<p>The short answer: <strong>No, sex differences in professions is not a good basis for judging the intelligence of males and females</strong>.</p>
<p>I would like to address some of the assumptions and misconceptions in the question. First, I would like to deconstruct the question, and then answer it.</p>
<h3>Deconstructing the question</h3>
<p>One of the earlier titles of the question was &quot;Are men more intelligent than women?&quot;. It starts with the observation that there are more males who work in areas related to mathematics and programming, therefore males are more intelligent.</p>
<p>I think this is a common bias in humans. People know a lot about their area of expertise and then judge others by their lack of understanding of what they are experts in. To take a stereotypical example, perhaps a female clinical psychologist, doctor,  or lawyer may wonder why so many males are mathematicians and programmers. She might think that this is because they lack the intelligence to function effectively in domains that require strong interpersonal skills. I am not defending this point of view either. I merely intend to highlight that to judge others by your own standards of what represents intelligence is problematic.</p>
<h3>Answering the question</h3>
<p>Have a read of page 91 of &quot;Intelligence: Knowns and Unknowns&quot;, which represents the position of a large reputable APA task force of leading intelligence researchers. Summarising a huge literature, males tend to perform much better on visual-spatial intelligence test items such as mental rotation and tracking moving objects. Females often perform better on verbal abilities such as synonym generation and verbal fluency. Overall, there is minimal difference in full-scale IQ.</p>
<p>You could also have a read of Hide's (2005) summary of meta-analytic sex differences across a wide range of cognitive tests.</p>
<blockquote>
<p>Here, the author advances a very different view, the gender
similarities hypothesis, which holds that males and females are
similar on most, but not all, psychological variables.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>However, this only addresses mean differences, and there is certainly much greater differences within sexes than between.</p>
<h3>References</h3>
<ul>
<li>Neisser, U., Boodoo, G., Bouchard Jr, T. J., Boykin, A. W., Brody, N., Ceci, S. J., ... &amp; Urbina, S. (1996). Intelligence: Knowns and unknowns. American psychologist, 51(2), 77. <a href="http://www.gifted.uconn.edu/siegle/research/correlation/intelligence.pdf" rel="noreferrer">PDF</a></li>
<li>Hyde, J. S. (2005). The gender similarities hypothesis. American psychologist, 60(6), 581. <a href="http://www.careerpioneernetwork.org/wwwroot/userfiles/files/the_gender_similarities_hypothesis.pdf" rel="noreferrer">PDF</a></li>
</ul>

CC BY-SA 3.0
2017-08-16T14:33:07.237Z
"You could also have a read of Hide's [sic] (2005) summary of meta-analytic sex differences across a wide range of cognitive tests." Hyde says next to nothing about intelligence and quantifies what he means by "similarity" sparsely. The [meta-analysis by Lynn and Irwing](http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0160289604000492) that is in Hyde's list of references (but cited nowhere in the paper that I could see) comes up with a 5 point higher IQ mean in adult men compared to adult women.
G. Bach
CC BY-SA 3.0
2017-08-16T14:37:37.297Z
The portion on sex differences in Neisser et al. starts with "Most standard 
tests of intelligence have been constructed so that there are no overall score differences between females and males. Some recent studies do report sex differences in IQ, but the direction is variable and the effects are small[.]", it doesn't quantify what it means by small. I can well see a 5 point difference to fall under that description.
G. Bach
CC BY-SA 3.0
2017-08-16T14:42:32.743Z
A [longitudinal study by Lynn & Kanazawa, 2011](http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0191886911001048) reports a standard deviation of 15.2 for boys aged 7 and 15.6 for the same boys aged 16, the numbers for girls are 14.7 at 7 and 14.3 at 16. These differences could also be called "small" by Neisser et al. Note that if the trend indicated by those numbers continues over a lifetime, the adult male SD in IQ may well be almost 2 points higher than that of women, and even 1.3 is small, but significant already. Higher mean and SD imply significantly more men in the high percentiles.
G. Bach
CC BY-SA 4.0
2021-02-13T04:12:56.067Z
Interestingly, a [recent study](https://doi.org/10.1016/j.cognition.2018.10.005) suggests that visual-spatial ability may in fact be the reason for womens' low representation in STEM occupations: "... the link between sex differences in spatial and math anxiety may be a consequence of sex-differences in the degree to which individuals use spatial versus non-spatial (e.g., verbal) strategies when solving mathematical tasks. Overall, our results may provide a significant advance in understanding why women are under-represented in STEM-related disciplines."
Arnon Weinberg
CC BY-SA 3.0
2014-01-30T00:55:47.293Z
2015-01-18T22:34:36.050Z
2020-06-17T09:55:31.633Z
Jeromy Anglim
<blockquote>
  <p><a href="https://www.ibm.com/developerworks/mydeveloperworks/blogs/invisiblethread/entry/quality_assurance_for_dependable_systems1?lang=en" rel="nofollow">Developing software is simultaneously artistic and scientific, which accounts for its appeal for some of the smartest and intuitive people on the planet</a></p>
</blockquote>

