PhDSciNet Interview 20: Stereotypes about Women in Research

Historical interview: The following preserves the research experiences and personal views expressed in the original manuscript.

PhDSciNet Interview Series

A Tour of Stereotypes about Women in Research

Because of physiological differences and historical factors, stereotypes about women still exist in society. Do these difficulties also arise in research? In this interview, we discuss several examples.

[Example 1: Several male professors at a university say in casual conversation that it would be better not to recruit women, describing them as “difficult to work with” and insufficiently capable.]

Is that reasonable? Why might a supervisor think this way?

Pika Earthworm: My first question is whether they were joking. If they later find some male students unreliable—for example, someone leaves halfway through a PhD because he feels he should earn money to support his family—will they stop recruiting men as well? Perhaps they saw an individual female student do something poorly and then generalized it to women as a whole. We should not label an entire group because of individual incidents. If I were recruiting, I would not treat men and women differently. I would mainly consider the person's ability and character.

Banana Bunch: If a woman joins the group and might have a child during her PhD, would you take that into account?

Pika Earthworm: No, because everything involves some probability. You might also encounter a male student or subordinate whom you are very unhappy with, or whose personality clashes strongly with yours. He might leave in the end as well. I think this is about differences between individuals.

In that respect, I am very grateful to my supervisor. He has always taught me that he never judges a student's quality by gender. He focuses on the issue rather than the person and does not label a particular group because of certain characteristics. Seeing one female scholar perform poorly does not lead him to assume that every female student will have the same problem. Both his parents are scholars, and very distinguished ones. His mother, in particular, continued going to the laboratory as a professor of organic chemistry even while pregnant.

He has always encouraged me by saying that there is no difference between people: if you take your work seriously, others will not question you because of your gender or background. Perhaps I have not experienced those differences because I have always worked in a relatively inclusive research environment.

Sanhong Pomelo: My first reaction is disbelief. I feel these professors have not developed enough understanding. How can a professor think that way? Perhaps students have hurt them in the past, but even so, reaching such an extreme conclusion seems quite unacceptable to me.

I had a child while doing my PhD, and I was the only woman in our group. Many colleagues joked that our supervisor's greatest fear was that I would have another child during the program. Whenever my husband was around, the supervisor would invite both of us to dinner and ask about our family plans. I do not know why he was so worried. He would invite us for meals around holidays and festivals. On one hand, he normally invited men to one-to-one meals, and inviting me alone might have felt less convenient; with my husband there, private socializing might have been easier. On the other hand, perhaps he did have concerns about women, worrying that I might have a child or leave the program. I felt that some concern about women lay behind his thinking. He also spoke very sharply to men, but was always pleasant with me. That could be called gentlemanly manners, though of course we do not know exactly what he was thinking.

In the workplace and during my PhD, the physiological difference I noticed was having less physical strength than men. For example, I could not move some equipment cabinets in a computer server room by myself. But colleagues were generally friendly and looked after one another.

From a woman's own perspective, I also think we should avoid supervisors of that kind. The same applies to people with particularly strong patriarchal or feminist positions. When choosing a supervisor, finding someone whose values and outlook align with yours may be better for both sides. If a supervisor says he does not want to recruit women, there is no need for a woman to spend her life trying to test or persuade him, proving through her actions that recruiting women is a good thing. It is unnecessary; going our separate ways is best. But if you encounter such a man while already doing a PhD, you should make your position clear and let him know that his attitude troubles you or makes you uncomfortable. That is necessary.

Banana Bunch: So if we encounter that situation, we should try to express our boundaries.

Sanhong Pomelo: Yes. If you are still outside the situation, avoid spending too much time in a head-on clash over values and wasting each other's time. If you are already involved and the supervisor has only said these things without acting on them, maintain a polite distance. But if he tells women he has already recruited that women are troublesome, the two sides should have a direct conversation.

