The Gender Gap in STEM Careers: An Inter-Regional and Transgenerational Experimental Study to Identify the Low Presence of Women

Round 1

Reviewer 1 Report

A cross-sectional research is carried out in this article. It studies the expectations of both men and women about the gender difference in STEM careers.

Introduction and theoretical framework are well writen and supported by sufficient bibliographical references.

Research project is well defined but objectives of the article are not described in the text. So the reader does not know what to expect from the discussion and conclusions.

I suggest that, in discussion, the authors can explain the differences between age of respondents, gender or something else and how the results change according to age.

 

Author Response

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Author Response File: Author Response.pdf

Reviewer 2 Report

This journal article explores an important avenue of research regarding barriers to women’s participation in STEM domains. The manuscript presents a rich dataset that spans multiple educational trajectories end educational domains. 

 

The survey methods presented in this manuscript are not reflective of best practices. First, the manuscript only presents descriptive statistics. Without the inclusion of inferential statistics, I cannot interpret or draw and conclusions from the results. The authors also appear to be using unvalidated survey items. This raises many reliability and validity issues. Also, are there any hypotheses for this research? Please see some sample articles below that detail psychometrics and inferential statistics in social science research. 

 

Kalkbrenner, M. T. (2021). A practical guide to instrument development and score validation in the social sciences: The MEASURE Approach. Practical Assessment, Research, and Evaluation, 26(1), 1.

 

Kalish, C. W., & Thevenow-Harrison, J. T. (2014). Descriptive and inferential problems of induction: Toward a common framework. In Psychology of learning and motivation (Vol. 61, pp. 1-39). Academic Press.

 

The barriers to women’s participation in STEM has been extensively studied over the past several decades. Given the breadth and depth of research on this topic, the literature review in the introduction seems sparse. 

 

The theoretical foundation of the study also can be more clearly specified and further explained. For example, social role theory is a much broader and more comprehensive theory than specifically explaining why women in leadership roles experience prejudice. 

 

Eagly, A. H., & Wood, W. (2012). Social role theory. Handbook of theories of social psychology, 2.

 

Furthermore, the connection of the theories to the measurement instruments used in the study is of concern given the validity issues described above. For example, when the authors state “Survey analysis tool: the surveys are based on a multi-model theorical foundation applying three theories.” What is the “analysis” or “tool” being used evaluate this data? Multi-model framework indicates that the authors will be conducting a multi-model analysis such as hierarchical linear modeling. 

 

Due to the lack of inferential statistics, I do not feel equipped to fully evaluate the Results and conclusions drawn from this research. 

Author Response

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Author Response File: Author Response.pdf

Reviewer 3 Report

In my opinion the paper needs to be deeply revised before being published

First of all, the paper need to be revised from an English point of view.

Then, my main concerns are about the solidity of the methodology, in particular I have the following  observation.

- The authors in section 2 present the ALAS approach. However, it is not clear if the questions of the surveys are derived by an existing theoretical model or if they are proposed by the authors. This should be clarified and in the second case, the authors need to motivate their choices about questions. 

- the authors describe participatory workshops as being part of the methodology but they do not present appropriate results about that

- in the results section, additional questions are described as being part of the surveys: how are the criteria behind these questions? why aren't they presented in the methodological part (section 2)?

- Figure 9 presents the project participants: why a so big unbalance among age ranges? Very few participants have been considered in the primary education: authors should explain why and motivate the reliability of the related data

- Why aren't the results about "Model 1" divided by gender?

In general, all the figures reporting results needs to be better explained and commented in the text (for example, results in Fig. 18 is not commented at all)

Some other concerns

- Table 2 is not clear: it should be reorganized and better explained

- poor presentation of the paper, for example: a) the label of Figure 7 is on another page with respect to the figure); b) the list of activities related to "Model 2" are repeated three times with unnecessary redundancy

Author Response

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Author Response File: Author Response.pdf

Reviewer 4 Report

The study is well-framed and clearly defines its purpose. However, I think the article should be improved. For this, I present the suggestions below and in the article itself.

* English changes are required;

* I suggest that the authors use Cronbach alpha to assess the reliability of the surveys. Cronbach's alpha quantifies, on a scale from 0 to 1, the reliability of a questionnaire. The minimum acceptable value to consider a reliable questionnaire is 0.7;

* The presentation of results should be rewritten. For example, authors write "Primary students find the subjects of..." instead of "Most primary students find the subjects...". I have identified the sentences in the document with the color yellow.

* The discussion is not supported by evidence in the results section. Sentences like "it is higher the number of girls than boys that..."?; "specially boys associate to one predefined gender."; "boys answer undoubtedly that girls are more organised." are not supported by evidence. How do you know it was a boy or a girl who gave a certain answer? (This also happens at the conclusion)

* In the discussion and conclusion, the authors do not compare the results obtained with the literature;

* References are not well formatted. I suggest you use an automatic referencing system:

- If you are an EndNOTE user download the MDPI reference style file from the EndNote website at http://endnote.com/downloads/style/mdpi

- If you are a Mendeley user, open the Mendeley desktop, click on the view tab, then citation style, "More styles" and select "Multidisciplinary Digital Publishing Institute". 

* The quality of most images should be improved.

Comments for author File: Comments.pdf

Author Response

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Author Response File: Author Response.pdf

Round 2

Reviewer 2 Report

I appreciate the authors attempt at incorporating inferential statistics and additional psychometric validation of the unvalidated survey items, but unfortunately the survey methods still do not reflect best practices. There are many issues with the analyses reported and also not enough information is provided to evaluate many of the analyses especially for the "validation" analyses. I would offer some suggestions on potential analyses, but given the paper does not provide any hypotheses, I can not decipher what the authors would like to test. 

Author Response

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Author Response File: Author Response.pdf

Reviewer 3 Report

Authors addressed the reviewer's comments

Author Response

Dear reviewer, we are glad to know that the revised manuscript has met your requirements.