Simple Observations and Simple Data: Increasing Female Success in an Introductory Course

ABSTRACT

The study discusses the insertion of experimental course materials into a general education political science course in an effort to increase female student success. The experimental materials highlighted women serving in political office, with a goal of combatting stereotype threat. Stereotype threat occurs when a person is aware of a negative performance stereotype and the awareness causes anxiety, resulting in poor performance; this phenomenon occurs in fields where gender stereotypes exist. This study uses documented methods of stereotype threat-mitigation from the fields of science, math, and psychology and applies them to the political science classroom. The experiment used materials that were already slated for update, and simple statistics were used to evaluate impact on success.

Notes

¹ The study was approved by the Texas Woman’s University institutional review board, under protocol 19623, which allowed for the use of grade data in anonymized form.