The purpose of this study was to examine instructor-student interactions in the College Algebra classroom for gender bias. Three measuring instruments were constructed to answer five research questions. These instruments included a Researcher Observation Code Sheet, an Instructor Questionnaire, and a Student Questionnaire. One of the research questions required triangulation of all three perspectives for the interactions.Participants included four mathematics instructors, 54 female students and 45 male students. Eighty-one students filled out the Student Questionnaire. The researcher coded 764 interactions.Findings showed most interactions involved instructors posing open questions to the class. Students mostly called out answers. Lower-level questions were asked the most by instructors.Male and female students responded almost equally to male and female instructor's questions. Male students received more positive responses from female instructors and females received more negative responses from male instructors. More students with male instructors were silent in class. Female students interacted more in male taught classes and female students communicated more via questions/comments in female-taught classes.Students perceived instructors called on them by name, pointing, or eye contact. Although male students thought they had more interactions than females, male students in male-taught classes thought females had more interactions with instructors. Female instructors tended to ignore students more than male instructors. More male students thought they were ignored than females. Female students thought instructors responded to them more positively than male students did. Students also thought that male and female students interacted with questions/comments equally regardless of instructor sex. Furthermore, students reported that instructor sex did not matter.Instructors reported their interactions with students as equitable, they knew all or most of the students' names, and treated both sexes equally when responding to them. Male instructors thought female students participated more, whereas female instructors thought males did. Most instructors classified their classroom climate as warm, friendly, or laid back.Triangulation of the three different perceptions showed that in most instances, instructor-student interactions were not perceived the same. However, all three were in agreement on classroom climate.

Indiana University-Purdue University Indianapolis (IUPUI) / Previous research has provided promising evidence for the effectiveness of video interventions to raise awareness of the gender bias that exists in science, technology, engineering, and math (STEM) fields. However, creating these beneficial video interventions can be costly and its possible that the success of these interventions may be hindered if a certain amount of resources are not invested into their creation (e.g., into high quality actors). Therefore, the current study expands on this research by investigating the use of personal testimonials of women’s experiences with gender bias in STEM as gender bias interventions. More specifically, I examined whether certain characteristics (e.g., genuineness) of the testimonial’s communicator would influence the relevant gender bias outcome (e.g., awareness of bias and sexism). I predicted that watching a woman genuinely talking about her experiences with bias, relative to a scripted re-telling of this story, would lead to better perceptions of the woman (e.g., more positive perceptions and perceptions of genuineness), greater feelings of empathy and connection with the woman, as well as less greater awareness of gender bias and less sexism from participants. To test this possibility, participants in the study were randomly assigned to interact with one of four story formats, a genuine telling of the woman’s experiences with bias, a scripted re-telling of these experiences, a written version of the story, or a unrelated control video. After interacting with the story participants then completed measures related to perceptions of the woman and gender bias. The findings of the study were limited, possibly due to a lack of power, but were encouraging as they were in the expected direction. The implications of the findings as well as future research ideas to expand and improve on these findings are discussed.

Status Characteristics Theory and Contact Theory are tested to measure gender bias in engineering students, and to determine if contact with female engineers helps reduce gender bias. To assess this, two versions of a resume, one with a female's name and one with a male's name, were given to senior mechanical engineering students (n=225) to establish if they would rate the male applicant better than the female applicant. Respondents were asked how qualified they thought the respondent was, how much they would want the respondent on their team, and whether or not they would hire the applicant. Respondents were also questioned about contact with female engineering faculty, having female engineers in the family, and having female engineering co-workers. Results showed that all of the effects that were expected to occur were not significant, except one. The interaction between having a female engineer in the family and the applicant sex of the resume significantly impacted males' desire to have the applicant on their senior design team. Therefore, overall there is very little support for Status Characteristics Theory and Contact Theory. Only one result supports both Status Characteristics Theory and Contact Theory — having a female engineer in the family seems to reduce gender bias toward team members among males. / Master of Science

Previous research has provided promising evidence for the effectiveness of video interventions to raise awareness of the gender bias that exists in science, technology, engineering, and math (STEM) fields. However, creating these beneficial video interventions can be costly and its possible that the success of these interventions may be hindered if a certain amount of resources are not invested into their creation (e.g., into high quality actors). Therefore, the current study expands on this research by investigating the use of personal testimonials of women’s experiences with gender bias in STEM as gender bias interventions. More specifically, I examined whether certain characteristics (e.g., genuineness) of the testimonial’s communicator would influence the relevant gender bias outcome (e.g., awareness of bias and sexism). I predicted that watching a woman genuinely talking about her experiences with bias, relative to a scripted re-telling of this story, would lead to better perceptions of the woman (e.g., more positive perceptions and perceptions of genuineness), greater feelings of empathy and connection with the woman, as well as less greater awareness of gender bias and less sexism from participants. To test this possibility, participants in the study were randomly assigned to interact with one of four story formats, a genuine telling of the woman’s experiences with bias, a scripted re-telling of these experiences, a written version of the story, or a unrelated control video. After interacting with the story participants then completed measures related to perceptions of the woman and gender bias. The findings of the study were limited, possibly due to a lack of power, but were encouraging as they were in the expected direction. The implications of the findings as well as future research ideas to expand and improve on these findings are discussed.

