Where are the female scientists with serious gender imbalance in scientific research circles？

　　Wang Liming, a 33-year-old professor at the Institute of Life Sciences of Zhejiang University, didn’t realize that there was a serious gender imbalance in the scientific research circle until he was asked the question that he couldn’t answer.

　　In his university, the number of female students has been increasing, which is also a national trend. According to the statistics of the Ministry of Education, by 2012, the number of female graduate students in China has surpassed that of male students year after year. According to the data of China Association for Science and Technology, by 2013, there were more than 24 million female scientific and technological workers in China, accounting for almost a quarter of all scientific and technological human resources.

　　In a chat, another professor asked Wang Liming: "There are almost the same number of girls and boys among our students;" But in your institute and mine, the proportion of female professors seems to be less than 10% of the total. So, where did all the girls who didn’t become professors go? Did they disappear out of thin air? "

　　Wang Liming a surprised. As the father of two daughters, he felt that he had an obligation to find out for his daughters what kind of world they would face.

　　He used to study biological problems such as "the combative behavior of fruit flies". This time, he found friends from different universities to help him and sent out a questionnaire on gender issues in domestic academic institutions. Within two weeks, 1600 valid questionnaires were received.

　　The questionnaire confirms the phenomenon of "disappearing girls" in academic circles. 67% of the respondents said that there are "few" or "very few" female professors. Of the more than 1000 professors, only 20% are women. Even in the humanities and social sciences departments that are "more suitable for women’s development" in daily experience, the proportion of female professors does not exceed 30%.

　　Scarcity is not only reflected in the title of professor. According to the data of China Association for Science and Technology, only 5% of academicians of the two academies were women in 2013; Among Changjiang scholars, the proportion of women is 3.9%; Among the winners of China Youth Science and Technology Award, 8.4% are women.

　　A number of studies have pointed out that female researchers have appeared the phenomenon of "high-level absence" — — The more you go to the top of the ivory tower, the fewer women there are.

　　What happened from 24 million to the lonely spire?

　　A fork in the road

　　Yan Ning, a professor in Tsinghua University, has a deep understanding of this.

　　This year, she attended the annual meeting of structural biology in Sweden, and was impressed by the large number of women among the speakers. However, in several international conferences she participated in in in China, it was quite difficult to achieve the international practice of "no less than 20% female reporters".

　　In a speech after returning to China, Yan Ning pointed out that "maybe 70% of our admissions" should be girls if we participate in the doctoral entrance interview every year solely on the basis of the candidates’ performance and on-site performance. In the performance of the laboratory, girls never fall behind. But when it comes to job hunting, differentiation arises. At the PI(Principal investigator) stage, the number of women dropped sharply.

　　"I gradually realized that many girls, especially my own students, are not without strength, just because of the consensus of social families, because they have to do multiple-choice questions at a certain stage, either actively or passively, and they are separated from their originally talented scientific research world. I am really sad." The female scientist who has always disliked being labeled as a "female scientist" said.

　　She has repeatedly advocated "giving fathers the right to take maternity leave" to ensure the consistency of career demands and career development of female scientific and technological workers.

　　Ma Ying, a researcher at China Academy of Science and Technology Development Strategy, has been focusing on female scientific research talents for several years. Every mother engaged in scientific research interviewed by her said: After giving birth, her mind is full of children, and nothing can be stuffed in.

　　At this time, the road in front of them began to branch off.

　　Ma Ying’s investigation found that "life cycle" affected the performance of female researchers, and childbirth was an important node. The average age of female researchers in China is about 30. Before children go to kindergarten (about 3 years old), the task of caring for children is mainly undertaken by women.

　　This seems to be physically inevitable. When the children go to kindergarten, female researchers can still choose to return to their posts, "arrange their time well" and continue their research.

　　In fact, childbirth is only the beginning of a long family life. Ma Ying survey shows that before the age of 35, there is little difference between the number of papers of female researchers and that of their male counterparts. At the age of 36, women began to fall behind, and at the age of 50, there was a significant difference between them and men.

　　Yang Jing (pseudonym), a postdoctoral fellow in astronomy, thinks that she is lucky that she has never left universities and research institutes, compared with those female students who flock to the workplace.

