No intrinsic gender differences in children's earliest numerical abilities

Abstract

Recent public discussions have suggested that the under-representation of women in science and mathematics careers can be traced back to intrinsic differences in aptitude. However, true gender differences are difficult to assess because sociocultural influences enter at an early point in childhood. If these claims of intrinsic differences are true, then gender differences in quantitative and mathematical abilities should emerge early in human development. We examined cross-sectional gender differences in mathematical cognition from over 500 children aged 6 months to 8 years by compiling data from five published studies with unpublished data from longitudinal records. We targeted three key milestones of numerical development: numerosity perception, culturally trained counting, and formal and informal elementary mathematics concepts. In addition to testing for statistical differences between boys' and girls' mean performance and variability, we also tested for statistical equivalence between boys' and girls' performance. Across all stages of numerical development, analyses consistently revealed that boys and girls do not differ in early quantitative and mathematical ability. These findings indicate that boys and girls are equally equipped to reason about mathematics during early childhood.

Fig. 1

Previously described gender similarities. Redrawn data showing no gender differences in early childhood on measures of object processing, numerical processing, and geometric reasoning

Fig. 2

Infant numerosity. a Depiction of numerosity change detection task. b Average percentage of time looking at the numerically changing image stream for girls (red) and boys (blue). Error bars represent standard error of the mean. c Density distributions for percentage of girls (red) and boys (blue) at a given % looking time preference

Fig. 3

Early childhood numerosity. a Average Weber fraction for girls (red) and boys (blue). Error bars represent standard error of the mean. b Growth curves for Weber fractions calculated across girls (red), boys (blue), and all children (black). Lightly shaded areas around girls’ and boys’ growth curves indicate 1 standard deviation above and below the mean growth curve. c Density distributions for percentage of boys (blue) and girls (red) at a given Weber fraction

Fig. 4

Early childhood counting. Growth curves for performance on the a “How High?” task and b “Give-N” task. Growth curves are calculated across girls (red), boys (blue), and all children (black). Lightly shaded areas around boys’ and girls’ growth curves indicate 1 standard deviation above and below the mean growth curve

Fig. 5

Early childhood mathematics. a Average raw TEMA score for girls (red) and boys (blue). Error bars represent standard error of the mean. b Growth curves for performance on TEMA calculated across girls (red), boys (blue), and all children (black). Lightly shaded areas around boys’ and girls’ growth curves indicate 1 standard deviation above and below the mean growth curve. c Density distributions for percentage of girls (red) and boys (blue) at a given raw TEMA score

Fig. 6

Early childhood formal and informal mathematics. a Average proportion correct (mean score) for administered TEMA informal and formal questions for girls (red) and boys (blue). Error bars represent standard error of the mean. b Proportion correct (mean score) for administered Informal and Formal Questions plotted by age. Lightly shaded areas around the regression lines indicate the 95% confidence interval