Are women ready to rule the world? Yes, according to Australian bio-ethicist Dr. Robert Sparrow, who suggested at a medical convention this past July that females could use frozen sperm to procreate and exist without men.
Women have steadily been gaining power over the last few decades, becoming a stronger presence in science and the military, as well as the political scene - this has especially been seen in Sen. Hillary Clinton's presidential campaign, and the recent nomination of Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin as the Republican Vice Presidential candidate.
However, women still remain underrepresented in science, technology, engineering and mathematics (known as STEM careers), according to UW-Madison professor Janet Hyde in her study in the July 25 issue of Science, fueling the ongoing debate over whether one gender is smarter than the other.
Hyde's study, Gender Similarities Characterize Math Performance,"" surveyed cognitive testing in mathematics in grades 2-11 across 10 states in order to analyze the relationship between gender and average performance and score variability.
Results indicated girls perform equally well as boys in math, but the study could not explain lopsided gender numbers in most STEM fields.
Although Hyde's study focused on subjects under the age of 18, a controversial U.K. study in 2005 insisted men beyond the age of 14 score an average of five points higher on IQ tests than women in the same age category.
The findings, however, were disputed in the journal Nature later that year, when author Steve Blinkhorn argued the test-taking research used in the study was flawed, and ""sex differences in average IQ, if they exist, are too small to be interesting.""
UW-Madison professor of plant pathology Caitilyn Allen said the IQ test has shown ""cultural, racial and gender biases,"" and scores vary with factors such as ""education, income and degree of Westernization,"" which suggests score differences between sexes are not necessarily biological.
""Some researchers, and maybe the pop press too, really seem to want to find biological explanations for gender differences in intelligence and science ability,"" Allen said. ""But the fact that just 50 years ago there were nearly no women professors in the sciences and math suggest that inborn intellectual deficiencies were not holding women back. It was social prejudice.""
Allen added most research on intelligence is based on test performance, which is often affected by the test-taker's expectations. Certain expectations can lead to lower scores, such as the ""stereotype threat.""
""If you tell a group of women that females typically score lower than males in math and then give them a math test, those women will score lower on average than a similar group who are just given the test and not told anything,"" Allen said. ""So if women go into a test thinking 'Oh, this will be bad, everyone says girls are bad at math,' they'll get a lower score than an equally competent male.""
Women also tend to perceive themselves as being less smart than men, according to a 2008 Newsweek article. In the article, British researcher Adrian Furnham explained that men are not any smarter than women but tend to overstate their abilities, creating a false ""perceived intelligence.""
""Who gets a job?"" Furnham asked. ""A bright woman who doesn't think she's smart or a not-so-smart man who believes he's capable of anything?""
Women are also presented with more tangible obstacles when it comes to entering the STEM fields.
""The field of physics in general has more male professors and scientists, thus there are fewer role models in general for females to seek guidance,""
Jon Brown, UW-Madison senior and president of the Physics Club, said. He added the physics department has a Climate and Diversity Committee meant to address this and other issues.
Chair of Industrial Systems and Engineering Program Patti Brennan remarked that industrial engineering draws in more women than any other part of the School of Engineering - most likely because there are women already there.
""I think it's really important to know that there is a critical mass factor,"" Brennan said. ""That is, you're more likely to see women go into fields where they see people like themselves.""
Brennan said industrial engineering requires good social skills and the ability to work with a team, so it may also be ""an affinity to interaction"" that brings women in. In addition, Brennan found her female students to be more responsive to her highly interactive approach to teaching than her male students.
""I have to be careful to think more specifically about how I interact with young men to make sure they stay engaged in the class,"" Brennan said. ""I'm persuaded that young people learn differently because of their genders, and they respond to different types of teaching.""
Some high schools, such as Arrowhead High School in Merton, Wis., have begun to offer single-sex classes, teaching the same concept to both genders but approaching it in different ways. Such a teaching structure could potentially increase the number of women who pursue science and math in college.
Brennan explained the examples that draw women in seem different than those that draw in men.
""In describing physics to young men, you would use the velocity of a car or speed of a baseball - very physical analogies presented,"" Brennan said.
""Women talk about why light is used in certain ways or why images show up in a different way based on the amount of backlight.""
At UW-Madison, however, Brown said students in the Physics Club ""work together without preconceived notions of ability.""
""We don't want people to think that the genders are isolated or are in competition with each other,"" Brown said, adding that 30 percent of the Physics Club is female, with two of the six officers being women.
The modern debate over gender intelligence seems to be less about IQ and more about what each sex can do, as old methods of testing become dated and inapplicable to today's ever-changing culture.
Although women may not take over the world as Dr. Sparrow suggested, they seem poised to make a great impact in fields where they are typically underrepresented.
""I think it's wonderful that women are becoming more common in technical fields as stereotypes and barriers fall,"" Allen said. ""Our biggest problems, like global warming, food insecurity, and emerging diseases, all urgently need technical solutions - in times like these, we can't afford to ignore the talents of half the human race.""