　　She is facing the pressure of post-doctoral leaving the station and striving for establishment. But at present, it seems that this pressure will not be much heavier than other competitors because of gender. After all, the criteria for measuring scientific research work are realistic: the number of papers published, the impact factors of journals, and the size of participating projects. Men and women are the same.

　　There is a new mother among Yang Jing’s friends. For her, childbirth "basically means two years." Pregnancy preparation, breastfeeding and baby care all involve a lot of time and energy. At this time, how the stars work can only be thrown away, and the biggest academic problem is how to stop the little guy from crying.

　　There are many female role models in Yang Jing’s tutors who "take care of family and career". She feels that those women who slow down academically after giving birth just don’t "work hard" to balance. Of course, this is not shameful, because "everyone’s pursuit of happiness" is different.

　　One of Ma Ying’s friends is a couple who graduated in the same year and entered the same research institute. Now they are both over 40. The husband is the leader of the college and the person in charge of an important project, while the wife is engaged in the auxiliary work of scientific research, which is not in the front line of scientific research.

　　"Your grades were better then, do you regret it?" Ma Ying asked her. She smiled and said that it is very satisfying to have a family life.

　　Yang Jing also doesn’t know if she will step back like many female predecessors if she gets married and has children in the future. There are more female students around her, and even after graduation, she never entered the front line of scientific research, but directly engaged in scientific research assistance work, "stable and convenient to take care of the family."

　　The girls in the scientific research world have not disappeared, they are just gradually disappearing.

　　In Wang Liming’s view, it seems that everyone has made the most reasonable choice at the moment, and this personal choice is also worthy of respect, but a greater irrationality has occurred — — This country has lost the scientific research wisdom of half its population.

　　Goodwill discrimination?

　　According to Dong Yige, a doctor of sociology, behind this self-choice is a kind of "self-marginalization" — — "Why do we never ask a man how to balance family and career? He doesn’t need to face this problem at all! "

　　This girl has a beautiful resume: she was admitted to the psychology department of Peking University, then transferred to the University of Hong Kong to finish her undergraduate course, and then went to the University of Chicago to study for a master’s degree in sociology. But as excellent as she is, she often can’t give a satisfactory answer to one question: when to get married.

　　This seems to be one of the compulsory questions for women. "There are some presuppositions of gender in our cultural values, and you will consciously or unconsciously copy this unequal logic." She said.

　　In the ivory tower where the rising channel seems fair and bright, gender discrimination is usually completely unconscious.

　　A survey in Wang Liming found that men and women seem to live in different campuses. The vast majority of female respondents feel the existence of gender discrimination in academic activities and daily life. On the contrary, most of the men interviewed are not aware of the existence of gender discrimination.

　　In the eyes of girls, this discrimination is invisible and wrapped in goodwill.

　　Yang Jing’s teacher once expressed ardent expectations for her: "Although you are a girl, I hope you will be more demanding of yourself." Yang Jing is very motivated, but at the same time she vaguely feels that this acquiesces that girls are generally not demanding of themselves.

　　Wang Liming’s side is also full of similar prejudice: "Take more care of girls", "Girls are not suitable for doctoral studies, and it is most reliable to get a master’s degree and find a stable job" … …

　　An important part of Dong Yige’s vomit with other female friends who have studied abroad is — — How can you confidently say such an incorrect thing?

　　When studying in the United States, the professors around her were very sensitive to gender issues. Naturally, any inappropriate remarks will be attacked by public opinion and may even be prosecuted. Even Nobel Prize winners will be bombarded and forced to resign because of sexist remarks.

　　She is serious and often quarrels with discriminatory remarks on the Internet. Interestingly, her supporters are few in the quarreling posts, but she often receives lengthy encouragement in her private mailbox.

　　"Everyone actually knows what is right and wrong, but they just don’t want to express it publicly." Dong Yige analyzed.

　　"Under the great cultural pressure, no one wants to be a trouble maker." She said.

　　"Male territory"?

　　Even if you pay attention to gender issues like Wang Liming now, you won’t "be true to others" when your colleagues get together. Those inappropriate words have been heard, and it is not easy to correct them.

