A scientist like me: demographic analysis of biology textbooks reveals both progress and long-term lags
A scientist like me: demographic analysis of biology textbooks reveals both progress and long-term lags
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DOI：
10.1098/rspb.2020.0877
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发表时间：
2020-06-24
影响因子：
4.7
通讯作者：
Ballen, Cissy J.
中科院分区：
文献类型：
--
作者：
Wood, Sara;Henning, Jeremiah A.;Ballen, Cissy J.
教科书塑造了生物学入门课程的教学和学习，并强调科学家是负责重大发现的潜在榜样。我们探讨了教科书上的科学家和使用教科书学习生物学核心概念的学生之间潜在的人口统计不匹配。我们从常见的生物学教科书中提取了数百个人名，并评估了特色科学家的二元性别和种族，进行了人口统计分析。我们发现教科书上最常见的科学家是白人。然而，女性和有色人种科学家在当代科学发现中的比例越来越高。事实上，教科书中强调的女性比例与该领域的女性比例同步增加，这表明教科书正在适应不断变化的人口结构。尽管取得了这些成就，教科书中描绘的科学家并不能代表他们的目标受众——学生群体。总体而言，很少有有色人种科学家受到关注，而且预测表明，按照目前的速度，我们可能需要几个世纪才能达到包容性的代表性。我们呼吁教科书出版商扩大他们所强调的科学家的范围，以反映生物学学习者的多样化群体。
Textbooks shape teaching and learning in introductory biology and highlight scientists as potential role models who are responsible for significant discoveries. We explore a potential demographic mismatch between the scientists featured in textbooks and the students who use textbooks to learn core concepts in biology. We conducted a demographic analysis by extracting hundreds of human names from common biology textbooks and assessing the binary gender and race of featured scientists. We found that the most common scientists featured in textbooks are white men. However, women and scientists of colour are increasingly represented in contemporary scientific discoveries. In fact, the proportion of women highlighted in textbooks has increased in lockstep with the proportion of women in the field, indicating that textbooks are matching a changing demographic landscape. Despite these gains, the scientists portrayed in textbooks are not representative of their target audience-the student population. Overall, very few scientists of colour were highlighted, and projections suggest it could take multiple centuries at current rates before we reach inclusive representation. We call upon textbook publishers to expand upon the scientists they highlight to reflect the diverse population of learners in biology.