Gender, academic abilities and postsecondary educational choices
Journal of Applied Research in Higher Education
ISSN: 2050-7003
Article publication date: 14 June 2018
Issue publication date: 19 June 2018
Abstract
Purpose
Gender inequalities in higher education have attracted interest in the academic literature. The paper aims to discuss this issue.
Design/methodology/approach
The author uses standardized high school final exam results and probit regression analysis to contribute to this highly important discussion.
Findings
Based on secondary, non-survey data, female students tend to outperform males in subjects requiring creativity. Consistent with this comparative advantage, female students also tend to be more affected by their abilities in choosing and preferring the related field of humanities as a higher education. In line with female students’ choices, the results presented in the paper confirm that men are more inclined toward exact and natural sciences, even though they do not prove to have stronger abilities in related subjects. In addition, men are also more influenced by their abilities in obtaining a professional higher education. The choice of social sciences is quite similarly affected by the academic abilities of men and women. The paper also provides evidence that, on average, individuals choose their field of study according to their academic abilities.
Originality/value
For evidence, a data set that makes it possible to relate quantitative measures of very different academic abilities to all major academic disciplines is used in the paper. This unique approach has so far been lacking in the literature due to data limitations. In other words, instead of concentrating on a specific area, such as science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM), the author takes a broader view.
Keywords
Acknowledgements
The author would like to thank Dr Patrick Blessinger and two anonymous referees for their useful suggestions and comments. The author is grateful to Marko Mölder and Estonian Ministry of Education and Science, Lauri Veski and Innove, Aime Lauk and Statistics Estonia for the data and their supportive attitude and efforts for processing my data requests. The author thanks Kristel Vaarmets for proofreading the paper. The author is also grateful to Tõnn Talpsepp, Kristjan Liivamägi, Karsten Staehr and participants of various seminars and conferences for helpful suggestions. This work was supported by the Tallinn University of Technology and the European Union through the European Regional Development Fund.
Citation
Vaarmets, T. (2018), "Gender, academic abilities and postsecondary educational choices", Journal of Applied Research in Higher Education, Vol. 10 No. 3, pp. 380-398. https://doi.org/10.1108/JARHE-12-2017-0155
Publisher
:Emerald Publishing Limited
Copyright © 2018, Emerald Publishing Limited