CSWS noon talk: Karyn Lewis on women in STEM

Karyn Lewis, a doctoral candidate in the University of Oregon's Department of Psychology, will discuss her research on women in the traditionally male-dominated fields of science, technology, engineering and math (STEM) from noon to 1 p.m. on Wednesday, April 24, in 330 Hendricks Hall.

Lewis’s talk, “When Hard Work Doesn’t Pay Off: Exploring Self-Perceptions to Understand the Underrepresentation of Women in STEM,” is based on her research that was funded by a grant from the Center for the Study of Women in Society in 2010.

Lewis’ research showed that men still outnumber women in STEM fields by ratios as high as 3.5 to 1. She believes that social psychologists can use their training to understand how the social context of male-dominated STEM fields might affect the participation and persistence of women.

Her work – done in collaboration with Sara Hodges, an associate professor of psychology at the UO – focuses on understanding what situational factors affect women’s self-perceptions and how the self-perceptions in turn affect decisions to persist in STEM.

- from the UO's Center for the Study of Women in Society