Policy Diffusion and Organizational Effects on STEM Women in Higher Education

该项目正在调查旨在增加美国大学各个科学、技术、工程和数学(STEM)领域女性人数的政策和做法的机构传播情况。这项研究是在以前针对个人和职业水平成果的研究的基础上进行的，但它的重点是研究生教育和科学技术教授职位中与性别多样性相关的体制层面的变化和影响。推动这项研究的问题是，一个机构一个部门的创新和改革可能如何影响另一个部门，以及决定政策指令和相关举措是否能够在高等教育研究生层面带来可持续改革的渠道和影响范围。因此，这项研究正在检查制度和组织动力是否导致(或不)在控制不同研究型大学的内部特征和条件的情况下采用(或不)同构的政策采纳和计划。因此，该项目正在审查STEM领域关于性别多样性的政策的横向和纵向制度化及其相关结果，并正在考虑政策先行因素和结果在绘制政策进程和划定政策采纳、传播和大学内部成果方面的影响。该项目正在将机构扩散框架纳入事件历史模型，以捕捉相关问题。它正在检验关于STEM领域性别多样性政策的横向和纵向制度化(聚合和分类)及其相对结果的八个假设。对政策通过和反应时间的事件历史分析有助于调查扩散过程中的时间变异性以及外部力量颁布的组织方案和倡议的影响。拟议的研究的智力价值在于它为描述和理解机构变革提供了新的见解。扩散框架方法的一个优点是，它允许同时对内部和外部过程进行经验分析。通过侧重于纵向和横向扩散，并考虑体制进程和动态，该研究提供了一种比典型的STEM妇女个人层面研究更全面的方法和框架。因此，它将有助于更广泛地理解机构动态作为政策进程的一个基本特征，并有助于描述和说明相关传播过程的理论基础。这项研究的更广泛影响在于它有助于了解象征性和实践性的机构和文化动态，并将其进一步应用于各种社会科学和教育领域的探索性工作。预计这项研究还将提供洞察，了解旨在增加授予女性的STEM研究生学位以及教师招聘和晋升的政策如何在整个大学和跨大学实施，以及如何在不同条件下更普遍地应用这些政策。

This project is investigating the institutional diffusion of policies and practices that have aimed at increasing the number of women in the various science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) fields in United States universities. This study is building upon previous studies directed at individual and career level outcomes, but its focus is on institutional level changes and effects relative to gender diversity in graduate education and in the science and technology professoriate. The research is being driven by questions on how innovations and reforms in one part of an institution might impact another and about the channels and spheres of influence that determine whether policy directives and related initiatives can lead to sustainable reform at the graduate level in higher education. Accordingly, the research is examining whether institutional and organizational dynamics lead to isomorphic policy adoption and programs (or not) while controlling for internal characteristics and conditions in various research universities. Thus this project is examining both the horizontal and the vertical institutionalization of policies on gender diversity in STEM fields and their relative outcomes, and is considering the effect of policy antecedents and consequences in mapping the policy process and delineating policy adoption, diffusion, and outcomes across and within universities. The project is incorporating an institutional diffusion framework into an event-history model to capture related issues. It is testing eight hypotheses about the horizontal and the vertical institutionalization of policies on gender diversity in STEM fields (aggregated and disaggregated) and their relative outcomes. Event-history analyses of the timing of policy adoptions and responses facilitate the investigation of temporal variability in the diffusion process and the impact of organizational programs and initiatives promulgated by external forces.The intellectual merit of the proposed study lies in the fresh insights that it is providing for characterizing and understanding institutional transformation. An advantage of the diffusion framework approach is that it is allowing simultaneous empirical analysis of internal and external processes. By focusing on vertical and horizontal diffusion and considering institutional processes and dynamics, the study is providing a more comprehensive approach and framework than can be found in typical individual level studies of STEM women. Thus, it will contribute to a broader understanding of institutional dynamics as a fundamental feature of the policy process and will allow for delineation and specification of the theoretical underpinnings for related diffusion processes.The broader impact of the study lies in its contribution to knowledge of both symbolic and practical institutional and cultural dynamics and their further application to exploratory efforts in a variety of social scientific and education fields. The study is expected to also provide insight into how policies aimed at increasing graduate STEM degrees awarded to women and at faculty recruitment and advancement can be implemented throughout and across universities and how they can be applied more generally under different conditions.