GSE/RES: The Role of Social Interaction in the Development of Scientist Identities and the Retention of Undergraduate Women in Science Majors

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This study combines traditional elicitation (survey and interview) methodologies with the ethnographic examination of naturally occurring social interaction in formal and informal educational contexts among undergraduate majors in three disciplines in which they remain underrepresented--physics, chemistry, and mathematics ("science")--in order to determine the sorts of interactions that are most effective in facilitating the development of scientist identities among undergraduate women and retaining them in the national pipeline toward science careers. The project takes advantage of the unique situation of UC Santa Barbara, which delivers science instruction to undergraduates both in a traditional letters and sciences college and in a small, innovative college via a variety of pathways. The selection of UCSB as a research site allows for comparison of science-related social interactions that arise within classroom, laboratory, and informal settings while holding relatively constant many of the variables that would intervene in a cross-institution comparison.It is anticipated that reporting a scientist identity will correlate with displaying such an identity interactionally via linguistic features. It is also hypothesized that the display of a scientist identity will be favored in contexts such as research settings, which allow students to make claims or introduce new information rather than report already established facts. The primary focus of the analysis is on women's experiences and interactions in undergraduate science, but male undergraduate science majors in all three groups are included to provide a cross-gender comparison. It is expected that interactions that promote women's retention in science will also promote men's, and hence the educational recommendations based on the findings will not only help women advance in science careers but will also expand the ranks of U.S. scientists generally.Intellectual merit: A detailed understanding of the specific linguistic and interactional practices that encourage women to adopt scientist identities and to persist in STEM majors is of crucial importance in increasing the number of women seeking careers in STEM. The study builds on existing findings regarding the role of social interaction in undergraduate women's retention in STEM, yet offers a new conceptual and methodological direction for the investigation of this issue by expanding from the domain of reported experiences to the heretofore little-explored arena of naturally occurring science-related social interaction at the undergraduate level. In addition, where a great deal of previous research on gender and undergraduate science education emphasizes factors inhibiting women's pursuit of science, the proposed study focuses on undergraduate women who have made a commitment to science by declaring a science major, in order to discover how daily science-related social interactions contribute to the development of a scientist identity and to retention in the national science pipeline.Broader impacts: The broader impacts of the proposed study will make the findings useful to educators and beneficial to students nationwide. First, the study's combined quantitative and qualitative methods are complementary for the end user as well for analysts: while quantitative data have the advantage of allowing for generalizations that can guide broad strategies of educational policy and practice, qualitative data are concrete, specific, and context-rich, and hence they will be more effective than quantitative evidence in demonstrating to educators, parents, and students the specific interactional practices associated with women's retention in science. The results will be disseminated to the academic research community and through outreach via presentations at high schools, via a website and informational video. These tools will bring the findings to students, parents, educators, and the general public.