Unrepresentative
Gender Composition and Group Confidence Judgment: The Perils of All-Male Groups
Steffen Keck & Wenjie Tang
Management Science, forthcoming
Abstract:
We explore the joint effects of group decision making and group gender composition on the calibration of confidence judgments. Participants in two laboratory experiments, individually and in groups of three, stated confidence interval estimates for general-knowledge questions and for financial forecasts. Across both studies, our results reveal that groups with at least one female member are significantly better calibrated than all-male groups. This effect is mediated by the extent to which group members share opinions and information during the group discussion. Moreover, we find that compared to a statistical aggregation of individual confidence intervals, group discussions have a neutral or positive effect on the quality of confidence judgments for groups with at least one female group member; in contrast, group discussion actually harms confidence calibration for all-male groups. Overall, our findings indicate that compared to all-male groups, even the inclusion of a small proportion of female members can have a strong effect on the quality of group confidence judgment.
Board Diversity, Firm Risk, and Corporate Policies
Gennaro Bernile, Vineet Bhagwat & Scott Yonker
Journal of Financial Economics, forthcoming
Abstract:
We examine the effects of diversity in the board of directors on corporate policies and risk. Using a multidimensional measure, we find that greater board diversity leads to lower volatility and better performance. The lower risk levels are largely due to diverse boards adopting more persistent and less risky financial policies. However, consistent with diversity fostering more efficient (real) risk-taking, firms with greater board diversity also invest persistently more in research and development (R&D) and have more efficient innovation processes. Instrumental variable tests that exploit exogenous variation in firm access to the supply of diverse nonlocal directors indicate that these relations are causal.
Messages about brilliance undermine women's interest in educational and professional opportunities
Lin Bian et al.
Journal of Experimental Social Psychology, forthcoming
Abstract:
Pervasive cultural stereotypes associate brilliance with men, not women. Given these stereotypes, messages suggesting that a career requires brilliance may undermine women's interest. Consistent with this hypothesis, linking success to brilliance lowered women's (but not men's) interest in a range of educational and professional opportunities introduced via hypothetical scenarios (Experiments 1–4). It also led women more than men to expect that they would feel anxious and would not belong (Experiments 2–5). These gender differences were explained in part by women's perception that they are different from the typical person in these contexts (Experiments 5 and 6). In sum, the present research reveals that certain messages — in particular, those suggesting that brilliance is essential to success — may contribute to the gender gaps that are present in many fields.
Cultural Diversity on Wall Street: Evidence from Sell-Side Analysts’ Forecasts
Kenneth Merkley, Roni Michaely & Joseph Pacelli
Cornell University Working Paper, December 2017
Abstract:
We study cultural diversity on Wall Street using information about sell side analysts’ cultural backgrounds. We find evidence consistent with higher levels of cultural diversity improving the accuracy of analysts’ consensus forecasts, and reducing optimism bias and dispersion. The positive effects of diversity on consensus forecast accuracy are more pronounced when firms have more opaque information environments, but also exhibit declining returns to scale. These results are robust to controlling for other dimensions of diversity (i.e., gender and educational diversity). Further, using exogenous shocks to analyst coverage resulting from brokerage house mergers, we find that drops in analyst coverage that reduce cultural diversity have a more significant impact on forecast accuracy. In additional analyses, we explore conference calls as one plausible mechanism for diversity to improve information flows, and find that cultural diversity is associated with more interaction on conference calls (as evidenced by analysts raising more questions on calls). Overall, our findings offer important insights on the effects of diversity between competitive agents.
