“This research identifies an element of children’s environments that could be targeted to reduce early gender differences in science behavior among young children.” “The roots of gender disparities in science achievement take hold in early childhood,” Rhodes observes. These findings suggest that efforts encouraging girls to enter science-a field in which they are underrepresented-might benefit from focusing on describing the activity of doing science rather than on encouraging children to adopt scientist identities, at least in early childhood. “These effects particularly hold for children who are the target of stereotypes suggesting that they might not be the kind of person who succeeds in science-in this case, girls,” she adds. “Describing science as actions, by saying ‘let’s do science,’ leads to more science engagement than does describing science in terms of identities, by asking them to ‘be scientists’” explains Marjorie Rhodes, an associate professor in NYU’s Department of Psychology and the senior author of the study, which appears in the journal Psychological Science. Asking young girls to “do science” leads them to show greater persistence in science activities than does asking them to “be scientists,” finds a new psychology study by researchers at New York University and Princeton University.

What do scientists do