that way, we're supposed to engage in this collective hand-wringing exercise: "Oh dear! Not enough wimmin in IT!" If they don't want it, I would seriously question the morality of (so to speak) tricking them into joining the profession on the basis of a collection of half-truths. Either you want to play with the shiny toys or you don't. And if you don't, good luck, because 90% of the time it's not exactly what you'd call fun anyway.
Incidentally, I've been around a bit and I have never, ever witnessed any indication of prejudice against women in IT. Where I've worked with female engineers, they've always been welcomed and treated with respect. Maybe we should just accept what any parent can tell you: there are gender differences, and we need to accept those rather than pretend we're all the same.
/rant. calming down now ;) talk amongst yourselves...
I have two children (1 boy, 1 girl) and they have very different interests, so I'm approaching this from a parent's viewpoint as well. As for encouraging them into the profession, I always say "do something you like and ignore computers, because it will grind you down in a relentless, soul-destroying fashion." I'm being a bit cynical and if they showed a genuine interest I'd encourage it, but I'll be damned if I say it's the most rewarding, happy profession out there. Cos it ain't.
Yup, I agree with that. My daughter discovered Xena a few years ago, then Buffy, so she doesn't fit the submissive, stupid mold at all :-) Good role models, AFAIC. There's no TV and I've always taught them to be suspicious of advertising, so that helps. But, let's face it, we all fit some kind of cultural expectations even when we don't want to.
I just don't buy that (U.S.) women are receiving and accepting a message that they are "submissive." There is still some overhang from the previous male dominated culture, but it is being rapidly eroded and may have already disappeared for the generation now attending college and/or entering the work force.
I am curious to see data indicating a trend in the opposite direction.
"Young women in New York and several of the nation’s other largest cities who work full time have forged ahead of men in wages, according to an analysis of recent census data."
Mainstream media can be pretty disturbing. I have a bunch of friends my age (19), and I'm quite possibly the only one that puts makeup on sparingly only at special events like a concert I'm performing at - like, covering up a small blemish and putting on a teeny bit of eyeshadow to be a bit more photogenic. Apparently you're not beautiful until your face is buried under a ton of makeup. :(
To the second half...I haven't even graduated college and I've dealt with more than I've wanted to. Sure, with some profs and at some of the places I've worked at it was awesome - people were friendly and treated me as an equal. But I've gotten my fair share of discrimination.
In fact, why do I end up writing so much about this. Lemme just copy and paste what I wrote on a similar reddit topic: I was interested in computers and programming in particular since elementary school, and since then I've been harassed about it by the most unexpected people. My parents gave up the fight but not after more than a decade, and I get irked by the various types of people I end up talking to when my job/major comes up. "You're kidding, right? You're a woman, do you know what to do?" is not that uncommon to hear, despite the decent resume with good references or a word-of-mouth recommendation from some happy client who wouldn't shut up telling them about how much they liked me and my work.
Just because you don't see it doesn't mean it's not there. Or maybe you just..don't notice it?
Well, you could argue that about the discrimination I've faced in my work. Or maybe I was just working with assholes, I don't know. Or maybe it's a cultural thing, comparing the US or India to the UK (where I live). I honestly don't know, but I can say that I have not once been aware of discrimination, at least in the immediate workplace. I can't speak about rates of pay or promotion prospects, or whatever, but that's my experience.
Assuming there is no discrimination or other judgement going on in the workplace causing them to choose a different career, and women simply choose not to enter IT/engineering fields, what's the problem with that?
A particular woman may want babies because women around her said "babies rock, all women want babies." Was it wrong for her mother to discuss the rewards of motherhood?
A particular man may like computers because his father told him how cool it is to bend machines to your will. Was that wrong?
If neither of those acts is wrong, then what is wrong with "society" telling people stuff?
Was that wrong in any moral or normative sense?
I'll grant that the underlying positive belief is incorrect, but what makes giving out well intentioned (if bad) advice wrong?
How does female engineering differ from male engineering? Why wouldn't male engineering allow us to maintain an economic advantage over India and China? And why does relative economic prosperity matter? As long as we're all getting better, shouldn't we be happy?
Note though that a couple of my friends work for scientists and claim gender discrimination is pretty bad. The picture they described of a scientific research company is nothing like what I've seen in the IT industry for the past 8 years or so.
I think the reason people are uncomfortable with the gender imbalance in IT is because of earlier studies showing that women tended to get paid less in jobs where they are doing the same work as men. Now whenever we hear of a gender inequality, we assume -- perhaps incorrectly, in this case -- that the inequality is due to a hidden, unfair bias.
So there is nothing wrong with women preferring non-IT jobs, per se. But I think we are right to feel cautious about conclusions in this area: Someone could take this general result and erroneously apply it to specific women, thereby assuming that female IT employees are less interested in their jobs than men and thus less deserving of raises or promotions... which creates a new source of gender bias.