Why are there so few girls in programming?
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Because nature and nurture conspire against them. Just this week I read a med sci piece on some bit of the brain that lights up like a christmas tree in autistic idiots savant and not at all in women, with blokes in the middle and nerdy engineers lighting up more than usual. That said, of the two (count them, two of forty) women in my computing course fifteen years ago, one was an oxygen thief and the other was so good it was scary. And she was a natural blonde with a radiant smile and a body to die for, with nice perky, oh wait wrong type of website. But you get the gist. I feel that we let down engineers everywhere when we failed to capture and clone her. Imagine, if you will, a world of hot chicks who like pizza, video games, programming computers and building gadgets, rode around on a trailbike... man, she even brewed her own beer! -- modified at 2:04 Thursday 22nd June, 2006
Peter Wone wrote:
one was an oxygen thief
I'm not familiar with that expression - Care to explain?
Scottish Developers events: * .NET debugging, tracing and instrumentation by Duncan Edwards Jones and Code Coverage in .NET by Craig Murphy * Developer Day Scotland: are you interested in speaking or attending? My: Website | Blog
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Okay, I'm a girl and I like programming. I'm not very good at it yet, but I do like it. I've done research on women in science and the number of girls going into "computer" (whether programming, IT, etc.) keeps dropping significantly every year. For those of you with a formal education I'm curious how many girls you had in classes, how they acted (shy? open for discussion?), ethnic diversity (we had a few foreign girls but i was the only "white" girl in most of my classes.) But why do you think so few girls go into programming/computers? Other girls please give your feedback!
Its not that strange, in our western society girls are fostered to think that beeing cool and beautiful is really really important. lots of girls gets breast implants just to fit in with this image of how a girl should be. And beeing a programmer that sits infront of a computer eating burgers and thinking about the fastest way to sort a list of polygons is generally considered geeky, anyone who does that are associated with the steriotype fat geek boy with big glasses. so the steriotypical image of the programming trade is the oposite of the western girls ideal. in our society its uncool for girls to deal with programming, they will be considered oddballs. Im sure things are quite different where those ideals dont exist.. for guys in the western world things are quite different, our ideal is just to be successful, and that just means earn as much money as possible. so Id say its all about culture.. (and I didnt say that _every_ girl/woman cares about those ideals, but very many do..) http://www.puzzleframework.com
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Its not that strange, in our western society girls are fostered to think that beeing cool and beautiful is really really important. lots of girls gets breast implants just to fit in with this image of how a girl should be. And beeing a programmer that sits infront of a computer eating burgers and thinking about the fastest way to sort a list of polygons is generally considered geeky, anyone who does that are associated with the steriotype fat geek boy with big glasses. so the steriotypical image of the programming trade is the oposite of the western girls ideal. in our society its uncool for girls to deal with programming, they will be considered oddballs. Im sure things are quite different where those ideals dont exist.. for guys in the western world things are quite different, our ideal is just to be successful, and that just means earn as much money as possible. so Id say its all about culture.. (and I didnt say that _every_ girl/woman cares about those ideals, but very many do..) http://www.puzzleframework.com
And now, the stranges observation of all: If a girl ignored those rules and became a successful progammer, the other girls forget that she was an uncool outsider. A certain amount of tech skills seem to be accepted as a replacement for perfect looks. I still don't know where this mysterious turning point is, but it exists. :suss: _____________________________________________________________________________ I don't expect too much, all I want is your vote for Halbsichtigkeit.
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Corinna John wrote:
why don't they like programming?
Dunno... :doh: You tell me. :rolleyes: --- With best regards, A Manchester United Fan The Genius of a true fool is that he can mess up a foolproof plan!
Don't know ... I like it. :-D _____________________________________________________________________________ I don't expect too much, all I want is your vote for Halbsichtigkeit.
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Corinna John wrote:
Diversity, where???
My class was similar - there was more ethnic diversity in the lecturers than in the students. As I recall the class make up was 90% Scots, 5% English, 5% miscellaneous other English speaking countries.
Corinna John wrote:
Seven years of IT school finally done
Congratulations - I stopped after 4 years of school.
Scottish Developers events: * .NET debugging, tracing and instrumentation by Duncan Edwards Jones and Code Coverage in .NET by Craig Murphy * Developer Day Scotland: are you interested in speaking or attending? My: Website | Blog
Colin Angus Mackay wrote:
there was more ethnic diversity in the lecturers
That may be because Great Britain and Germany have less ethnical diversity than the US. Less diversity in the overall country must result in less diversity in each class. ;)
Colin Angus Mackay wrote:
I stopped after 4 years of school.
Why? School is fun! You meet other people who are just as strange as you are. :cool: _____________________________________________________________________________ I don't expect too much, all I want is your vote for Halbsichtigkeit.
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Okay, I'm a girl and I like programming. I'm not very good at it yet, but I do like it. I've done research on women in science and the number of girls going into "computer" (whether programming, IT, etc.) keeps dropping significantly every year. For those of you with a formal education I'm curious how many girls you had in classes, how they acted (shy? open for discussion?), ethnic diversity (we had a few foreign girls but i was the only "white" girl in most of my classes.) But why do you think so few girls go into programming/computers? Other girls please give your feedback!