Happy Homebody Soda: From what I know, some groups around me have more men. That might be because their projects require physical strength or high attendance. But if you look carefully, groups working in biology or on DNA may have more female students, even when the supervisor is a man. The gender balance among students may be related to the nature of the project. If I were a supervisor, I might choose a balance of men and women, because an all-male or all-female group may not be very beneficial for students' mental health.

Banana Bunch: Speaking of disciplines, why do groups working on DNA and RNA have more women? Are women better suited to that work?

Happy Homebody Soda: Perhaps the common impression is that women work more carefully and are less careless than men, so they might be better at handling very delicate things. But many men are excellent biologists too. There are certainly individual differences, though men and women may generally have some physiological or habitual differences.

Banana Bunch: So physiological differences are not merely a fixed stereotype; some differences really do exist, right?

Happy Homebody Soda: Yes, I think that is unavoidable, but whether a supervisor has prejudice is very important.

[Example 2: A university physics department has dozens of male professors but only one female professor.]

Why is there such a large gender imbalance?

Pika Earthworm: Looking at the proportions of male and female professors in a department, the proportion of women is indeed much smaller. We can also see that female teachers around us have, to some extent, made sacrifices in family life. My child is now two, so I can deeply understand why many people find it difficult to continue along the way.

As everyone knows, finding a faculty position is very difficult, especially in science, engineering, and the natural sciences. If you want a good position and your own independent laboratory, you basically cannot afford to take a wrong turn from your doctoral years onward. You need good papers during your PhD to secure a good postdoc, and you need continuous output to find a faculty job. The competition for faculty positions is extremely intense. It demands that you make almost no missteps throughout your research career; even one wrong step may require more time and effort to make up for later. That is a feature of the research environment now, and it is particularly unfavorable to women.

For example, I became pregnant at 28 and had my baby at 29. That meant one or two years in which I could not do intensive research, and my output declined over those two or three years. Many universities in China, however, require you to obtain certain titles before a particular age, which means accumulating sufficient research achievements beforehand. Losing two or three years can therefore have a substantial effect on a woman's later research career.

I know that some research institutions in Canada relax recruitment age conditions when they learn that you have had a child and taken maternity leave. That provides some breathing room and partly compensates women for needing more time because of childbirth or other family circumstances. But I do not know how much benefit these measures actually provide. I think a main cause of the problem is that competition in the field is already extremely fierce. You cannot really afford to take detours while young; for women, that means needing even better planning.

[Example 3: In a country with severe gender inequality, a man asks his female supervisor to pour him water at a group meal. Because they are both from that country, even a supervisor is expected to serve a man if she is a woman.]

Sanhong Pomelo: During my PhD, some people in our laboratory came from countries with particularly patriarchal social traditions. They strongly accepted this kind of authority. They felt that women should not appear prominently in public or compete assertively. When you were competing with them, especially when you performed better, you could sense hostility. They often asked me, “Doesn't your husband mind? Is it okay for you to come out and be so visible in public whenever you decide to?”

Why should there be objections to a woman simply working or studying normally? I think these disagreements arise from values and traditional ideas learned in childhood. Our supervisor always treated everyone equally. He did not lower his expectations because I was a woman. By contrast, our Iranian colleagues would often say that the men should do something a particular way, but that I could be an exception because I was a woman. That could be understood as friendliness, or as the belief that a woman cannot compete with men in the same environment or be judged by the same standard. My supervisor often drank coffee with male colleagues, but whenever he had coffee with me, he would bring someone else. He never arranged coffee with me alone. Perhaps that was part of his tradition, to avoid any appearance of impropriety.

Have you experienced gender prejudice in life or in research?

Pika Earthworm: Within the family, perhaps. My family wants me to enjoy the happiness they associate with being a woman. They know a PhD is hard work, and every parent wants their child to live comfortably and with peace of mind. They also know doctoral study can bring a lot of pressure and keep you very busy. But I think their intentions are good, and this is not about me being a girl. The environment in which I have lived has always been fairly relaxed.

