Is this suggesting that girls do not choose STEM faculties because they can read better so they like more humanistic faculties, where there are more texts (as in literature books) to read? Or my text comprehension is that bad?
It feels right, it was a really tough choice between math and philosophy for me and only peer pressure sent me to STEMs (and i sometime regret it). I'm gonna wait until replication is done until i define an opinion.
For me the scale was more like "problem solving <-> wrote learning" and I did everything I could to avoid stuff on the RHS.
So this ancedote is kind of like a twin study. We both did great at reading, in most years on standardized California Achievement Tests we'd be in the 98th or top percentile for reading. On the other hand for math we were always below the median, sometimes our score was so low we were in danger of the state forcing us to be in public school.
These results probably aren't surprising, we both had essentially the same educational experience.
Interestingly enough we both went on to different universities with full scholarships. She chose creative writing. I (he) chose information technology.
I don't know what can explain this aside from random variation, because this study certainly doesn't explain this well.
One of the guys I grew up with was the middle child between two girls. Girls never had to do chores, he helped with garbage and dishes, and in later years, helped with renos and yard work.
My point being that he was basically trained from birth to be productive, whereas his sisters were always allowed to explore their creativities (since they didn’t have to do chores). His sisters both have liberal arts degrees and have bounced around jobs, but he owns a very successful landscaping company.
This is a fancy way of saying lots of kids'll stick with the things they think they do best at; and they'll decide that by comparing themselves to their peers and comparing that between subjects.
For example, if Alice is a 75th-percentile maths student and a 85th-percentile english student; whereas Bob is a 75th-percentile maths student an a 65th-percentile english student, Alice is less likely to study maths than Bob despite having the same marks in maths as she recognises her talents lie elsewhere.
This is not a complete explanation of anything, but a tidbit to keep in mind.
Either that ("like more", ie preference), or they ask themselves what they're good at ("intraindividual comparisons of achievement"), and conclude that a career with words rather than numbers is better suited for them.
That depends. Are you a woman or a man? /s