From Opt Out to Blocked Out: The Challenges for Labor Market Re-entry after Family-Related Employment Lapses
Katherine Weisshaar
American Sociological Review, forthcoming
Abstract:
In today’s labor market, the majority of individuals experience a lapse in employment at some point in their careers, most commonly due to unemployment from job loss or leaving work to care for family or children. Existing scholarship has studied how unemployment affects subsequent career outcomes, but the consequences of temporarily “opting out” of work to care for family are relatively unknown. In this article, I ask: how do “opt out” parents fare when they re-enter the labor market? I argue that opting out signals a violation of ideal worker norms to employers — norms that expect employees to be highly dedicated to work — and that this signal is distinct from two other types of résumé signals: signals produced by unemployment due to job loss and the signal of motherhood or fatherhood. Using an original survey experiment and a large-scale audit study, I test the relative strength of these three résumé signals. I find that mothers and fathers who temporarily opted out of work to care for family fared significantly worse in terms of hiring prospects, relative to applicants who experienced unemployment due to job loss and compared to continuously employed mothers and fathers. I examine variation in these signals’ effects across local labor markets, and I find that within competitive markets, penalties emerged for continuously employed mothers and became even greater for opt out fathers. This research provides a causal test of the micro- and macro-level demand-side processes that disadvantage parents who leave work to care for family. This is important because when opt out applicants are prevented from re-entering the labor market, employers reinforce standards that exclude parents from full participation in work.
Doing Gender by Criticizing Leaders: Public and Private Displays of Status
Trenton Mize
Social Problems, forthcoming
Abstract:
Previous work shows that stereotypes influence women’s ability to attain and act in leadership positions, however much less work has examined the role that gendered expectations and stereotypes might play for subordinate behavior and how this might reinforce the gender leadership gap. Drawing on theories of gender and status, I predict gender differences in responses to — and behavior in — subordinate roles. In a series of experimental studies I find that men are more publicly critical of leaders and more willing to undermine leaders than are women. In two studies I find that men are more publicly critical in both high and low status subordinate roles, and under both men and women leaders. In a third study, I find that men and women do not differ in their private behavior or evaluations of a leader and that gender differences in subordinate behavior and evaluations only arise in publicly visible evaluations, behavior, and criticism. Gender differences in public behavior and evaluation may be due to men exaggerating their criticism to restore a threatened sense of status or masculinity, or due to women tempering their criticism due to gender stereotypes that discourage assertive and critical behavior for women. Either explanation suggests that men and women perform gendered expectations in public and behave in ways that can disadvantage women leaders.
Further Understanding Incivility in the Workplace: The Effects of Gender, Agency, and Communion
Allison Gabriel et al.
Journal of Applied Psychology, forthcoming
Abstract:
Research conducted on workplace incivility — a low intensity form of deviant behavior — has generally shown that women report higher levels of incivility at work. However, to date, it is unclear as to whether women are primarily treated uncivilly by men (i.e., members of the socially dominant group/out-group) or other women (i.e., members of in-group) in organizations. In light of different theorizing surrounding gender and incivility, we examine whether women experience increased incivility from other women or men, and whether this effect is amplified for women who exhibit higher agency and less communion at work given that these traits and behaviors violate stereotypical gender norms. Across three complementary studies, results indicate that women report experiencing more incivility from other women than from men, with this effect being amplified for women who are more agentic at work. Further, agentic women who experience increased female-instigated incivility from their coworkers report lower well-being (job satisfaction, psychological vitality) and increased work withdrawal (turnover intentions). Theoretical implications tied to gender and incivility are discussed.
The effects of skin tone, height, and gender on earnings
Srikant Devaraj, Narda Quigley & Pankaj Patel
PLoS ONE, January 2018
Abstract:
Using a theoretical approach grounded in implicit bias and stereotyping theories, this study examines the relationship between observable physical characteristics (skin tone, height, and gender) and earnings, as measured by income. Combining separate streams of research on the influence of these three characteristics, we draw from a sample of 31,356 individual-year observations across 4,340 individuals from the National Longitudinal Study of Youth (NLSY) 1997. We find that skin tone, height, and gender interact such that taller males with darker skin tone attain lower earnings; those educated beyond high school, endowed with higher cognitive ability, and at the higher income level (>75th percentile) had even lower levels of earnings relative to individuals with lighter skin tone. The findings have implications for implicit bias theories, stereotyping, and the human capital literature within the fields of management, applied psychology, and economics.
Gender Equity in College Majors: Looking Beyond the STEM/Non-STEM Dichotomy for Answers Regarding Female Participation
Colleen Ganley et al.
