It's more likely a result of the rigid gender norms in US society that say girls don't belong in science, and those damn "math is hard" Barbies that are a product of this norm.
And the representational bias - when a guy is bad at math, it's either because he is bad at math or because he hasn't studied hard enough. When a girl isn't doing well at math, there's often a "reassuring" response that it's not her fault, or she's doing OK, for a girl... Relevant XKCD comic (http://xkcd.com/385/).
For guys, math trouble is framed as a personal failing to overcome, and for girls, it's just a force of nature. No wonder more girls are socialized to give up.
Of course, it doesn't help that math, for example, is unnecessarily terrifying for a lot of people, including teachers of math. I'll never forget my college course for Intro to Logic, where the prof opened up by saying she was terrible at formal logic as a student and hated the topic. Way to set the tone, there.
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Date: 2010-06-12 02:29 pm (UTC)From:And the representational bias - when a guy is bad at math, it's either because he is bad at math or because he hasn't studied hard enough. When a girl isn't doing well at math, there's often a "reassuring" response that it's not her fault, or she's doing OK, for a girl... Relevant XKCD comic (http://xkcd.com/385/).
For guys, math trouble is framed as a personal failing to overcome, and for girls, it's just a force of nature. No wonder more girls are socialized to give up.
Of course, it doesn't help that math, for example, is unnecessarily terrifying for a lot of people, including teachers of math. I'll never forget my college course for Intro to Logic, where the prof opened up by saying she was terrible at formal logic as a student and hated the topic. Way to set the tone, there.