The Right Rebuttal

The Right Rebuttal

By: Shannon Laughlin

Before taking this class, I had heard of Larry Summers, former President of Harvard, but did not know much about him. After all, I was only in third grade when he triggered an uproar in the math and science community. Now, I am aware of the magnitude of controversy typically associated with his name. In January of 2005, Larry Summers, then-President of Harvard, made remarks at a conference stating why he thought less women were represented in top math and science positions. His remarks were extremely controversial, and caused him to step down from his position shortly after. We read these remarks a few weeks ago in class and they left me perplexed. How could someone say such things? How valid is his evidence? I questioned most of the points he made, but couldn’t quite articulate a differing opinion because I had no data to support any assertions, due to the fact that my initial reaction was almost entirely emotionally-based. However, after reading experts Elizabeth Spelke and Ariel D. Grace’s essay, I now feel justified to oppose Summer’s comments. Their article was entirely dedicated to exploring and/or dispelling the views of Larry Summers. It was compelling and research-filled, and for the most part, left me agreeing with their claims.

I found the format of this essay to be tremendously different from the others. It was extremely formulaic, and immediately laid out its three main topics: women and men’s sex differences in motivation for STEM careers, differences in cognitive function, and sex discrimination in the workplace. Spelke and Grace, sticking to the formulaic format, then described the three main arguments for differences in cognition between males and females. They included the tendency of boys to favor objects while girls favor people, the increased aptitude of math in boys, and the increased variability of boy’s abilities. All three of these were refuted with research, coming to the conclusion that there is not a difference in cognition between the sexes, at least not until later adulthood. That section reminded me of parts of the Why So Few? PowerPoint, where it was also stated that cognitive abilities can be taught and are not innate. It also seemed like a direct refutation of Kimura’s argument in Ch. 2, and when comparing them side-by-side, I support Spelke and Grace’s argument. As I talked about two blogs ago, Kimura’s essay seemed to jump to conclusions quickly, while Spelke and Grace did a good job of walking through each point. One part of it I especially liked was their challenging of the SAT-M scores I’ve seen so many authors write about. I’ve always questioned the validity of those SAT scores relating to boy’s supposed superiority in math, and Spelke and Grace articulated research on the matter. They state that most research on this agrees the SAT-M performances cannot assess a gender difference because it doesn’t provide an understanding of “the nature of mathematical aptitude and its distribution across the sexes (60).”

To tackle the subject of discrimination, Spelke and Grace referred to two studies about the innate discrimination parents show against their daughters and the discrimination shown in the hiring process. Similar to Valian’s argument in Ch. 1, they discussed the impact gender schemas make on the overestimation of males and underestimation of females, although they did not refer to them as “gender schemas”. I do agree that gender schemas affect society’s perceptions of the sexes and women’s lives in the workplace because of the evidence Spelke and Grace provide, but also because of Valian’s evidence (a computer program that simulated even the smallest amounts of bias piling up). Also, the study on babies mentioned by Spelke and Grace completely blew me away. It is troubling to think that my parents could have been more confident in the abilities of my brothers than me, even before we were old enough to reasonably show a difference. Spelke and Grace finished this section with the comment that these perceptions are malleable, so there is hope for future generations.

Lastly, Spelke and Grace handled the point of motivation for women and men to choose a STEM career, specifically centered on family life as a factor. This point, however, was decided to be inconclusive because of the lack of research comprehensive enough to come to a consensus. Despite this, I did find an interesting article pertaining to women and family life. It is titled “Rethink what you know about high-achieving women,” and it discusses truth and falsity in common beliefs people have about the working woman. This article also talked about family life pertaining to women’s choice of careers. While it also came to a somewhat inconclusive solution, they stated that “the conventional wisdom doesn’t tell the full story,” implying that the common misconception of women not being able to have families is not accurate. And similarly, Valian pulls in data that women’s family lives do not affect their work success at all.

Despite the fact that I agree with almost everything Spekle and Grace stated, there were a few aspects of the essay that were dissatisfying. The layout was so mechanical that there wasn’t any room left for Spelke and Grace’s personal assertions: the entire essay was basically a rebuttal. This was somewhat of a letdown, because I am genuinely interested to know what Spelke and Grace think about the other parts of this issue, such as the incremental and entity theories of learning and intelligence.  Another place where I believe it fell flat was the conclusion. After finishing covering all the points, Spelke and Grace didn’t really conclude their final thoughts. It bothered me a bit, because they didn’t have a place to prescribe remedies to the issues they stated, besides the small call-to-action in the discrimination section.

Although Spelke and Grace didn’t necessarily present any new ideas to me, all of their evidence helped me maintain a belief that the lack of women in STEM careers is mostly because of societal discrimination and misconceptions, coupled with closed (entity) mindsets on these matters (discussed three blogs ago). As they stated, education will be a key factor in changing society’s attitude towards women in STEM careers, and highly successful women in general. I believe if we teach the consequences of negative gender schemas, society will take a turn for the better and women will be able to excel in any field they choose.

Article: https://hbr.org/2014/12/rethink-what-you-know-about-high-achieving-women

PowerPoint: http://www.aauw.org/research/why-so-few/

Image: http://www.projectation.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/01/rebuttal.png