Strictly my opinion: There are few women in software engineering because few women WANT to be in software engineering, period. ...and it's not a given that this is by definition a bad thing for them either.

Or at least arkward. When I started to study IT, I was surprised to see, that the stereotypes were the majority. Meaning, long, oily hair, etc.

So I guess that is still changing, and I really do not believe 50% women should be the goal, but maybe the IT world still needs reflection sometimes, why so little women want to get into it.

Not only is 85% a really large part of the majority of everyone employed, and a higher number than in the US, but for any male dominated sector there is a equal large female dominated one. In addition, the trend has been for the last 50 years of ever increasing gender segregation.

If sexist atmosphere is the culprit then the numbers makes no sense at all. People like to throw in the gender paradox, but that is more of an observation rather than explanation. If we go by the data the cause must be very fundamental, exist in practically all work places, and have equal force at both women and men.

I personally ascribe the phenomenon to a pretty old theory from the 1970. People feel slightly more confident and secure in a decision when they mimic decisions of people they identify with. From the first moment someone choose a education path, to succeeding and failing with exams, to applying for jobs, to succeeding and failing in the job, each time the benefit of feeling more confident and secure apply a small bias. You thus get a leaky pipe, and the more equality in choice people have in every step the higher the probability is that you end up with a gender segregated work place by the time people are in the mid 40s or 50s. If we wanted to prevent this we would need to raise confidence of any minority (gender, race, wealth, background, anything that people identify with) to be identical to the observed effect. In my view this is the primary reason mentor programs actually work, while looking at atmosphere (sensitivity training comes to mind) is unlikely to change the outcome.

Of note is that the percentage of open source programmers who are women is half that of the broader industry, despite open source programming generally involving less face-to-face interaction. Surely, if women were scared away by ugly creepy nerds, the safety from behind a screen and absence of compelled personal interaction would tend to bring them out? It would seem to be suggestive that far fewer women enjoy doing that sort of thing for fun.

Incidentally, we have a nursing shortage. The incidence of male nurses is similarly low to female programmers. I find it amusing that no one hand wrings about this, or would dare make comments like "maybe men don't want to be nurses because nurses are ugly".

I don't see at all how an environment full of unattractive and not well-socialized people create an environment that is in any way hostile to women.

But superficial people who, when female, will play the feminism card against people who happen to be unattractive and not well-socialized do create a hostile work environment for the latter group.

No. Genes play a role, but attractiveness is not so much about looks as it is about confidence and self esteem (and smell, of course).

I was considered very ugly in my youth. And yes, I compensated with computers. I did not got much experience with girls in teenage years.

Then I traveled, studied and grew in my mind and confidence.

And today, well, lets just say, sometimes I am still confused, when very attractive women flirt with me, as my old me would have considered them to be way out of league.

Now I know how to play the game, so to say, but in the beginning, I know I hurt quite some feelings and was probably considered arrogant, when I simply did not know how to respond.

So, I got out of the basement. But:

"I don't see at all how an environment full of unattractive and not well-socialized people create an environment that is in any way hostile to women."

many nerds never did. They long for women, but never learned the game and sometimes think, they are too ugly etc. bullshit.

So when you have lots of men with unfullfiled desires and weak confidence or knowledge regarding women ... then yes, they act awkward towards women. They would like to bond, but don't knowmhow and think they never can. So not hostile, but awkward, so quite some women feel uncomfortable and rather leave.

Now to be clear, no, not every IT nerd is like this. But too many. I was one of them once.

Exhibit A: Physical unattractiveness pairing off with acting like you're not unattractive, perhaps because of some misguided Disney-movie philosophy about how self-confidence makes you attractive. Somebody acting like Johnny Depp when they look like Patton Oswalt is pretty much the definition of creepy, while somebody acting like Patton Oswalt when they look like Patton Oswalt may be perfectly acceptable.

Exhibit B: Up until this point of the conversation, attractive/unattractive was in reference to the presence/absence of factors that make women uncomfortable when being around you, which does not really extend very far into the sexual realm. And all of a sudden you start talking about bonding, longing, unfulfilled desires, flirting, playing the game, hurt feelings, etc. That is precisely what women want men in the workplace to steer clear of, when they look like Patton Oswalt.

I rest my case.

It is even more creepy, when someone "acts" like looking good, when he actually believes inside, he does not.

