---
title: "Women in science"
chunk: 25/25
source: "https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Women_in_science"
category: "reference"
tags: "science, encyclopedia"
date_saved: "2026-05-05T04:38:14.758470+00:00"
instance: "kb-cron"
---

==== Problematic public statements ====
In January 2005, Harvard University President Lawrence Summers sparked controversy at a National Bureau of Economic Research (NBER) Conference on Diversifying the Science & Engineering Workforce. Dr. Summers offered his explanation for the shortage of women in senior posts in science and engineering. He made comments suggesting the lower numbers of women in high-level science positions may in part be due to innate differences in abilities or preferences between men and women. Making references to the field and behavioral genetics, he noted the generally greater variability among men (compared to women) on tests of cognitive abilities, leading to proportionally more men than women at both the lower and upper tails of the test score distributions. In his discussion of this, Summers said that "even small differences in the standard deviation [between genders] will translate into very large differences in the available pool substantially out [from the mean]". Summers concluded his discussion by saying:So my best guess, to provoke you, of what's behind all of this is that the largest phenomenon, by far, is the general clash between people's legitimate family desires and employers' current desire for high power and high intensity, that in the special case of science and engineering, there are issues of intrinsic aptitude, and particularly of the variability of aptitude, and that those considerations are reinforced by what are in fact lesser factors involving socialization and continuing discrimination.Despite his protégée, Sheryl Sandberg, defending Summers' actions and Summers offering his own apology repeatedly, the Harvard Graduate School of Arts and Sciences passed a motion of "lack of confidence" in the leadership of Summers who had allowed tenure offers to women plummet after taking office in 2001. The year before he became president, Harvard extended 13 of its 36 tenure offers to women and by 2004 those numbers had dropped to 4 of 32 with several departments lacking even a single tenured female professor. This controversy is speculated to have significantly contributed to Summers resignation from his position at Harvard the following year.

== See also ==

== References ==

== Sources ==
 This article incorporates text from a free content work. Licensed under CC-BY-SA IGO 3.0. Text taken from UNESCO Science Report: towards 2030​, 85–103, UNESCO, UNESCO Publishing.

== Further reading ==

== External links ==

Science Speaks: A Focus on NIOSH Women in Science Short, personal stories of females working in fields of science.  A video series developed by the National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health (NIOSH)
Gender tutorials on women in science from Hunter College and the Graduate Center of the City University of New York (CUNY)
Statistics on women at science conferences from the American Astronomical Society, Committee on the Status of Women in Astronomy
The Library of Congress Selected Internet Resources Women in Science and Medicine
Women in Science at the Encyclopædia Britannica