Sanhong Pomelo: I rather envy growing up in such a relaxed environment. My upbringing was strict, and my parents were traditional. They did not impose many restrictions specifically on boys or girls, but they believed you should do certain things at certain ages. They also thought a girl should marry and have children at the appropriate age. In their view, women have a social duty. They have always believed that, after fulfilling society's expectations, you can be free to be yourself. But until you complete those “KPIs,” they keep instilling these ideas in you. Although I have always strongly disagreed, that pressure has never stopped.

Happy Homebody Soda: I think my supervisor does treat male and female students differently, but that difference is not necessarily a form of suppressing women. He does not criticize me very harshly, while he may treat men differently. He rarely speaks to me in a very angry or severe tone, but he may be stricter with men. I am not sure whether that counts as discrimination.

[Example 4: Many media reports shift attention away from women's research through sensational headlines such as “ageless goddess” or “goddess PhD supervisor.”]

What do you think of sensational headlines designed to attract attention?

Pika Earthworm: Those headlines are indeed attractive. Sometimes I like clicking on them too, because liking attractive women and men is human nature. If a male teacher or academy fellow is particularly handsome and the headline says, “He was a heartthrob in his younger days too,” you might click for that reason as well, right?

This happens to both men and women, though women are somewhat more prominently affected. To me, it feels relatively neutral. Attracting attention through appearance can bring advantages and recognition, which is not necessarily a bad thing for some people.

Sanhong Pomelo: I think it is praise with a bias, but still praise. If that publicity ultimately produces a good outcome, it can be acceptable. “Ageless goddess” may reflect the traditional Chinese ideal of being fair-skinned, slim, and youthful: not aging and not having wrinkles is seen as good. It can feel a little uncomfortable, but people are generally pleased when someone says they look young.

I know a senior woman from my academic circle who is very accomplished. She studied at Tsinghua and then went to Princeton, and was described as the youngest female member of an American academy. Everything has two sides. Publicizing a “goddess,” on one hand, can highlight women's strength and overturn traditional assumptions. For women and the public, that can be a form of progress. It can also encourage girls to take her as a role model and do better, helping them break free of traditional social expectations. The less positive side is placing too much emphasis on achievement through gender. For example, media reports may say that she remained unmarried and childless, gave up family life and having children, and devoted herself to research.

In publicity about outstanding academics, if the person is a man, people do not necessarily say he sacrificed his family and children even if he does not take care of them. That excessive emphasis on gender is not good. What we need is publicity that strengthens women's agency and inspires people; that is positive.

Banana Bunch: I think that was very well put. Beauty can also be a form of power, and people do not necessarily have to feel deeply offended. The media should also encourage a more rounded view of women.

Sanhong Pomelo: If we are receiving attention, we would prefer people to focus on our research achievements rather than our appearance. We earn our living through research and work, not our looks. We hope people will set gender aside and pay more attention to the results themselves.

Happy Homebody Soda: Think about it: when you see a stranger, your first impression is based on their appearance, right? When I was choosing a doctoral supervisor, I actually looked up every prospective supervisor's photograph to see whether they looked kind and easy to get along with. We hoped they would guide us as an approachable intellectual leader through four or five years of study, or even longer.

If a woman is attractive, people may also think she is polished and well put together. I remember a period when the media enthusiastically praised Ivanka, saying that even though she was so busy, she was still beautiful and put care into her appearance, dressing carefully before going out each day and handling both life and work well. People formed an image of her as a goddess. If a woman is untidy, however, people can easily form a negative impression. Even as a woman, I may not have a good first impression when I see another woman looking untidy. During my master's degree, some male teachers combined strong professional skills with good looks and attention to clothing. Students found them more charismatic, and they attracted many admirers.

After reading these examples and everyone's views, what would you like to say? Feel free to leave a comment. Let us keep improving together~

Participants: Pika Earthworm (皮卡蚯蚓), Banana Bunch (一把香蕉), Sanhong Pomelo (三红蜜柚), and Happy Homebody Soda (快乐肥宅泡泡水)

Editor: Honey Peach Oolong

Interviewers: Banana Bunch and Happy Homebody Soda

Audio recording: Huangyuan Wandou (黄圆豌豆)