I'm not sure how the trend started, but since this trend is already established, as a girl you'd have to resign yourself to working with male programmers, and the stereotype of the average male programmer probably isn't appealing to most women.
"... This man is obviously a psychotic." "We-he-ell, uh, I'd like to hold off judgement on a thing like that, sir, until all the facts are in." (Dr. Strangelove or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb)
~ ScrollingGrid (cross-browser freeze-header control)
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leckey wrote:
But why do you think so few girls go into programming/computers?
Because most of them have a life? :laugh: Jeremy Falcon
That made me think of all the geek jokes over the years... The tigress is here :-D
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The other day I had a manager tell me that they were going to hire a young woman that had previously worked at the company. She finished her masters and was lured away to become a consultant but can't live with the travel. The reason they want to hire her back is that they can offer her a lower rate because they believe she is less qualified. From her work that I reviewed I can say she is as qualified as any other programmer working on the projects. I am not saying this is common but if young women believe that they are going to paid less and not respected it could scare them away from the occupation.
Sadly that is universal :sigh: The tigress is here :-D
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That is an interesting question. I propose that we get you, me and as many of the other female CPians that are interested in this topic to meet in person, for about 5 days to discuss the issue.
"Just about every question you've asked over the last 3-4 days has been "urgent". Perhaps a little planning would be helpful?"
Colin Angus Mackay in the C# forumled mike
:laugh: The tigress is here :-D
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The numbers are even worse in electrical engineering I remember when I was in school there were 65 guys an 2 to 4 girls in most of my core EE classes. John
Same here. Out of 120 or so in my year, there were only about 5 of us (though I was undercover at the time!). Anna :rose: Currently working mostly on: Visual Lint :cool: Anna's Place | Tears and Laughter "Be yourself - not what others think you should be" - Marcia Graesch "Anna's just a sexy-looking lesbian tart" - A friend, trying to wind me up. It didn't work.
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Yes, that's a fact. But why don't they like programming? _____________________________________________________________________________ I don't expect too much, all I want is your vote for Halbsichtigkeit.
Men are better at being obessive than women? :rolleyes: The tigress is here :-D
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Because nature and nurture conspire against them. Just this week I read a med sci piece on some bit of the brain that lights up like a christmas tree in autistic idiots savant and not at all in women, with blokes in the middle and nerdy engineers lighting up more than usual. That said, of the two (count them, two of forty) women in my computing course fifteen years ago, one was an oxygen thief and the other was so good it was scary. And she was a natural blonde with a radiant smile and a body to die for, with nice perky, oh wait wrong type of website. But you get the gist. I feel that we let down engineers everywhere when we failed to capture and clone her. Imagine, if you will, a world of hot chicks who like pizza, video games, programming computers and building gadgets, rode around on a trailbike... man, she even brewed her own beer! -- modified at 2:04 Thursday 22nd June, 2006
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Its not that strange, in our western society girls are fostered to think that beeing cool and beautiful is really really important. lots of girls gets breast implants just to fit in with this image of how a girl should be. And beeing a programmer that sits infront of a computer eating burgers and thinking about the fastest way to sort a list of polygons is generally considered geeky, anyone who does that are associated with the steriotype fat geek boy with big glasses. so the steriotypical image of the programming trade is the oposite of the western girls ideal. in our society its uncool for girls to deal with programming, they will be considered oddballs. Im sure things are quite different where those ideals dont exist.. for guys in the western world things are quite different, our ideal is just to be successful, and that just means earn as much money as possible. so Id say its all about culture.. (and I didnt say that _every_ girl/woman cares about those ideals, but very many do..) http://www.puzzleframework.com
An interesting point. I saw a program about plastic surgery and it turns out the implant market is growing (sic) but for men - instead of working out having implants! Elaine (stunned fluffy tigress) The tigress is here :-D
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I'm not sure how the trend started, but since this trend is already established, as a girl you'd have to resign yourself to working with male programmers, and the stereotype of the average male programmer probably isn't appealing to most women.
"... This man is obviously a psychotic." "We-he-ell, uh, I'd like to hold off judgement on a thing like that, sir, until all the facts are in." (Dr. Strangelove or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb)
~ ScrollingGrid (cross-browser freeze-header control)
I looked carefully when applying for a job - some industries are very hostile to women but some are fine. Elaine :rose: The tigress is here :-D
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KevinMac wrote:
I am not saying this is common but if young women believe that they are going to paid less and not respected it could scare them away from the occupation.