Master of Arts / Department of Sociology, Anthropology, and Social Work / Gerad Middendorf / This study examines the issue of gender bias and other gendering processes within the profession of law in Kansas. Although women have made great strides toward equality within the law profession, there are still glaring disparities between men’s and women’s occupational attainment. Women enter law school at similar rates as men do; however, they are not similarly represented in the legal profession upon graduation, or throughout their careers. Utilizing a theory of gendered organizations, this study seeks to investigate what impact, if any, certain sociodemographic factors, sector of law, mentorship, and perceptions of discrimination, have on women’s levels of job satisfaction. To accomplish this goal, this study makes connections between previous research conducted by the Kansas Bar Association, and more recent survey data modeled after the original KBA research. Underlying structures and ingrained interactions are examined quantitatively, to gain a better understanding of the gendered processes that women experience within the profession of law in Kansas.

Automatic translation tools have facilitated navigating multilingual contexts, by providing accessible shortcuts for gathering, processing, and spreading information. As language technologies become more widely used and deployed on a large scale, however, their societal impact has sparked concern both within and outside the research community. This thesis adresses gender bias affecting Machine Translation (MT) and Speech Translation (ST) models. It contributes to this pressing area of research with an interdisciplinary perspective, to raise awareness of bias, improve the understanding of the phenomenon, and investigate best practices and methods to unveil and mitigate it in translation systems.

Children’s literature is a critical aspect during a child’s development; the messages portrayed in children’s books can affect the development of gender identity in young children and can affect how a child with act and perceive the world around them in the future (Tsao, 2008). Expanding on this research this study aimed to determine if award winning children’s literature contained implicit and explicit gender stereotypes and biases in the illustrations and text. The sample examined was Caldecott Award and Honor books from 2001 through 2014; the sample size was did not include biographies, autobiographies, informational books, concept books, poetry, and science fiction. This study only examined works of fiction and each book was examined, read, and analyzed. Following the methodology of various studies, a three part Data Collection Instrument was used: book identification, frequency analysis of illustrations, and a character analysis. This research attempted to answer the following questions: (1) Is there evidence of gender stereotypes in the written depiction of characters in Caldecott Award and Honor books award between 2001 and 2014?, (2) Is there evidence of gender stereotypes in the illustrated depictions of characters in Caldecott Award and Honor books award between 2001 and 2014?, and (3) Are males’ and females’ roles and attributes represented equally through the text and illustrations? This research aimed at examining whether gender biases and stereotypes still existed in the text and illustrations and if so, to what extent.

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The aim of this master’s thesis is to examine how gender is produced in a contemporary technological sphere. I am examining a department called MST within the School of Electrical Engineering at The Royal Institute of Technology (KTH) primarily by focus group interviews and in depth interviews with a doing gender perspective. I also carry out participant observations for additional background information. I argue from a gender studies perspective that KTH as a technological institution and workplace is reproducing ideals that confirms men as norm. Furthermore, I suggest that the technical sphere and historically traditional (male) gendered environment that which KTH represents, embodies and reproduces, makes it more challenging for female PhD-students to compete against their male counterparts when it comes to gaining recognition than it is vice versa. I am studying the awareness of gender norms in a technical milieu as well as thoughts about the daily negotiations and biased representations of gender on postgraduate/research level among the female PhD-students at MST. Moreover, I suggest that there are certain connotations with and cultural conceptions of what it means to be and to work as an engineer.

The Swedish Curriculum for the upper secondary school states that teachers should “ensure that teaching in terms of content and its organisation is typified by a gender perspective” (Skolverket 2011, p. 9). Considering that there is no further information regarding what a “gender perspective” means in reality, this sentence could be interpreted in many different ways. This study aims to explore how EFL teachers deal with linguistic gender equality, and which strategies they use to maintain a gender inclusive language in their classroom. Six interviews were conducted with EFL teachers at upper secondary schools in Stockholm, Sweden. The results indicated that the teachers thought this was an important issue to consider in teaching, andthat they had well-reasoned strategies for maintaining a gender perspective. The most prominently discussed strategies were encouraging reflection and discussion on these matters, and choosing appropriate literature that either would show a variety of different perspectives, or else would question the social norm. However, concerning their own language production, some of the teachers lacked explicit strategies for maintaining a gender inclusive language, which could derive from a lack in knowledge. Thus, this essay proposes that gender inequality in language needs to be more explicitly explored, both in teacher education and in further education for employed teachers. The teachers displayed an ambition to maintain a gender equal language teaching; and would benefit from more explicit tools to realize that.