For computing to serve humanity, computing spaces must be safe for all individuals. While prior work has surfaced how hegemonic racial and gendered expectations manifest in computing, it has only indirectly attended to expectations surrounding neurodivergence. As computing stereotypes largely align with stereotypes of some neurodivergent…

Like other STEM fields, computer science (CS) lacks representation of minorities, such as Black and Hispanic individuals, both in the number of bachelor's degrees obtained and the number of individuals in the CS workforce. Out-of-school CS programs are often designed with the intent to inspire young people to pursue careers in CS. Much of this…

Stereotypes people hold about computer scientists contribute to underrepresentation in computer science. Perceptions of computer scientists have historically been linked to males and a "nerd" culture, which can lead to lack of interest, particularly for girls. This article presents two studies conducted with two groups of middle…

We developed the Draw-A-Computer-Scientist-Test (DACST) to better understand elementary school students' conceptions of computer scientists and the nature of their work. By understanding how young children perceive computer scientists, we can broaden their ideas about the activities and images of computer scientists. We administered the DACST to…

Controversy and fanfare accompanied the announcement in 2010 by Mattel, Inc. of the Barbie® doll's 126th career--computer engineer. Even though women have been and still are in a minority in the information technology (IT) and computer science (CS) fields, enough women voted for the computer engineer as the next career for Barbie® on Mattel's…

Broadening computer science learning to include more students is a crucial item on the United States' education agenda, these authors say. Although policymakers advocate more computer science expertise, computer science offerings in high schools are few--and actually shrinking. In addition, poorly resourced schools with a high percentage of…

Teaching computer programming to novices is a difficult task due to the complex nature of the subject, as negative stereotypes are associated with programming and because introductory programming courses often fail to encourage student understanding. This Protocol outlines the plan that is to be followed in order to investigate the effectiveness…

This study explores the representation of women in computer science at the tertiary level through data collected about undergraduate computer science education at Kabul University in Afghanistan. Previous studies have theorized reasons for underrepresentation of women in computer science, and while many of these reasons are indeed present in…

Among the many reasons for choosing an academic major are stereotypes that students hold of particular occupations and the degree to which they believe that their personalities match those stereotypes. We examined relevant personality characteristics (i.e., achievement motivation, conformity, conscientiousness, creativity and extroversion) of 899…

This paper investigates the Australian literature relating to female under-representation in the information technology (IT) sphere of careers and education. This summary of the current body of literature presented through the lens of the nature of the discipline includes emerging theories that explore the masculinization of the discipline,…

Researchers studying attitudes toward computer careers interviewed 68 students in a university computer science course, 33 secondary school girls, and 19 women working professionally in computer-based careers. Both groups of students tended to stereotype computer-related careers as menial, isolating, and overly technical; this view differed…

Competence-based stereotypes can negatively affect women's performance in math and science (referred to as stereotype threat), presumably leading to lower motivation. The authors examined the effects of stereotype threat on interest, a motivational path not necessarily mediated by performance. They predicted that working on a computer science task…

A questionnaire completed by 928 postsecondary students asked subjects to rate one of two computer scientists on 16 personal attributes. Aside from gender of the ratee, questionnaires were identical. Results indicate that on eight attributes the female was rated significantly more positively than the male. Implications are discussed. (Author/CH)

This study examined Draw-a-Scientist-Test (DAST) images solicited from 212 undergraduate students for the presence of traditional gender stereotypes. Participants were 100 males and 112 females enrolled in psychology or computer science courses with a mean age of 21.02 years. A standard multiple regression generated a model that accounts for the…

Some women have various misconceptions about technology careers. Some of them think that one has to be a geek in order to become a computer scientist. When the Women in Computing Group at Indiana University (WIC@IU) was looking for ideas on how to increase the number of women in computing majors at IU, the authors realized that women were turning…