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DOI 10.1007/s11199-011-9996-2
FEMINIST FORUM
Introduction
Issues of gender equity in math achievement, course-taking,
and careers have been of concern at least since the 1970s
(e.g., Fennema and Sherman 1977; Jacobs 2005; Perl 1982).
Historically, males have been reported to have higher levels
of math achievement than females, but results of achievement tests given to elementary and high school students in
the United States indicate that this gender gap has closed in
recent years (Hyde et al. 2008). Nevertheless, gender
differences persist in the number of students who take
advanced math courses (Eccles 2007) and who pursue mathrelated careers (Jacobs 2005). Thus, despite similar math
achievement test scores for girls and boys, fewer girls choose
to pursue math coursework or quantitative career paths.
This disconnect raises the possibility that factors other than
gender differences in math achievement play an important role
in influencing the choices that males and females make about
math-related careers. While many such factors have been
proposed, including womens belief that successful STEM
careers are incompatible with raising children and the
possibility of hiring and promotion discrimination against
women in STEM fields (for a recent review, see Ceci et al.
2009), we focus our review on early-developing math
attitudes. In this review, we conceptualize math attitudes as
a cluster of beliefs and affective orientations related to
mathematics, such as math anxiety, math-gender stereotypes,
math self-concepts, and attributions and expectations for
success and failure in math. These math attitudes have all
been shown to contribute to individuals choices to pursue
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child has more talent in math and has to try less hard than
mothers of girls, and fathers set much higher minimum
standards for math grades for average-ability boys than for
average-ability girls (there was no difference in fathers'
minimum standards for high-ability boys and high-ability
girls; Yee and Eccles 1988). Importantly parents have
gender-stereotyped beliefs about their boys and girls math
abilities even when boys and girls math achievement
levels do not differ according to objective measures (Yee
and Eccles 1988).
Additional studies have established that parents genderstereotyped beliefs about their childrens abilities influence
their childrens perceptions of their own math ability
(Jacobs 1991; Parsons et al. 1982). Among parents of 6th
to 11th grade students, parents of girls hold stronger gender
stereotypes favoring boys in math than parents of boys
(Jacobs 1991). Further, parents who hold stronger mathgender stereotypes in general also have more genderstereotyped beliefs about their own childs math ability,
controlling for the childs previous years math grade
(Jacobs 1991). In other words, parents who believe that
boys are better at math than girls also apply this stereotype
to the abilities of their own children, despite their access to
a great deal of information about their childs actual math
achievement, which should moderate these views. Notably,
parents beliefs about their childrens math ability predict
childrens self-perceptions in math even more strongly than
childrens own past math achievement; further, childrens
self-perceptions about math affect their subsequent math
achievement (Jacobs 1991; Parsonset al. 1982). Taken
together, these results suggest a causal model in which
parents gender stereotypes bias their beliefs about their
own childs math ability and these beliefs affect childrens
own self-perceptions about math, which in turn affect
childrens subsequent math achievement.
The effects of parents expectancies on childrens math
attitudes are less well studied in younger children, although
some studies have found that parents gender biases are
present and impact their children in early elementary school
as well. One study found that parents perceptions of
kindergarten through 3rd grade childrens math competence
did not differ by gender (Eccles et al. 1990). However,
these parents believed that math was more important for
boys than for girls, and those who held stronger mathgender stereotypes were more likely to have gender-biased
perceptions of their childrens math ability (Eccles et al.
1990). A study of 3rd and 4th grade students in Germany
found that parents of boys believed that their children were
more competent in math than parents of girls; again, this
effect was strongest among parents who endorsed mathgender stereotypes in general (Tiedemann 2000b). In
addition, a cross-cultural study of parents and children in
Taiwan, Japan, and the U.S. found that mothers of
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Investigating Mechanisms
In addition to expanding research to earlier ages and
adopting a developmental perspective, researchers should
also consider the mechanisms through which adults
gendered math attitudes are passed on to children. Most
previous research has investigated the relations between
adults math attitudes and childrens math attitudes and
math achievement (Eccles et al. 1990; Jacobs 1991;
Midgley et al. 1989; Simpkins et al. 2006; Yee and Eccles
1988). This research establishes that adults math attitudes
can affect children, but does not reveal how this process
occurs. Yet any effect of adults attitudes on childrens
attitudes and behaviors must be mediated through adults
behaviors and interactions with children. Understanding
these behaviors is critical for advancing theoretical knowledge of the social transmission of gendered math attitudes.
Moreover, this understanding is crucial for designing
interventions that can break the cycle that perpetuates
negative attitudes about girls and math. For example,
interventions currently exist that target specific behaviors,
such as treating children in a gender-neutral way in the
classroom (Jones et al. 2000; Lundeberg 1997), or that
target underlying attitudes, such as teachers math anxiety
and confidence in math teaching (e.g., Simon and Schifter
1993; Vinson 2001). Although these types of interventions
can bring about change in teachers and students math
attitudes, further elucidation of the mechanisms of math
attitude transmission can provide a framework for evaluating existing interventions and developing powerful new
interventions for parents and teachers.
Some research has already begun to address specific
behaviors that may mediate the relation between adults
math attitudes and childrens math attitudes and performance. For example, one major source of parent-child
interaction about math among school-age children is childrens completion of math homework. Several studies have
found that parents math-gender stereotypes are related to
lower expectations for female than male children, which
in turn are related to girls lower perceptions of their
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Modeling
Modeling may also prove to be an important mechanism
through which adults math attitudes affect children.
Children are particularly sensitive to the behaviors of
same-gender adults, and are more likely to model their
beliefs and behaviors after same-gender adults while
distancing themselves from other-gender adults (Bussey
and Bandura 1984). Thus, having a same-gender teacher
may make that teachers behaviors particularly salient.
Since most elementary school teachers are female (National
Education Association 2003), modeling is likely to affect
girls more than boys in early elementary school. Support
for this theory comes from the finding that female teachers
math anxiety is related to girls but not boys increased
math-gender stereotypes and decreased math achievement
(Beilock et al. 2010). Girls may see their female teachers as
role models for gender-appropriate behaviors; when these
teachers dislike and fear math, girls may be likely to
interpret that behavior as appropriate for all females
(Bussey and Bandura 1984). This may lead girls to adopt
stronger math-gender stereotypes and to disengage from
and fear math themselves.
Conclusion
Although there is no longer a gap between boys and girls
on math achievement tests, negative math attitudes can
prevent individuals from performing at their best and can
lead girls to pursue math-related courses and career paths at
lower rates than boys. Math attitudes begin to form in
preschool and early elementary school, with children
endorsing gender stereotypes about math, girls displaying
lower math self-concepts than boys, and girls being
negatively affected by implicit and explicit activation of
math-gender stereotypes (Ambady et al. 2001; Beilock et al.
2010). Understanding the math attitudes that eventually lead
to gender differences in college and career choices requires
understanding the development of these math attitudes from
early childhood onward.
Childrens math attitudes form as a result of environmental influences, especially those that occur in interactions
with parents and teachers. For example, parents and
teachers expectations for childrens success in math are
biased by their own gender stereotypes (Eccles et al. 1990).
These gender-biased expectations lead to lower achievement and lower math-self concepts among girls than boys
(Eccles et al. 1990). However, adults stereotypes and
expectancies are not the only routes through which adults
can communicate negative math attitudes to children,
especially girls. Drawing upon recent research, we propose
that adults own math anxieties and adults beliefs and
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