　　Discrimination exists in children’s growth period. Wang Liming often heard teachers say that "girls will fail in high school" or "girls should not study science". At that time, the little boy didn’t feel that there was a problem, but he also gave birth to a sense of superiority. It was not until he entered the university and worked with many female scientists that he realized that his prejudice against women’s abilities was unreasonable.

　　As a father, he began to worry that his daughter would also hear these wrong hints. What should I do?

　　And even the students in elite colleges and universities can’t completely get rid of the soil of the past. There are many excellent girls in his laboratory, with new ideas and good at designing experiments and analyzing problems. But when they choose to graduate, some of them finally choose to leave campus and find a stable job to support their families, even though they still have nostalgia for scientific research.

　　Wang Liming was surprised to find that these girls’ families have a strong sense of son preference, and even if their daughters enter famous schools, they can’t be reversed.

　　He said that in the presupposition of the whole social culture, scientific research is originally a "male territory" — — "When most people talk about science, the first thing they think of is an old man, very wise and deep."

　　Dong Yige thinks that under this presupposition, one of the paths for female researchers to rise is to completely obliterate female identity.

　　This has been verified to be successful. At a meeting of scientists, an 85-year-old scientist who gave birth to three children admitted that he never felt like a woman except on March 8th.

　　Her efforts can be seen as an attempt to tear off the gender label. Another joke that the society responded to was even more unfriendly: "There are three kinds of people in the world, men, women and female doctors."

　　This evaluation once made Yang Jing very uncomfortable. She still tried to "get used to" herself, even making fun of herself before others mentioned it. However, when the work is over and the pressure of reality and the future comes together, she will still feel confused: where can I go?

　　Wang Xiaoyun, a famous female mathematician, recalled in a speech: I really want to have a drink and talk about my work after work, just like my male colleagues. But she still needs to buy food, cook and pick up the children, and her mother can’t talk to her about math. So, she developed a habit of thinking about math problems while doing housework.

　　In Dong Yige’s view, this is a world that belongs to men. She is very tired of people saying that "men and women are not equal, and women are going to climb on top of men", or "my wife is the boss in our family, isn’t that feminist?"

　　She studied sociology and thought that the starting point of seeing all relationships clearly was interest — — When the most cutting-edge research and the most concerned projects are dominated by men, men hold the structural advantage.

　　Wang Liming doesn’t think he is a feminist, but he also regrets: "No matter the research direction, major, discipline and field, as long as it is something that positively affects the world, women are faced with problems. So you say that women have disappeared. In fact, they have disappeared not only from academia, but also from most places that can influence the world. "

　　In Dong Yige’s view, what China is experiencing now has been experienced by the United States.

　　She once asked a very famous female sociologist ambitiously to introduce her topic, research related to gender imbalance in China. The teacher said: This issue is not new in theory, because American academic circles have experienced the second wave of feminist thoughts in the 1960s and 1970s.

　　Many of her teachers are women in their fifties, and they studied for doctors in the 1970s and 1980s. At that time, the women’s movement initiated by the academic circle was bearing fruit, and the first female president appeared in Harvard University, and the American Sociological Society successively produced several female presidents.

　　She looks forward to the day when the current attention to gender issues will blossom and bear fruit.

　　Change is happening after all. The National Natural Science Foundation of China first put forward the policy of "giving priority to women under the same conditions" in the evaluation work in 2010. Since 2011, the upper age limit for women to apply for the Youth Science Fund has been relaxed to 40 years, which increases the application opportunities compared with 35 years for men. In the Science Fund for Outstanding Young Scholars established in 2012, the upper age limit for women to apply was set at 40 years, which increased the application opportunities for two years compared with 38 years for men.

　　Abroad, the Marie Heim project set up by the Swiss National Science Foundation (SNSF) is only for women who "have interrupted or delayed their career development due to family responsibilities or spouse migration". A project of the Dutch Research Council helps women with lower professional titles to carry out scientific research projects.

　　Dong Yige, a girl from Henan, was transferred to Beijing in middle school. She was particularly sensitive to her accent and was often hurt by teasing "outsiders". Later, after studying, she gradually realized that to fight against all discrimination, whether it is against region, race or gender, she needs more vigilance and sensitivity.

　　"Change begins with making clear what is right and wrong in public opinion." She said, "We need a little ‘ Political correctness ’ 。”

　　Therefore, she chose to be true.