Exploring bias in mechanical engineering students' perceptions of classmates.
Gender disparity in science, technology, engineering, and math (STEM) fields is an on-going challenge. Gender bias is one of the possible mechanisms leading to such disparities and has been extensively studied. Previous work showed that there was a gender bias in how students perceived the competenc...
| Main Authors: | , , |
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| Format: | Article |
| Language: | English |
| Published: |
Public Library of Science (PLoS)
2019-01-01
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| Series: | PLoS ONE |
| Online Access: | https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0212477 |
| _version_ | 1819024559940042752 |
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| author | Shima Salehi N G Holmes Carl Wieman |
| author_facet | Shima Salehi N G Holmes Carl Wieman |
| author_sort | Shima Salehi |
| collection | DOAJ |
| description | Gender disparity in science, technology, engineering, and math (STEM) fields is an on-going challenge. Gender bias is one of the possible mechanisms leading to such disparities and has been extensively studied. Previous work showed that there was a gender bias in how students perceived the competence of their peers in undergraduate biology courses. We examined whether there was a similar gender bias in a mechanical engineering course. We conducted the study in two offerings of the course, which used different instructional practices. We found no gender bias in peer perceptions of competence in either of the offerings. However, we did see that the offerings' different instructional practices affected aspects of classroom climate, including: the number of peers who were perceived to be particularly knowledgeable, the richness of the associated network of connections between students, students' familiarity with each other, and their perceptions about the course environment. These results suggest that negative bias against female students in peer perception is not universal, either across institutions or across STEM fields, and that instructional methods may have an impact on classroom climate. |
| first_indexed | 2024-12-21T04:56:43Z |
| format | Article |
| id | doaj.art-9f4fdce0550e4d979fa12d9a95c83724 |
| institution | Directory Open Access Journal |
| issn | 1932-6203 |
| language | English |
| last_indexed | 2024-12-21T04:56:43Z |
| publishDate | 2019-01-01 |
| publisher | Public Library of Science (PLoS) |
| record_format | Article |
| series | PLoS ONE |
| spelling | doaj.art-9f4fdce0550e4d979fa12d9a95c837242022-12-21T19:15:21ZengPublic Library of Science (PLoS)PLoS ONE1932-62032019-01-01143e021247710.1371/journal.pone.0212477Exploring bias in mechanical engineering students' perceptions of classmates.Shima SalehiN G HolmesCarl WiemanGender disparity in science, technology, engineering, and math (STEM) fields is an on-going challenge. Gender bias is one of the possible mechanisms leading to such disparities and has been extensively studied. Previous work showed that there was a gender bias in how students perceived the competence of their peers in undergraduate biology courses. We examined whether there was a similar gender bias in a mechanical engineering course. We conducted the study in two offerings of the course, which used different instructional practices. We found no gender bias in peer perceptions of competence in either of the offerings. However, we did see that the offerings' different instructional practices affected aspects of classroom climate, including: the number of peers who were perceived to be particularly knowledgeable, the richness of the associated network of connections between students, students' familiarity with each other, and their perceptions about the course environment. These results suggest that negative bias against female students in peer perception is not universal, either across institutions or across STEM fields, and that instructional methods may have an impact on classroom climate.https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0212477 |
| spellingShingle | Shima Salehi N G Holmes Carl Wieman Exploring bias in mechanical engineering students' perceptions of classmates. PLoS ONE |
| title | Exploring bias in mechanical engineering students' perceptions of classmates. |
| title_full | Exploring bias in mechanical engineering students' perceptions of classmates. |
| title_fullStr | Exploring bias in mechanical engineering students' perceptions of classmates. |
| title_full_unstemmed | Exploring bias in mechanical engineering students' perceptions of classmates. |
| title_short | Exploring bias in mechanical engineering students' perceptions of classmates. |
| title_sort | exploring bias in mechanical engineering students perceptions of classmates |
| url | https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0212477 |
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