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Not feeling recognized as a physics person by instructors and teaching assistants is correlated with female students’ lower grades

Sonja Cwik and Chandralekha Singh
Phys. Rev. Phys. Educ. Res. 18, 010138 – Published 31 May 2022
Physics logo See Research News: Keeping Women in Physics is More Than a Numbers Game

Abstract

Student motivational beliefs in introductory physics courses can influence their course outcomes as well as their retention in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics disciplines and future career aspirations. Prior research has shown that students’ perceived recognition by others as a physics person is important in predicting their physics identity and career choices. This study used validated survey data from 827 students in the first of two college algebra-based introductory physics courses primarily taken by bioscience majors, in which women make up approximately 67% of the class. We investigated how the students’ perceived recognition by instructors and teaching assistants (TAs) as a physics person predicts their grade at the end of a mandatory physics course for bioscience majors in which women are not outnumbered by men. We found that overall women had lower perceived recognition than men as a physics person and their perceived recognition played an important role in predicting course grades controlling for high school GPA and math SAT scores. Since physics as a discipline presents a barrier to women due to deep-rooted societal stereotypes and biases about who can excel in it, the numerical representation of women alone in these courses does not imply that they will feel recognized by their instructors and TAs as a physics person without an intentional effort to make the learning environment equitable and inclusive. These findings suggest that physics instructors and TAs should focus on changing the culture in their physics classes and create an equitable and inclusive learning environment in which students from traditionally marginalized demographic groups, e.g., women, feel recognized, and can excel.

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  • Received 2 November 2021
  • Accepted 22 March 2022

DOI:https://doi.org/10.1103/PhysRevPhysEducRes.18.010138

Published by the American Physical Society under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International license. Further distribution of this work must maintain attribution to the author(s) and the published article’s title, journal citation, and DOI.

Published by the American Physical Society

Physics Subject Headings (PhySH)

Physics Education Research

Research News

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Keeping Women in Physics is More Than a Numbers Game

Published 31 May 2022

In intro-to-physics classes containing more women than men, women still feel out of place, implying that more needs to be done to make physics classrooms feel inclusive.

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Authors & Affiliations

Sonja Cwik and Chandralekha Singh

  • Department of Physics and Astronomy, University of Pittsburgh, Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania 15260, USA

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Issue

Vol. 18, Iss. 1 — January - June 2022

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