That can't be the reason they choose not to become programmers. Besides, this happens in way more than one field, and there are a lot of working women out there. Maybe it could have something to do with male-dominated fields, but that isn't strictly programmer and a bit of a broader scope. I'm not certain about this though. Jeremy Falcon
I agree. From talking to others I strongly suspect it's largely due to it being perceived as a male dominated profession. Having worked in otherwise all male teams before I can see why that is not at all attractive to others. I much prefer a more mixed environment, and I'm sure that's not uncommon. Anna :rose: Currently working mostly on: Visual Lint :cool: Anna's Place | Tears and Laughter "Be yourself - not what others think you should be" - Marcia Graesch "Anna's just a sexy-looking lesbian tart" - A friend, trying to wind me up. It didn't work.
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Dude. Your SLLLLLOOOOOOOOOOOOOWWWWWWWWWWWW.:-D He wants to hook up with all the programming chicks and hand pick the hotties for 5 days of fun and sun.
"You have an arrow in your butt!" - Fiona:cool:
Welcome to CP in your language. Post the unicode version in My CP Blog [ ^ ] now.People who don't understand how awesome Firefox is have never used CPhog[^]CPhog. The act of using CPhog (Firefox)[^] alone doesn't make Firefox cool. It opens your eyes to the possibilities and then you start looking for other things like CPhog (Firefox)[^] and your eyes are suddenly open to all sorts of useful things all through Firefox. - (Self Quote)
He's been rumbled, I see. :laugh: Anna :rose: Currently working mostly on: Visual Lint :cool: Anna's Place | Tears and Laughter "Be yourself - not what others think you should be" - Marcia Graesch "Anna's just a sexy-looking lesbian tart" - A friend, trying to wind me up. It didn't work.
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I'm not sure how the trend started, but since this trend is already established, as a girl you'd have to resign yourself to working with male programmers, and the stereotype of the average male programmer probably isn't appealing to most women.
"... This man is obviously a psychotic." "We-he-ell, uh, I'd like to hold off judgement on a thing like that, sir, until all the facts are in." (Dr. Strangelove or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb)
~ ScrollingGrid (cross-browser freeze-header control)
Without a doubt that's the case. 5. :rose: Anna :rose: Currently working mostly on: Visual Lint :cool: Anna's Place | Tears and Laughter "Be yourself - not what others think you should be" - Marcia Graesch "Anna's just a sexy-looking lesbian tart" - A friend, trying to wind me up. It didn't work.
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Colin Angus Mackay wrote:
there was more ethnic diversity in the lecturers
That may be because Great Britain and Germany have less ethnical diversity than the US. Less diversity in the overall country must result in less diversity in each class. ;)
Colin Angus Mackay wrote:
I stopped after 4 years of school.
Why? School is fun! You meet other people who are just as strange as you are. :cool: _____________________________________________________________________________ I don't expect too much, all I want is your vote for Halbsichtigkeit.
Corinna John wrote:
Why? School is fun! You meet other people who are just as strange as you are.
Myself and two classmates co-founded a company together developing software. It was a curious childhood ambition to run a software company. Now, I've done that my ambition is to run a successful software company. ;)
Scottish Developers events: * .NET debugging, tracing and instrumentation by Duncan Edwards Jones and Code Coverage in .NET by Craig Murphy * Developer Day Scotland: are you interested in speaking or attending? My: Website | Blog
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Okay, I'm a girl and I like programming. I'm not very good at it yet, but I do like it. I've done research on women in science and the number of girls going into "computer" (whether programming, IT, etc.) keeps dropping significantly every year. For those of you with a formal education I'm curious how many girls you had in classes, how they acted (shy? open for discussion?), ethnic diversity (we had a few foreign girls but i was the only "white" girl in most of my classes.) But why do you think so few girls go into programming/computers? Other girls please give your feedback!
It's because women have the "cook, sew, and clean" gene, and the men have the "work for a living" gene. Seriously, though... It's been scientifically proven that the female brain is wired differently than the male brain. As a rule, women don't use the analytical side of their brain as much as men do (and no, I don't know why that is). Also, female reaction times to external stimuli are generally slower (that's why they generally cost less to insure). It's not that they can't be programmers - it's that they don't want to be. Could it be how they're raised? Get married, have kids, blah blah blah. Don't know... [edit] And if I'm going to get one's I might as well earn them... Women who used to be men are still men in their brain, so the circuitry is the same, no matter how many operations they have... I wish I had a cherry to put on this thread, because that pretty much says it all, unless someone comes up with the universal thread closer, "neener neener neener", but I think that's a little out of context. [/edit]
"Why don't you tie a kerosene-soaked rag around your ankles so the ants won't climb up and eat your candy ass..." - Dale Earnhardt, 1997
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"...the staggering layers of obscenity in your statement make it a work of art on so many levels." - Jason Jystad, 10/26/2001-- modified at 16:43 Thursday 22nd June, 2006
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Same here. Out of 120 or so in my year, there were only about 5 of us (though I was undercover at the time!). Anna :rose: Currently working mostly on: Visual Lint :cool: Anna's Place | Tears and Laughter "Be yourself - not what others think you should be" - Marcia Graesch "Anna's just a sexy-looking lesbian tart" - A friend, trying to wind me up. It didn't work.
Anna-Jayne Metcalfe wrote:
(though I was undercover at the time!).
:laugh::laugh: Man that was funny
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