American Educational Research Journal, forthcoming
Abstract:
Women are underrepresented in many science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) majors and in some non-STEM majors (e.g., philosophy). Combining newly gathered data on students’ perceptions of college major traits with data from the Education Longitudinal Study of 2002 (ELS:2002), we find that perceived gender bias against women emerges as the dominant predictor of the gender balance in college majors. The perception of the major being math or science oriented is less important. We replicate these findings using a separate sample to measure college major traits. Results suggest the need to incorporate major-level traits in research on gender gaps in college major choices and the need to recognize the impact of perceptions of potential gender discrimination on college major choices.
Sex differences in academic strengths contribute to gender segregation in education and occupation: A longitudinal examination of 167,776 individuals
Serhiy Dekhtyar et al.
Intelligence, forthcoming
Abstract:
We investigate whether sex differences in academic strengths have an impact on society by affecting the career choices made by women and men. By longitudinally following 167,776 individuals from Sweden, we found that (1) more 16-year old girls than boys had a relative strength in verbal/language school subjects than in technical/numerical ones, whereas more boys than girls had a relative strength in technical/numerical school subjects than in verbal/language ones; (2) when these girls and boys attained higher education and entered employment, they largely pursued careers cognitively matching their initial academic strengths; (3) while individuals generally made career choices in line with their academic strengths, men and women matched on these strengths nevertheless made rather distinct career choices, in particular women with technical/numerical strengths who largely avoided careers demanding these skills; (4) sex distribution in education and occupation was related to the extent these career paths were perceived as either numerically or verbally demanding. Taken together, although gender segregation is to some extent associated with individuals making choices matching their academic strengths, the vast discrepancies in career outcomes between men and women can be only in part attributed to sex differences in academic performance.
Drop out, switch majors, or persist? The contrasting gender gaps
Carmen Astorne-Figari & Jamin Speer
Economics Letters, forthcoming
Abstract:
Men and women respond differently to early-college struggles. Men are more likely than women to drop out of college, while women are more likely to switch majors. These effects offset so that there is no gender gap in the probability of graduating in one’s initial major choice. For students who begin in STEM majors, however, women are far less likely to graduate in the field, driven by the fact that they are twice as likely to switch majors. We find no evidence that women are more sensitive to poor academic performance in the switching or dropout decisions.
Beyond the Stalled Gender Revolution: Historical and Cohort Dynamics in Gender Attitudes from 1977 to 2016
Xiaoling Shu & Kelsey Meagher
Social Forces, forthcoming
Abstract:
It remains unclear to what extent shifts in gender attitudes are products of changes in micro-level characteristics, macro-level social transformations, or net cohort and period transitions. We test these questions on 20 waves of data from the General Social Survey, 1977–2016 (N = 45,125). Compositional change in individual characteristics accounts for almost 78 percent of the cohort variation in gender attitudes, but only 32 percent of the historical transformations. Macro dynamics are responsible for an additional 60 percent of the historical change in gender attitudes. Two structural forces are associated with historical transitions in American gender attitudes: gender equality in the labor force and the rise of men’s overwork. Each of these factors accounts for a significant proportion of the period variation in gender attitudes in our analysis, and the rise of men’s overwork appears to account for the puzzle of the “stalled revolution” in the 1990s and its “restart” in the mid-2000s. The conservative swing in 1994–2004 correlates with the rise of overwork, as the proportion of men who overwork soared during this period when traditional gender roles were reinforced.
Will This Get Me a Job? Gender, Employment and College Attainment, Before and After the Mancession
Vedant Koppera & Aashish Mehta
University of California Working Paper, November 2017
Abstract:
Between 1981 and 2008, US college attainment rates rose faster for young women than men. However, after the 2008 “Mancession,” male attainment rose faster than female attainment. The most widely supported explanations for women’s domination of the pre-2008 college expansion (improved contraceptive and household technologies, no-fault divorce laws, and young women’s greater college readiness), do not readily explain the post-2008 reversal in gendered attainment trends. We show, in a variety of ways, that sharp differences in female and male employment trends before and after 2008 offer a plausible account for the post-2008 reversal of gendered attainment trends. Pre-2008, a rapid increase in the representation of women in high wage occupations increased the incentive for women to go to college. Post-2008, this trend disappeared, and men, driven by receding opportunities in traditionally male sectors, were incentivized to go to college seeking access to service jobs, especially those whose wages are institutionally shielded from labor market competition. These results indicate some convergences in the ways that men and women capitalize on their college educations in the labor market.
