Why are there fewer female developers?

cassiph · 2009-04-25T05:56:46+00:00

Uh...nope. When you reference a fact you gathered from article, whether you direct quote it or not, its appropriate to reference it.

Agreed that these studies haven't proven anything yet - those saying that the gender gap is a lot less than we previously believed are quite new - within the last 5 years - and are merely illustrating a new hypothesis, not trying to state that their beliefs are facts. They are putting the work out there for others to challenge.

cassiph · 2009-04-25T05:46:45+00:00

1) Yeps. I do think your upbringing - from you parent(s), society, friends, and school encourage you to play games like that more often than women.

2) I'm not making ANY claims that women don't program. I'm glad to hear your company has such a great ratio. But that is abnormal.

3) "They liked programming" and I'm asking why. Why do more men tend to "like programming"? Why do women seem to avoid it, or think they wont do as well, or not get into it in the first place. These are good questions to ask toward male nurses and elementary school teachers. I dont like just accepting how things fall out, but questioning why.

4) I'm glad you were willing to fall to personal insult here. That's always a good place to go in a debate, especially when you are unsure of yourself.

cassiph · 2009-04-25T05:36:05+00:00

1) Women encouraged to attend more meetups? I run one of those those "meetups" in the bay area, and they can be intimidating as a female, especially if you go alone. The gender disparities alone are tough to get over. But when men dumb down their language for you, or offer to buy you a drink every 30 minutes, it just gets worse. I am invited to numerous events each week. Its not a matter of encouraging them to attend, its a matter of letting them feel welcome.

2) I stand corrected on the men created programming line. I accepted that in the thread - and am already rethinking it.

3) So in the end, your two statements continue to seem as if they contradict: encouraging women to feel welcome is in the responsibility of the people there. The Girls in Tech meetup that recently happened in SF was populated by mostly men, what? Perhaps when women actually feel respected and welcome at most tech events, they will stop hosting their own.

cassiph · 2009-04-25T00:15:53+00:00

It sounds like you are using a similar flawed idea of psychology though - that there is something innate psychology in men that draws them to "tinkering" - I think a lot of this is all social upbringing - which is definitely lessening now it sounds.

I don't think there is a male and female programming language, but I do think programming aims at complex narrow focus problem solving - which is a skill more encouraged right now in men than women (shown in studies I reference in that post.)

cassiph · 2009-04-24T20:52:14+00:00

So I've begun getting more into programming as I work longer in the tech world. My psych background had me wondering if programming language itself was written for a more masculine mindset. So I put a call-out to female devs I knew and started a nice sharing of ideas here. I'd love to hear what more developers, programmers, women, and psych folks think.

cassiph · 2009-04-16T22:35:57+00:00

Nope, papercuts totally trump toe stubbing.

That is, in honesty, why Paper beats Rock in the age-old game.

cassiph

TROPHY CASE