<p>There is a generally observable and most likely a statistically provable <a href="http://articles.latimes.com/2013/oct/24/business/la-fi-tech-sexism-20131024" rel="nofollow">scarcity of women in the</a> programmer community.</p>

<p>Would it be right to conclude from this that men are generally more intelligent than women? If so, what's the cause of this? And if not, why?</p>

CC BY-SA 3.0
2014-01-29T19:02:53.117Z
It is certainly a different question, not necessarily a better one. "*statistically provable* scarcity of women" but a link to an essay?  Why other remarks or question - there should be ONE question per question.  Plus, in general, before asking here some proof of initial research is welcome.
Piotr Migdal
CC BY-SA 3.0
2014-01-30T01:00:45.470Z
I hope the question doesn't get closed. I think the question embodies a view held in the community, and I hope that well reasoned answers can help separate stereotypes and misconceptions from the scientific evidence.
Jeromy Anglim
CC BY-SA 3.0
2014-01-30T11:51:25.793Z
@JeromyAnglim My objections are not related to the question subject (I don't care much for political correctness or being polite), but the lack of research/effort by OP (at least starting with wikipedia, any job census or whatever - it is not a niche problem!). But TU for you - great answer to a so-so question!
Piotr Migdal
CC BY-SA 3.0
2015-02-23T14:02:52.787Z
Maybe the correct placement of commas is a better indication?
RedSonja
CC BY-SA 3.0
2016-02-02T23:37:04.193Z
I don't think the question is all that bad, but there really should be a better source than a link to a newspaper article, if possible. It is not hard to find sources for the claim, after all.
jona
CC BY-SA 4.0
2023-07-03T00:41:44.150Z
If intelligence is defined as analytical deduction, then men would be as smarter.  As a result, you see more men in engineering and programming fields.  And, I would suggest that this is a legitimate way to define intelligence.  I would even go as far as to suggest that perhaps, we shouldn't factor in verbal ability so much when calculating g.  But, I don't think this proclivity towards math is genetic.  I'd suggest that it's something linked to the nature of being a boy.
QuietInMontana
<intelligence><sex-differences>
Does the scarcity of female programmers, suggest that men are more intelligent than women?
Bleeding Fingers
# Does the scarcity of female programmers, suggest that men are more intelligent than women?

(Asked by: username_0 on 2014-01-29)

> [Developing software is simultaneously artistic and scientific, which accounts for its appeal for some of the smartest and intuitive people on the planet](https://www.ibm.com/developerworks/mydeveloperworks/blogs/invisiblethread/entry/quality_assurance_for_dependable_systems1?lang=en)

There is a generally observable and most likely a statistically provable [scarcity of women in the](http://articles.latimes.com/2013/oct/24/business/la-fi-tech-sexism-20131024) programmer community.

Would it be right to conclude from this that men are generally more intelligent than women? If so, what's the cause of this? And if not, why?

**Tags:** intelligence, sex-differences

> **Comments:**
> **username_1**: It is certainly a different question, not necessarily a better one. "*statistically provable* scarcity of women" but a link to an essay?  Why other remarks or question - there should be ONE question per question.  Plus, in general, before asking here some proof of initial research is welcome.  
> **username_2**: I hope the question doesn't get closed. I think the question embodies a view held in the community, and I hope that well reasoned answers can help separate stereotypes and misconceptions from the scientific evidence.  
> **username_1**: @JeromyAnglim My objections are not related to the question subject (I don't care much for political correctness or being polite), but the lack of research/effort by OP (at least starting with wikipedia, any job census or whatever - it is not a niche problem!). But TU for you - great answer to a so-so question!  
> **username_3**: Maybe the correct placement of commas is a better indication?  
> **username_4**: I don't think the question is all that bad, but there really should be a better source than a link to a newspaper article, if possible. It is not hard to find sources for the claim, after all.  
> **username_5**: If intelligence is defined as analytical deduction, then men would be as smarter.  As a result, you see more men in engineering and programming fields.  And, I would suggest that this is a legitimate way to define intelligence.  I would even go as far as to suggest that perhaps, we shouldn't factor in verbal ability so much when calculating g.  But, I don't think this proclivity towards math is genetic.  I'd suggest that it's something linked to the nature of being a boy.  