The Dynamics of Discrimination: Theory and Evidence
Aislinn Bohren, Alex Imas & Michael Rosenberg
University of Pennsylvania Working Paper, November 2017
Abstract:
We model the dynamics of discrimination and show how its evolution can identify the underlying cause. We test these theoretical predictions in a field experiment on a large online platform where users post content that is evaluated by other users on the platform. We assign posts to accounts that exogenously vary by gender and history of evaluations. With no prior evaluations, women face significant discrimination, while following a sequence of positive evaluations, the direction of discrimination reverses: posts by women are favored over those by men. According to our theoretical predictions, this dynamic reversal implies discrimination driven by biased beliefs.
Mentoring and the Dynamics of Affirmative Action
Michèle Müller-Itten & Aniko Oery
Yale Working Paper, November 2017
Abstract:
We study the evolution of labor force composition when mentoring is more effective within members of the same socio-demographic type. Typically, multiple steady states exist. Some completely exclude juniors of one type. Even a mixed steady state tends to over-represent the type that is dominant in the population. In contrast, the efficient labor force balances talent recruitment against mentoring frictions. It may even under-represent the dominant type and typically calls for persistent government intervention. This contrasts with the public discourse around temporary affirmative action. We consider specific policy instruments and show that hiring quotas can induce equilibrium employment insecurity.
Dancing Backwards in High Heels: Female Professors Experience More Work Demands and Special Favor Requests, Particularly from Academically Entitled Students
Amani El-Alayli, Ashley Hansen-Brown & Michelle Ceynar
Sex Roles, forthcoming
Abstract:
Although the number of U.S. female professors has risen steadily in recent years, female professors are still subject to different student expectations and treatment. Students continue to perceive and expect female professors to be more nurturing than male professors are. We examined whether students may consequently request more special favors from female professors. In a survey of professors (n = 88) across the United States, Study 1 found that female (versus male) professors reported getting more requests for standard work demands, special favors, and friendship behaviors, with the latter two mediating the professor gender effect on professors’ self-reported emotional labor. Study 2 utilized an experimental design using a fictitious female or male professor, with college student participants (n = 121) responding to a scenario in which a special favor request might be made of the professor. The results indicated that academically entitled students (i.e., those who feel deserving of success in college regardless of effort/performance) had stronger expectations that a female (versus male) professor would grant their special favor requests. Those expectations consequently increased students’ likelihood of making the requests and of exhibiting negative emotional and behavioral reactions to having those requests denied. This work highlights the extra burdens felt by female professors. We discuss possible moderators of these effects as well as the importance of developing strategies for preventing them.
Gender Homophily in Referral Networks: Consequences for the Medicare Physician Earnings Gap
Dan Zeltzer
Tel Aviv University Working Paper, December 2017
Abstract:
In this paper, I assess the extent to which the gender gap in physician earnings may be driven by physicians' preference for working with specialists of the same gender. By analyzing administrative data on 100 million Medicare patient referrals, I provide robust evidence that doctors refer more to specialists of their same gender, a tendency known as homophily. I propose a new measure of homophily that is invariant to differences between the genders in the propensity to refer or receive referrals. I show that biased referrals are predominantly driven by physicians' decisions rather than by endogenous sorting of physicians or patients or by gender differences in the labor supply. As 75% of doctors are men, estimates suggest biased referrals generate a 5% lower demand for female relative to male specialists, pointing to a positive externality for increased female participation in medicine.
