Sex Differences In Schools

Sex differences in humans has long been a topic of debate among scholars and researchers. It sparks interests in many controversial societal issues such as the male dominance in engineering and science fields and single-sex education. For a long time, it has been a commonly held belief that men are advantaged in math and sciences while women are better in learning language. Yet, results are often inconsistent. Some studies proved a slight advantage for males, while some showed no differences or privileges for both sexes. It is essential and interesting to understand gender difference as gender is the most powerful determinant of how a person see the world, more influential then income, race or age (Brennan, 2009). This can help us better shape

As I am studying Economics and Finance, which requires quite a lot of mathematical skills, I thought there should not be inequalities between my performance and my male classmates’ (Otherwise I will not choose this “unfair” subject!). In my opinion, before researching for this essay, 20 years ago boys performed better than girls in mathematics because they were advised and willing to take more advanced math courses. But now this should no longer be the case as girls are taking just as many as the boys. A study in 2008 by the National Science Foundation in the United States also proved that girls are performing as well as boys nowadays on standardized math tests (The New York Times,

I think social factor may account for it. Extensive researches have shown that some societal stereotypes and learning environment somehow put pressures on individuals (American Psychological Association, 2005; The Clayman Institute for Gender Research, 2011; Miller, & Halpern, 2014). This means that girls talk more because they are taught to express themselves verbally, boys do better in math because everyone believes boys should excel in math. Diane Halpern, the former president of the American Psychological Association, pointed out that sex differences are not immutable because the continuous interplay of biological and environmental influences can change the direction and size of the effects in the course of time (Halpern, 2004). Women’s position in society has been raising in recent decades. They can have more flexibility in choosing their field of profession and be treated more equally in workplace. The number of science and math courses taken by female students has increased too (Niederle, & Vesterlund, 2010).Thus, females tend to be more confident in competing intelligence with males and so some empirical results showing that sex gap in learning ability may be