Office of Development
Foundation & Corporate Relations / Science Major Trends
2000-2009
Gender Trends in Science Majors at Amherst: 2000-2009
OVERALL TRENDS
· During the 10-year period, about half of all science majors at Amherst were women. This percentage has held fairly steady over the 10 year period.
· When psychology majors (the most popular major for women at Amherst) are factored out, the overall percentage of women majors across the 10 year period drops below 45%. However, in 2009, the number of women non-psychology science majors rose, accounting for nearly half of the total.
Science majors with the most female representation
· The majority of students choosing psychology, neuroscience, biology, and geology majors over the past 10 years were women.
· Psychology is the most popular science major for women at Amherst—it is the science major with both the largest number and percent of women. Over the 10 year period, nearly 68% of all Amherst students who choose to major in psychology were women. The percentage of women majors has dropped slightly in recent years, but, with the exception of the 2007-2008 academic year, has remained above 60%.
· Neuroscience is the second most likely science major to be chosen by Amherst women. An average of 59% of students majoring in neuroscience over the 10 year period were women. The breakout each year by gender for this major is highly variable. For example, in 2007-08, just 39% of students graduating with the major were women, while in 2008-09, 85% of students (11 out 13) majoring in neuroscience were women.
· Biology majors account for the second largest number of science majors at Amherst. More women than men at Amherst consistently choose to major in biology: over the ten year period, an average of 57% of students who graduated with a major in biology were women. The percentage of women majoring in biology has remained fairly consistent throughout the last 10 years.
· Just over half of all students choosing geology as a major over the last 10 years were women. The total number of geology majors each year is too small (<12) for changes over time to be meaningful.
· About half of all chemistry majors at Amherst for the 10 years have been women. In 2009, the number of women at Amherst who graduated with a chemistry major (9) was almost double that of men graduating with the major.
SCIENCE MAJORS WITH THE LEAST FEMALE REPRESENTATION
Computer science, math and physics are the three science majors least likely to be chosen by women. Women make up less than 30% of those graduating with these majors.
· Of all the sciences, women at Amherst are least likely to choose to major in computer science. Since 2006, an average of 3 women, compared to an average of 10 or more men graduated each year with a computer science major. The majority of those who graduate with a major in computer science also have a second or third major (often math, economics or physics).
· Male graduates with a major in mathematics greatly outnumbered female graduates with the major over the last 10 years (29 women vs. 86 men). Recently, numbers of women choosing the major have risen slightly: following a low of 1 female major in 2002, the number of female mathematics majors rose to an average of 3-5 in until 2009, when 6 women graduated with a major in mathematics.
· During the 10 year period, Amherst graduated over three times as many men as women with a major in physics (21 women, compared to 73 men) Numbers have not improved in recent years: in academic years 2006-07, 2007-08 and 2008-09, the number of women graduating from Amherst with a physics major were 0, 3 and 1 respectively.