abstract: The gender gap of women in science is an important and unresolved issue in higher education and occupational opportunities. The present study was motivated by the fact that there are typically fewer females than males advancing in science, and therefore fewer female science instructor role models. This observation inspired the questions: Are female college students influenced in a positive way by female science teaching assistants (TAs), and if so how can their influence be measured? The study tested the hypothesis that female TAs act as role models for female students and thereby encourage interest and increase overall performance. To test this "role model" hypothesis, the reasoning ability and self-efficacy of a sample of 724 introductory college biology students were assessed at the beginning and end of the Spring 2010 semester. Achievement was measured by exams and course work. Performance of four randomly formed groups was compared: 1) female students with female TAs, 2) male students with female TAs, 3) female students with male TAs, and 4) male students with male TAs. Based on the role model hypothesis, female students with female TAs were predicted to perform better than female students with male TAs. However, group comparisons revealed similar performances across all four groups in achievement, reasoning ability and self-efficacy. The slight differences found between the four groups in student exam and coursework scores were not statistically significant. Therefore, the results did not support the role model hypothesis. Given that both lecture professors in the present study were males, and given that professors typically have more teaching experience, finer skills and knowledge of subject matter than do TAs, a future study that includes both female science professors and female TAs, may be more likely to find support for the hypothesis. / Dissertation/Thesis / M.S. Biology 2010

Les inégalités de revenu affectent-elles la fourniture des biens publics ? Warr a établi en1983 un théorème de neutralité : sous certaines conditions, une redistribution marginale des revenus entre agents n'affecte pas la quantité de bien public fournie par leurs contributions volontaires. Les généralisations de ce résultat par Bergstrom et al. (1986), ont permis de mieux comprendre ce phénomène : les redistributions neutres sont de " faible "amplitude de sorte que les agents dont le revenu a été amputé ont toujours la possibilité de maintenir leur dépense en biens privés, et les ajustements des contributions individuelles laissent inchangée la contribution agrégée au bien public. Itaya et al. (1997) se sont intéressés aux conséquences d'une redistribution non neutre sur le bien-être. Dans les deux premiers chapitres de cette thèse nous testons ces prédictions en laboratoire grâce à un jeu de bien public avec utilités quadratiques. Le premier chapitre considère une redistribution de " faible " amplitude qui ne devrait pas entrainer une modification de la quantité de bien public. En revanche dans le chapitre 2, la redistribution est d'une amplitude telle qu'elle affecte la quantité de bien public fournie et le bien-être de la société. Bien que nous retrouvions en laboratoire certaines prédictions théoriques, notamment au niveau de la modification ou non de la quantité de bien public produit et du bien-être, les prédictions concernant les comportements et les gains individuels sont rarement vérifiées. En particulier, nous observons que, suite à la modification de leur revenu, certains joueurs réduisent ou augmentent moins leur contribution que la théorie ne le prédit et que les agents pauvres sur-contribuent. Il semble enfin que l'émergence d'inégalités n'affecte pas de la même façon les comportements que lorsque ces inégalités préexistent et donc que le sens de la redistribution, selon qu'elle crée ou diminue les inégalités, importe. Dans le chapitre 3, nous étudions plus précisément une redistribution créatrice d'inégalités dans un jeu de bien public linéaire et nous regardons si les hommes et les femmes réagissent de la même façon à ce changement et quelles conséquences cela entraine sur la quantité de bien public fournie. Nous montrons que lorsque les femmes bénéficient de la redistribution,la quantité de bien public produit diminue. Il apparait aussi que les comportements sont modifiés lorsque les sujets connaissent le genre de ceux qui se sont enrichis. / Do income inequalities affect the provision of public goods? Warr established in 1983 a theorem of neutrality : under some conditions, a marginal redistribution of endowments among agents does not affect the amount of public good provided by their voluntary contributions. Generalizations of this result by Bergstrom et al. (1986), helped to better understand this phenomenon: neutral redistributions are those of "low" amplitude, so that agents whose income decreases can maintain their consumption of private goods, and adjustments of individual contributions leave unchanged the aggregate contribution to the public good. Itaya et al. (1997) have focused on the consequences of a non-neutral redistribution on welfare. In the first two chapters of this thesis we test these predictions in the laboratory using a public good game with quadratic utility functions. The first chapter considers a redistribution of a "low" amplitude that should not modify the amount of public good supplied. However in Chapter 2, we run a redistribution of a "high" magnitude so that it affects the amount of public good provided and the social welfare. Although some theoretical predictions are found in the laboratory, such as the modification or not of the amount of public good and of the welfare, predictions on individual behaviors and payoffs are rarely verified. In particular, we note that following a modification of their endowment, some subjects decrease or increase their contribution less than theory predicts and that poor agents over-contribute. It further appears that the emergence of inequalities does not affect behaviors in the same way than when these inequalities preexist and thus that the direction of the redistribution, depending on whether it creates or decreases inequalities, matters. In Chapter 3 we study more precisely a redistribution that creates inequalities in a linear public good game and we test wether men and women respond similarly to the modification of their endowment and what are the consequences on the supply of the public good. We show that when women become rich, the quantity of public good provided decreases. It also appears that behaviors are modified when the rich gender is common knowledge.

