"gifted" a gender problem

[iggly2]

Not so much the percentage of females or males that are gifted but the consequences......

I did mean "smarter". This is an old computer and the letters e, r and t are not great.

The book is called "Nurture Shock" it is a really interesting read. I tend lend my books (Malcolm Gladwell books as well) to friends so can't say who wrote it. It is very interesting, googling will say the authors.

Sorry "I tend to lend". I realise I now have to reread everything I post.

Malcolm Gladwell often stresses the importance of practice in his literature. You may find his books of use (use them to look up specific research).

iggly

I will have a look thank you. Both of these sound right up my street,

I hope this thrad goes well for you. I find them hard at times as most parents are those of G&T children who are academic, I don't know any for vocational subjects, but think there must be loads of them. Mnet tend to be very academic, my dd is very bright at picking up languages too, maybe that is consistent with the music, who knows.

Thanks "theposterformallyknownas".

I do think there maybe a difference with how some male and female gifted children (and adults) may deal with pressure.

Are you Malcolm Gladwell? You have managed to repeat the name a number of times.

Cute how the letters 'e' 'r' and't' don't work on your "old" computer yet your last postings are riddled with those letters.

I am not Malcolm Gladwell

Tallypet

If iggly is Malcolm Gladwell he has been posting in other threads for a while as I recognise iggly from other threads.
Bit ashamed to say, not agreed with one I think, if I remember correctly.

Rtft and none the wiser. Perhaps I fell at the more difficult question phase. But I do prefer a question to have a clear purpose... Being a well educated female.

I do hope I haven't inadvertently proved some random point. That would be most irksome.

There are some interesting issues here. By the way, I'm well aware that behaviour is often determined by adult expectations which are often themselves gender-biased.

I can well believe from my own experience that girls might, on average, underperform (versus previously-determined ability levels) when presented with progressively difficult/ impossible tasks - which I think is what is being claimed here. Girls are often more perfectionist and less comfortable with risk-taking than boys. This is not controversial and it is why girls often do much better at school than boys of a similar ability level. How much of this is nurture vs nature is another question entirely.

FWIW my DD is not a perfectionist and doesn't generally lack confidence, but compared to her brother (who is objectively less able) she is more likely to characterise herself as "useless" at things she is good at (eg maths). This can lead to underperformance and performance-anxiety.

Misti that's what I am interested in . When things get difficult, if it's hard to be or do the best, people can handle things in different ways. In this research the intelligent females (on average) showed the most difficultly with coping. My DH deals with things very well and can bounce back from setbacks, I can't. My friend has a lovely intelligent daughter who, just like her, can also be a perfectionist (and get upset with herself). I do think that I may worry more about this if DS was a girl. I am going to try to find the exact part of the book (whether it was "Nurture Shock" or a book by Malcolm Gladwell).

Iggly, it sounds like the impossible section of the test was constructed to test for resilience i.e. the ability to handle stress and adversity, ability to make a step by step plan of how to approach a difficult situation (i.e. skip questions you can't do and move on to ones you can), handle your emotions (don't get bogged down feeling like a failure for not being able to answer every question).

Resilience shares aspects of male-oriented approach to handling problems by making up action plans rather than internalisation and thinking about the emotions of a situation which may create gender bias.

I think you can help children develop this type of resilience by emphasizing effort over results, but there is certainly a personality component as well as a gender one.

OK, I'm trying to get this clear in my head, bear with me.

So, you take a population, and divide it into four: 'more intelligent' girls, 'more intelligent' boys, 'less intelligent' girls, 'less intelligent' boys (scare quotes as i'm not clear exactly what 'intelligent' signifies here - perhaps higher scoring on an IQ test?)

Then, the single group 'more intelligent' girls is observed to perform less well than any of the three other groups at a particular style of test - one that becomes extremely hard in the middle, and then easier again.

My first question would be, over how many studies has this been observed? If it is on one study or a small number of studies only, how large are these studies, how robust are their methodologies? Sorry to ask these questions, but it's very easy to get a superficially interesting result purely by chance.

If this effect has been observed over a large population and/or on several studies, then it becomes interesting.

I'm thinking that stereotype threat can presumably be ruled out, since if this was the issue, then 'less intelligent' girls would underperform too (and certainly not out perform 'more intelligent' girls).

