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Gender imbalance in US geoscience academia

Nature Geoscience volume 1, pages 79–82 (2008)Cite this article

An Erratum to this article was published on 12 February 2008

Geoscientists explain women's under-representation in our field along three dominant themes: the structure of academia, historically low numbers of women, and women's views and choices. Which factor they perceive as most important depends overwhelmingly on their gender.

Diversity enhances problem solving, increases creativity and raises the level of critical analysis in work groups1,2. In a research environment, enhanced creativity should therefore produce better science. Unfortunately, the geosciences lag behind all other science, technology, engineering and mathematics fields (STEM) in terms of racial and ethnic diversity3,4,5. With respect to gender equity, we fare better than physics and engineering, but trail behind chemistry and the biological sciences6,7,8. About half of the undergraduate students in the geosciences are women, but as seniority increases, there is a precipitous decline in the proportion of women in geoscience academia. We are convinced that it is essential to attract more of this population into the field if the geosciences are to take advantage of the best minds. But how do other geoscientists perceive women's representation in their field? Do they see a problem, and if so, what do they see as the root causes? We have investigated geoscientists' perceptions using focus groups to address these questions.

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Figure 1: Proportions of women in each academic rank in US geoscience academia11.
Figure 2: How male and female geoscientists explain the low numbers of women in academic positions in the US.

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Acknowledgements

This research was funded by the National Science Foundation ADVANCE program (award number 0123669), and by the Association for Women Geoscientists Foundation. Research methods were approved by University of Nebraska-Lincoln (IRB number: 2002-03-237). Discussions with Carol de Wet, Gail Ashley, Julie Winkler, and all participants at our workshop, “Where are the Women Geoscience Professors?” greatly aided our thinking regarding these issues and we thank them for their generosity.

Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. University of Nebraska-Lincoln, 214 Bessey Hall, Lincoln, 68588-0340, Nebraska, USA

    Mary Anne Holmes

  2. Wesleyan University, 264 Church Street, Middletown, 06450, Connecticut, USA

    Suzanne O'Connell

  3. Southern Illinois University-Edwardsville, PH 1201, Box 1455, Edwardsville, 62026-1455, Illinois, USA

    Connie Frey

  4. Unity College in Maine, 90 Quaker Hill Road, Unity, 04988-9502, Maine, USA

    Lois Ongley

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  1. Mary Anne Holmes
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  2. Suzanne O'Connell
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  4. Lois Ongley
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Correspondence to Mary Anne Holmes.

Supplementary information

Supplementary Information

Supplementary table S1 and figures S1-S2 (PDF 541 kb)

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Holmes, M., O'Connell, S., Frey, C. et al. Gender imbalance in US geoscience academia. Nature Geosci 1, 79–82 (2008). https://doi.org/10.1038/ngeo113

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