---

## 1 answers

### Answer by username_2 on 2014-01-30. Score: 23 | Accepted answer

The short answer: **No, sex differences in professions is not a good basis for judging the intelligence of males and females**.

I would like to address some of the assumptions and misconceptions in the question. First, I would like to deconstruct the question, and then answer it.

### Deconstructing the question

One of the earlier titles of the question was "Are men more intelligent than women?". It starts with the observation that there are more males who work in areas related to mathematics and programming, therefore males are more intelligent.

I think this is a common bias in humans. People know a lot about their area of expertise and then judge others by their lack of understanding of what they are experts in. To take a stereotypical example, perhaps a female clinical psychologist, doctor, or lawyer may wonder why so many males are mathematicians and programmers. She might think that this is because they lack the intelligence to function effectively in domains that require strong interpersonal skills. I am not defending this point of view either. I merely intend to highlight that to judge others by your own standards of what represents intelligence is problematic.

### Answering the question

Have a read of page 91 of "Intelligence: Knowns and Unknowns", which represents the position of a large reputable APA task force of leading intelligence researchers. Summarising a huge literature, males tend to perform much better on visual-spatial intelligence test items such as mental rotation and tracking moving objects. Females often perform better on verbal abilities such as synonym generation and verbal fluency. Overall, there is minimal difference in full-scale IQ.

You could also have a read of Hide's (2005) summary of meta-analytic sex differences across a wide range of cognitive tests.

> Here, the author advances a very different view, the gender
> similarities hypothesis, which holds that males and females are
> similar on most, but not all, psychological variables.

However, this only addresses mean differences, and there is certainly much greater differences within sexes than between.

### References

* Neisser, U., Boodoo, G., Bouchard Jr, T. J., Boykin, A. W., Brody, N., Ceci, S. J., ... & Urbina, S. (1996). Intelligence: Knowns and unknowns. American psychologist, 51(2), 77. [PDF](http://www.gifted.uconn.edu/siegle/research/correlation/intelligence.pdf)
* Hyde, J. S. (2005). The gender similarities hypothesis. American psychologist, 60(6), 581. [PDF](http://www.careerpioneernetwork.org/wwwroot/userfiles/files/the_gender_similarities_hypothesis.pdf)

> **Comments:**
> **username_6**: "You could also have a read of Hide's [sic] (2005) summary of meta-analytic sex differences across a wide range of cognitive tests." Hyde says next to nothing about intelligence and quantifies what he means by "similarity" sparsely. The [meta-analysis by Lynn and Irwing](http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0160289604000492) that is in Hyde's list of references (but cited nowhere in the paper that I could see) comes up with a 5 point higher IQ mean in adult men compared to adult women.  
> **username_6**: The portion on sex differences in Neisser et al. starts with "Most standard  tests of intelligence have been constructed so that there are no overall score differences between females and males. Some recent studies do report sex differences in IQ, but the direction is variable and the effects are small[.]", it doesn't quantify what it means by small. I can well see a 5 point difference to fall under that description.  
> **username_6**: A [longitudinal study by Lynn & Kanazawa, 2011](http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0191886911001048) reports a standard deviation of 15.2 for boys aged 7 and 15.6 for the same boys aged 16, the numbers for girls are 14.7 at 7 and 14.3 at 16. These differences could also be called "small" by Neisser et al. Note that if the trend indicated by those numbers continues over a lifetime, the adult male SD in IQ may well be almost 2 points higher than that of women, and even 1.3 is small, but significant already. Higher mean and SD imply significantly more men in the high percentiles.  
> **username_7**: Interestingly, a [recent study](https://doi.org/10.1016/j.cognition.2018.10.005) suggests that visual-spatial ability may in fact be the reason for womens' low representation in STEM occupations: "... the link between sex differences in spatial and math anxiety may be a consequence of sex-differences in the degree to which individuals use spatial versus non-spatial (e.g., verbal) strategies when solving mathematical tasks. Overall, our results may provide a significant advance in understanding why women are under-represented in STEM-related disciplines."  

---