But when someone believes he looks good and feels actually good in his body, no matter the weight fot example, then this person does look good. (to most people) But that does not mean, that suddenly everyone wants to have sex with him or her.

You seem to took the hollywood definition, that attractiveness is objectivly measurable on a linear scale. With sexiest woman toplist etc. That is bullshit. There are general things if course, like healthy body and mind, but attractiveness is highly subjectiv. Eastern areas for example love fat women. Weetern not so much (in general)

And I have seen really "ugly" men (by common standard) with very beautiful women in true love. Because the men had confidence amd strenght and knew is way around in this crazy world and the women loved that strength to feel save.

At university .. I got the impression that quite some people forgot that. Regulary. Also to wash clothes. There is a difference between unattractive and disgusting. And I love open source and fresh air. But I did not enjoy some linux convention for example, because I seemed to be the only one, who minded the bad, worn out air in the rooms. So all of this I find offputting, I suppose is putting of women as well. What is the problem with more hygiene and fresh air and more sensitivity?

And the number of male nurses is increasing.

Why? Complex, I guess. But also not too interesting to me. I am more interested in motivating people in IT towards a healthier live style in general.

Do you realize how this comment would come off if you were talking about women and judging them for their appearance when they went to school to study something utterly unrelated to appearance?

I believe body hygiene is wanted in all professions. (btw. my hair is long, too)

This is hilarious. I don't know if it is more insulting to nerds or to women, but I somehow like it.

Seriously, I don't even know how to begin here...

It's the concept that women have no agency. That other people are responsible for the choices of individual women.

Check out my other post on this thread-- I show three different investigations into the reality:

Regarding occupational interests:

Men prefer working with things, women prefer working with people

But if you want it explained, well above I just said, that many (not all!) IT nerds still fullfill the stereotype in my experience.

And the stereotype is unwashed nerds, who have never been close to a women in a way they wanted, but they want to, but don't know how. So they behave weird with women around.

That makes women uncomfortable and avoiding the scene. Not long hair.

I see what you mean, the real discrimination in tech is against well groomed people! So all the well groomed men and women get pushed out and are forced to study things like business, medicine or law instead!

How do we solve that? I know, we put up posters like "Deodorant is not a sin", have mandatory diversity training days teaching the nerds how to properly shave, and have recruiters float well groomed peoples applications to the top!

Hmm, this is a reason I never heard of. Honestly I haven't come across many men with long hair in 20 years.

Do you think this might be regional? Are there a lot of men with long hair in your area? Perhaps moving countries might help.

I was more speaking of things like body hygiene ...

well, stereotypes don't appear out of thin air.

but think about it : when you started to study IT, you had to enroll a few months before, right ? the 1B$ question is why, with the information you had you chose to enroll, while many women with the same information do not. If we don't solve this, there's no chance to get anywhere near 50% parity in the workplace.

Edit: citation https://www.theguardian.com/careers/2017/aug/10/how-the-tech...

The fact that data entry was a female dominated profession because women were pushed into it and men discouraged from it doesn't serve to prove that current women are not able to work in the field.

There was a time that nobody would have considered education peasants. It was not a conscious bias.

Times have changed and will continue to do so, we need to do what we can to correct the mistakes of the past.

Independent autonomous people making decisions about which field they would like to study and seek employment in is not a mistake that needs correcting.

In order to study CS at my school you had to take some fairly advanced Math classes including Calculus and Linear Algebra, which are not easy unless you are comfortable with Math.

My SO codes but hated anything girly from a very young age and was constantly told she wasn't acting ladylike.

Those experiences are from prior to encountering the effects from the rest of society. My SO was diagnosed with ASD as an adult but has had elevated testosterone levels found at a young age. So just personally it feels weird attributing those things to upbringing.

And Sweden where I am really shouldn't have as few women in tech as we do either if it was based on gender roles in upbringing.

I wish. I have a baby and the most important question is allways: a boy or a girl? (Not: healthy? Everything allright? Hard birth? (Yes, allmost, yes))

And clothes, very important the distinction between boy and girl. We got a lot of second hand clothing ... and people did not understand, that I really don't car about the color shades. They should be comfortable, good to the babyskin and fitting for the weather. And good looking, yeah, that comes afterwards. But underlining that it is a son? Why?

The reality is pretty much the opposite, with Eastern Europeans, Indians and Chinese being overrepresented in software engineering and higher degrees in STEM subjects.

Maybe women have less of a chance to get something in that field because employers are specifically excluding them from their job ad targeting?