Girls in the boat: Sex differences in rowing performance and participation
Kevin Keenan, Jonathon Senefeld & Sandra Hunter
PLoS ONE, January 2018
Abstract:
Men outperform women in many athletic endeavors due to physiological and anatomical differences (e.g. larger and faster muscle); however, the observed sex differences in elite athletic performance are typically larger than expected, and may reflect sex-related differences in opportunity or incentives. As collegiate rowing in the United States has been largely incentivized for women over the last 20 years, but not men, the purpose of this study was to examine sex differences in elite rowing performance over that timeframe. Finishing times from grand finale races for collegiate championship on-water performances (n = 480) and junior indoor performances (n = 1,280) were compared between men and women across 20 years (1997–2016), weight classes (heavy vs. lightweight) and finishing place. Participation of the numbers of men and women rowers were also quantified across years. Men were faster than women across all finishing places, weight classes and years of competition and performance declined across finishing place for both men and women (P<0.001). Interestingly, the reduction in performance time across finishing place was greater (P<0.001) for collegiate men compared to women in the heavyweight division. This result is opposite to other sports (e.g. running and swimming), and to lightweight rowing in this study, which provides women fewer incentives than in heavyweight rowing. Correspondingly, participation in collegiate rowing has increased by ~113 women per year (P<0.001), with no change (P = 0.899) for collegiate men. These results indicate that increased participation and incentives within collegiate rowing for women vs. men contribute to sex differences in athletic performance.
CEO gender and corporate board structures
Melissa Frye & Duong Pham
Quarterly Review of Economics and Finance, forthcoming
Abstract:
The number of female executives has increased remarkably in recent years. We contribute to the investigation of the gender question by examining the relationship between the gender of the CEO and corporate board structures. We propose that gender-based behavioral differences between males and females may lead to differences in a firm’s board structure. We find evidence that female CEOs are associated with smaller boards that are more independent, more gender diversified, have a lower ratio of inside to outside directors, a broader director network, and younger directors. We also combine these individual board characteristics to capture the overall monitoring potential of the board. Our findings are consistent with the notion that boards of female CEOs are structured for more monitoring. The results are robust to using a propensity score matching sample, a sample of firms that experience a male-to-female or a male-to-male CEO transition, and to controlling for endogenous matching between firms and CEOs. Overall, our results suggest that differences in board structures between firms led by male versus female CEOs can at least be partially explained by gender-based behavioral differences.
Working across Time Zones: Exporters and the Gender Wage Gap
Esther Ann Bøler, Beata Javorcik & Karen Helene Ulltveit-Moe
Journal of International Economics, forthcoming
Abstract:
This study argues that there is a systematic difference in the gender wage gap (GWG) between exporting firms and non-exporters. Exporters may require greater commitment from their employees, such as working particular hours to communicate with partners in different time zones or travelling at short notice, and may therefore disproportionately reward employee flexibility. If women are less flexible, or perceived as such, exporters will exhibit a higher GWG than non-exporters. This hypothesis is examined using matched employer-employee data from the Norwegian manufacturing sector for 1996-2010. The results suggest a firm’s entry into exporting increases the GWG by about 3 percentage points for college educated workers. A lower overlap in business hours between the Norwegian exporter and its foreign markets and a greater need for interactions with foreign buyers are associated with a higher GWG.
For Law and Markets: Employment Discrimination Lawsuits, Market Performance, and Managerial Diversity
Elizabeth Hirsh & Youngjoo Cha
American Journal of Sociology, January 2018, Pages 1117-1160
Abstract:
Drawing on institutional theories of corporate response to the law, the authors investigate if and how employment discrimination litigation promotes gender and race equality among targeted firms. Using data on 171 high-profile sex and race discrimination lawsuits settled against publicly traded companies between 1997 and 2007, the authors estimate the impact of lawsuit resolutions on subsequent changes in managerial sex and race composition. Results show that the impact of lawsuit resolutions depends on the conditions surrounding the resolution. Lawsuit resolutions that produce a drop in stock prices for defendants, attract national media coverage, and mandate organizational policy changes improve white women’s, black women’s, and black men’s access to management, while those that involve costly monetary payouts have no or negative effects. These findings demonstrate how market and legal pressures interact to affect workplace practices and managerial diversity.
