Males significantly outnumbered women when portrayed and represented as scientists. For the most part, men are the ones over-represented in scientific roles, 82% of scientists portrayed in the media are men.
Women’s intuitions and emotions are often shown when doing science, sometimes as negative characteristics, while men are shown to do more rational science. There has been a positive increase in the portrayal of female scientists but there are many more depictions casting them as dependent, passive, weak, and emotional, men are more often shown as independent, assertive, and aggressive
A key difference in the portrayal of scientists is the recurring tendency to refer to women as female scientists, you never hear/read: the male scientists.
Media portrayal of scientists is predominately associated with males, they are seen as the norm while women are seen as the exception. Women are seen as tokens in science careers.
Studies show that there is higher emphasis of physical attraction and appearance on women than men. Also, women’s descriptions are more sexualized. Men’s physical description tends to be brief and de-sexualized, often comparing them to past scientist. For example, descriptions of women include “blonde bombshell”, “flicks her blonde tresses in a manner that must make kneecaps quiver among livelier male peers in the House of Lords”, “her tight black pelmet of a skirt barely covers slim thighs encased in black tights””, and, “blonde hair, short skirt, big brain”, descriptions of men include comparing their beards to Albert Einstein or Charles Darwin. This gives the public the impression that women are only sexual objects for men in scientific fields.Women’s accomplishments in men’s fields tend to be invisible or denigrated by the men in the field. Rosalind Franklin was a scientist in the 1950s who was a contributor to the double helix structure of the DNA who was denigrated by Watson stating
"spoke to an audience of fifteen in a quick, nervous style. There was not a trace of warmth or frivolity in her words. And yet I could not regard her as totally uninteresting. Momentarily I wondered how she would look if she took of her glasses and did something to her hair” (Lorber 615).Not only was Watson disregarding her contribution to the double helix model but he also downgraded her professional expertise to looks.
When viewing photographs of scientist, more often times male scientists are photographed as doing science, women tend to be portrayed as using it or overseeing. The media often reinforces and exacerbates stereotypes that undermine women and their abilities to do and comprehend science.The dominating image of scientists as men reflects the absence of women in science and engineering fields.
Even when women are in men dominated jobs, they do not hold the same positions; men hold positions that have higher status and better pay than jobs that women hold in that occupational category. For example engineers, doctors, and surgeons. Surgery is mostly dominated by men, high paid and high prestige; women are over represented in gynecology, family practice, pediatricians, etc. which tend to be lower paid and lower status jobs. Many women are underrepresented in higher position jobs and in certain specialties, both in real life and in the media.
Men are more often quoted than women as expert witnesses, and more likely to be quoted first than women scientists.
Men are more often quoted than women as expert witnesses, and more likely to be quoted first than women scientists.
A common depiction of female scientists is the conflict in balancing their personal live with their professional careers; It is rare for a woman to be successful in all three. There are very few films that show women who have successfully balanced their work with their roles as mothers and wives. The depiction that it is hard to balance family responsibilities with work conveys that women can’t, or shouldn’t enter careers in science if they want a family.
Even though there has been a small increase in the positive portrayal of women in SEMT, the media still exaggerates gender difference, rather than showing the similarities. They tend to focus and emphasize the differences. People are bombarded with media images that sometimes they do not even realize it, they are implicit, but the messages they carry become so ingrained that they leave no room for free thought. The gender schemas produced by media conception of science, and science careers become internalized in children and adults into influencing their perceptions of gender-appropriate roles and careers. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=64PKoAiWhjE
Scientists are stereotyped to be consumed by their careers/research. Images of women in science are portrayed as attractive, for the most part, if not they transformed in films. Women are often excluded from research with male colleagues or from Clubs. They are also perceived as sexual beings for male scientists, undermining their professional expertise.
Ivy is seen as unattractive, turned beautiful, undermined by her male colleague scientist because she is a woman and very emotional/irrational