Similarly, one would assume that a specifially gender related way of approaching problem solving (eg more strategic) can be ruled out for the same reason.

Which I guess does suggest issues of perfectionism and a particular way of socialising 'more intelligent' girls as a place to start looking.

This is interesting as I work in a field where to enter our vocational degree course academically you need to be top 3% of population and you need to have the tenacity to get the required work experience.
Once you are on the degree course you have to cope with having been academically the top where you can from to being just average at Uni. Long gone are full marks the majority of exam results for the majority of students will be 50 to 60%. Then there are the long hours, the nights on call and the tough assessments.
In our profession women outweigh men 10 to 1. This is such a problem for the profession that there is now positive discrimination for men applying to courses and then through out the profession.
This is a profession that turns out over 1,000 graduates every year and it's been like this for 20 years. I would say that the evidence of 20,000 graduates would be that in the long run girls are more likely succeed.

What is your field, Lonecat?

I would assume lonecatwithkittens is a vet. "In our profession women outweigh men 10 to 1." would support that.

It may well be the case though that the veterinary profession appeals to females more than males. Does it not, as a profession, have one of the highest suicide rate to....

I wonder how much of that is experience though ? For example, I used to be able to do maths for homework, but freaked at the exams. I trained myself to keep calm, and find the bits I could do - ie not panic when you get to the hard bit. I taught myself to say - ok - assume the answer to the first bit is x (even if I can't work it out), and then carry on from there. That is technique, and allows you to show what you can do, rather than stumble on what you can't. At technique that worked well for me right up to and after degree finals. I don't remember ever being taught that technique.

I wonder if the test didn't necessarily show anything inherent, but more of an attitude problem.

And I wonder if that response is more common now. It seems that the current system is kind of geared to the cleverest ones always getting brilliant marks. When they get to a level where they don't, then they are floored by the experience. They haven't learnt to look at failure in a given chance as an opportunity to work out where you struggle and improve. I get the impression though that culturally in the US that is the general approach - failure is a stepping stone to success, whereas in the UK we tend to see it as a sign that we should be doing something else.

Yes I am a vet. At 16 roughly equal numbers if girls and boys are interested. By the time of university applications it is about 6 girls to 4 boys.
Interestingly we have a high suicide rate among the men in our profession it is much lower among the women.

Thought it was! I have just looked up an abstract from The Canadian Medical Journal (Can Vet J v.44(7); 2003 Jul PMC340187)

"Men are not applying for admission to veterinary colleges to the same extent as women. In the United States, men constituted 44% of the applicant pool in 1985, but only 28% of the applicant pool in 1999 (2). Canada has experienced a similar gender shift in its veterinary student applicant pool. The reasons for the relative decline in the attractiveness of the veterinary profession for male applicants, and the increased attractiveness of the profession for women, are speculative.

Explanations that have been put forward for the feminization of the veterinary profession include the following: (1) elimination of discrimination at admission based on gender; (2) improvement in chemical restraint for large animals; (3) an increase in the number of female role models, especially in physically challenging aspects of the profession; and (4) the caring image of veterinarians portrayed in books and on television (2,3).

The decreased interest of men in veterinary medicine has been attributed to: (1) the reluctance of men to enter careers with low or stagnant incomes (the case in veterinary medicine for some time); (2) loss of autonomy in the profession (associated with the proliferation of corporate practices in the United States and a general decrease in the number of practice owners relative to employed veterinarians); and (3) a “trend effect” (as more women enter the veterinary profession, it decreases the profession prestige as a male occupation) (2,3)."

I appreciate that this is the USA trends.

I cannot recall at school of any males wanting to go to Veterinay school/college. It seemed to be more females.

As someone who actively assists students to apply to vet school. What I actually see on the ground is that when it gets a bit tricky in the application process (mainly getting the work experience) the boys start to consider the other options. The don't appear to ave the same tenacity as the girls.

I would also say the 'coporatisation' of veterinary medicine is the result of increased women in the profession. The first coperates in the UK emerged about 10 years ago by the then the trend to increased females was well and truly established.

DH is a medical doctor. He is exceptionally bright and could do anything academically if he put his mind to it. I would say that at some level pay and a good career structure played a part in his decision on a career, he never considered Veterinary.

Could some of the males looking at veterinary think that they could enjoy another subject more?