What Can UWE Do for Economics?
Tatyana Avilova & Claudia Goldin
NBER Working Paper, January 2018
Abstract:
Men outnumber women as undergraduate economics majors by three to one nationwide. Even at the best research universities and liberal arts colleges men outnumber women by two to one or more. The Undergraduate Women in Economics Challenge was begun in 2015 as an RCT with 20 treatment schools and at least 30 control schools to evaluate whether better course information, mentoring, encouragement, career counseling, and more relevant instructional content could move the needle. Although the RCT is still in the field, results from several within treatment-school randomized trials demonstrate that uncomplicated and inexpensive interventions can substantially increase the interest of women to major in economics.
Can mixed assessment methods make biology classes more equitable?
Sehoya Cotner & Cissy Ballen
PLoS ONE, December 2017
Abstract:
Many factors have been proposed to explain the attrition of women in science, technology, engineering and math fields, among them the lower performance of women in introductory courses resulting from deficits in incoming preparation. We focus on the impact of mixed methods of assessment, which minimizes the impact of high-stakes exams and rewards other methods of assessment such as group participation, low-stakes quizzes and assignments, and in-class activities. We hypothesized that these mixed methods would benefit individuals who otherwise underperform on high-stakes tests. Here, we analyze gender-based performance trends in nine large (N > 1000 students) introductory biology courses in fall 2016. Females underperformed on exams compared to their male counterparts, a difference that does not exist with other methods of assessment that compose course grade. Further, we analyzed three case studies of courses that transitioned their grading schemes to either de-emphasize or emphasize exams as a proportion of total course grade. We demonstrate that the shift away from an exam emphasis consequently benefits female students, thereby closing gaps in overall performance. Further, the exam performance gap itself is reduced when the exams contribute less to overall course grade. We discuss testable predictions that follow from our hypothesis, and advocate for the use of mixed methods of assessments (possibly as part of an overall shift to active learning techniques). We conclude by challenging the student deficit model, and suggest a course deficit model as explanatory of these performance gaps, whereby the microclimate of the classroom can either raise or lower barriers to success for underrepresented groups in STEM.
Gender disparities in colloquium speakers at top universities
Christine Nittrouer et al.
Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, 2 January 2018, Pages 104–108
Abstract:
Colloquium talks at prestigious universities both create and reflect academic researchers’ reputations. Gender disparities in colloquium talks can arise through a variety of mechanisms. The current study examines gender differences in colloquium speakers at 50 prestigious US colleges and universities in 2013–2014. Using archival data, we analyzed 3,652 talks in six academic disciplines. Men were more likely than women to be colloquium speakers even after controlling for the gender and rank of the available speakers. Eliminating alternative explanations (e.g., women declining invitations more often than men), our follow-up data revealed that female and male faculty at top universities reported no differences in the extent to which they (i) valued and (ii) turned down speaking engagements. Additional data revealed that the presence of women as colloquium chairs (and potentially on colloquium committees) increased the likelihood of women appearing as colloquium speakers. Our data suggest that those who invite and schedule speakers serve as gender gatekeepers with the power to create or reduce gender differences in academic reputations.
More Than Public Service: A Field Experiment on Job Advertisements and Diversity in the Police
Elizabeth Linos
Journal of Public Administration Research and Theory, January 2018, Pages 67–85
Abstract:
There is a human capital crisis looming in the public sector as fewer and fewer people show interest in government jobs. At the same time, many public sector organizations struggle with increasing the diversity of their workforce. Although many institutional forces contribute to the challenge, part of the solution is in how government recruits. This study presents the results of a field experiment aimed at attracting more and different people to apply to a police force by varying job advertisements in a postcard. The results suggest that focusing on public service motivation (PSM) messages is ineffective at attracting candidates that would not have applied anyway. Rather, messages that focus on the personal benefits of applying to the job — either emphasizing the challenge of the job or the career benefits — are three times as effective at getting individuals to apply as the control, without an observable loss in applicant quality. These messages are particularly effective for people of color and women, thereby supporting a key policy goal of the police to increase diversity of applicants.