Ik weet dat er er een boekje bestaat dat in de titel claimt dat jongens slimmer zijn dan meisjes (maar lees de ondertitel), maar deze nieuwe studie toont hoe meisjes zelfs in landen waar de ongelijkheid tussen de geslachten groot is, toch beter scoren dan jongens voor wiskunde.
Hiervoor vergeleek men de PISA-cijfers met de VN-cijfers over gelijkheid.
Meer zelfs, er waren slechts 3 landen die de onderzoekers van de universiteit van Glasgow, onder leiding van Gijsbert Stoet, bekeken waar de jongens beter scoorden:
- Colombia
- Costa Rica
- Himachal Pradesh (een staat in India)
Toch zijn er binnen de groep van jongens en meisjes ook nog verschillen. De best-presterende jongens bleken beter dan de best-presterende meisjes.
Ook voor prestaties op lezen en wetenschap scoorden de meisjes in 70% van de landen beter dan de jongens.
Samengevat:
- Sex differences in educational achievement are not reliably linked to gender equality.
- Correlations between achievement and gender equality are inconsistent over time.
- Girls’ overall educational achievement is better than boys’ in 70% of studied countries and economic regions.
Abstract van het onderzoek:
The national differences in gender equality in economic and political participation have garnered considerable attention as an explanation of boys’ better achievement in mathematics in most countries, but the debate is far from resolved. Using data from four international assessments of the academic achievement of 1.5 million 15 year olds (Programme for International Student Assessment, PISA), we demonstrate that the relation between sex differences in PISA achievement and national measures of gender equality is not consistent across assessments, and several of the positive findings are confounded by outliers. Further, for overall achievement across reading, mathematics, and science literacy girls outperformed boys in 70% of participating countries, including many with considerable gaps in economic and political equality, and they fell behind in only 4% of countries. The results raise doubts about the relation between national equality policies and mathematics achievement, and raise broader questions regarding women’s underrepresentation in political, economic, and academic leadership despite stronger academic skills and regarding the long-term economic prospects and social stability of nations with many men who are not competitive in the modern economy.