If most scholars tend to agree that the native language of a speaker does influence the way they will understand the reality around them, the question becomes ambiguous when it comes to bilingual speakers’ cognition. How is their reality affected by the combination of their languages? This study aimed at exploring this question under the angle of grammatical gender. Adult simultaneous early bilingualsin French and Swedish were asked, in an innovative experiment, to match a culturally neutral item to a voice. In a second experiment, the same participants were asked to match a culturally loaded item to a voice. In both experiments, items were carefully chosen according to their grammatical gender. Results indicate that grammatical gender was not a predictor of voice assignment. However, the perceived cultural stereotypes of the items used in the second experiment appeared to be a robust predictor of voice assignment. Findings suggest thus that grammatical gender does not affect how simultaneous early bilingualism French and Swedish would conceptualise artifacts, but cultural gender would.

La drépanocytose est une hémoglobinopathie essentiellement connue pour ses répercussions hématologiques, hémodynamiques et vasculaires chez les patients homozygotes (SCA). Bien que ces sujets présentent une intolérance à l'effort, la littérature est très pauvre concernant les répercussions musculaires de la maladie. Ce travail doctoral nous a permis de caractériser pour la première fois les répercussions structurales, énergétiques et microvasculaires du muscle d’hommes (étude 1) et de femmes (étude 2) drépanocytaires par rapport à des sujets SCT et contrôles (CON). Nos analyses histologiques et biochimiques ont mis en évidence chez les sujets SCA masculins une amyotrophie qui explique au moins en partie la diminution de l’IMC des SCA au dépend de la masse maigre. Nous avons également observé l’altération de plusieurs indices du métabolisme oxydatif (CS, β-HAD et COx) qui pourrait relever de la restriction d’approvisionnement et d’utilisation tissulaire en O2 et expliquer en partie l’intolérance à l’effort. Enfin, un remodelage microvasculaire caractérisé par une raréfaction, une moindre tortuosité et une fragilisation des microvaisseaux a également été démontré. Ce remodelage microvasculaire pourrait contribuer à limiter le risque d’enclavement des hématies falciformées et ainsi réduire les risques de vaso-occlusions. La recherche de ces différents stigmates dans le muscle de la population féminine homologue a rapporté un remodelage musculaire similaire à celui observé chez les hommes SCA, mais ce dernier semble atténué, suggérant un effet genre / Sickle cell anemia (SCA) is a hemoglobinopathy particularly known for its hematologic, hemodynamics and vascular repercussions. Although SCA patients are exercise intolerant, no studies have looked at muscle repercussions. We assessed repercussions of sickle cell anemia on skeletal muscle and its microvasculature in men (study 1) and women (study 2) for the first time. Our results showed that men with SCA displayed an amyotrophy which can at least partly explain the decrease of BMI at the expense of lean muscle mass. We also pointed out a decrease in muscle oxidative capacities (CS, β-HAD and COx) which could result from O2 supply and utilization disorders and partly explain their exercise intolerance. Finally, a microvascular remodeling characterized by a rarefaction, a decrease in microvessel tortuosity and a microvessel weakening was also highlighted. This remodeling could contribute to maintain local blood flow and reduce risks of entrapment of sickle red blood cells in the microvasculature, hence reducing vaso-occlusive risks. Muscle repercussions on a similar female population testified of the same muscle remodeling as the one observed in men with SCA, but this latter seemed to happen at a lesser extent in women with SCA, suggesting a gender effect

If most scholars tend to agree that the native language of a speaker does influence the way they will understand the reality around them, the question becomes ambiguous when it comes to bilingual speakers’ cognition. How is their reality affected by the combination of their languages? This study aimed at exploring this question under the angle of grammatical gender. Adult simultaneous early bilingualsin French and Swedish were asked, in an innovative experiment, to match a culturally neutral item to a voice. In a second experiment, the same participants were asked to match a culturally loaded item to a voice. In both experiments, items were carefully chosen according to their grammatical gender. Results indicate that grammatical gender was not a predictor of voice assignment. However, the perceived cultural stereotypes of the items used in the second experiment appeared to be a robust predictor of voice assignment. Findings suggest thus that grammatical gender does not affect how simultaneous early bilingualism French and Swedish would conceptualise artifacts, but cultural gender would.