Microaggressions in Engineering Student Teams: Effects on Learning, Performance, and Persistence

由于工程学是一个男性化的领域，女性工程学学生在学习环境中可能会遇到微妙而普遍的陈规定型信息，这可能会对她们的经历产生负面影响。这个早期阶段的研究项目将确定性别刻板印象的具体行为表现-微侵略-以及它们对学习，表现和入门工程课程团队合作的持久性的累积影响。这种微侵略可能会导致团队的气氛变得不那么欢迎女性。拟议的研究结合了两个领域的强烈研究兴趣（社会科学研究性别定型观念和工程教育的团队合作和气候），以促进了解妇女的代表性不足，在工程相比，男子。该项目的目标是确定和可靠地测量microaggression在实验室为基础的和基于课堂的工程学生项目团队。该研究将测试与男性相比，暴露于微攻击是否会增加感知到的刻板印象威胁，并减少女性在工程方面的归属感，从而导致在学习，表现和持久性等重要工程成果方面有利于男性的性别差距。该研究计划建立在之前NSF资助的研究工作的基础上，包括五项研究活动。研究一的目标是确定微攻击的具体类型（例如，忽视女性的贡献或将女性分配到不太重要的任务）。研究人员将开发一个可靠的微攻击评估程序，并将分析对工程成果（学习，表现和持久性）的影响。在研究二中，基于实验室的数据将补充定性数据报告的学生谁以前参加了工程学生小组项目，通过学生焦点小组。研究三将研究随着时间的推移，在基于班级的团队中发生的微攻击对工程成果的影响。将在一个学期的三个时间点跟踪和观察介绍工程学生团队，以测量微攻击及其对学术和心理结果的影响。 在研究中，四名和五名工程专业的学生（包括女性和男性）将被随机分配观看两个视频中的一个，这两个视频显示了在团队互动中存在或不存在微攻击的学生团队。研究人员将分析不同视频对学生对视频内容的了解以及他们解决问题的持久性的影响。

Because engineering is cast as a masculine field, women engineering students can experience subtle yet pervasive stereotypic messages in their learning environments that can negatively influence their experiences. This early stage research project will identify specific behavioral manifestations of gender stereotypes--microaggressions--and their cumulative effect on learning, performance, and persistence in introductory engineering course teamwork. Such microaggressions may cause the climate of the team to become less welcoming to women. The proposed research unites two areas of strong research interest (social science research on gender stereotypes and engineering education on teamwork and climate) to advance understanding of women's underrepresentation in engineering as compared to men.The goal of the project is to identify and reliably measure microaggressions in both lab-based and classroom-based engineering student project teams. The research will test whether exposure to microaggressions increases perceived stereotype threat and diminishes a sense of belonging in engineering for women compared to men, leading to a gender gap favoring men in the important engineering outcomes of learning, performance, and persistence. The research program builds on prior NSF-funded work of the investigators and includes five research activities. The goal of Study One is to identify the specific types of microaggressions (e.g., ignoring women's contributions or assigning women to less important tasks) occurring in videotaped laboratory-based engineering teams. Researchers will develop a reliable microaggressions assessment procedure, and will analyze effects on engineering outcomes (learning, performance, and persistence). In Study Two, the lab-based data will be supplemented with qualitative data reported by students who previously participated in an engineering student group project, via student focus groups. Study Three will examine the influence of microaggressions occurring in class-based teams on engineering outcomes over time. Introductory engineering student teams will be tracked and observed at three time points in one semester to measure microaggressions and their influence on academic and psychological outcomes. In studies Four and Five engineering students (both women and men) will be randomly assigned to view one of two videos showing student teams in which microaggressions are present or absent in team interactions. The researchers will analyze the effects of the different videos on the students knowledge of the content of the video and their persistence in solving problems.