  Prior work shows that men and women speak with different levels of
confidence, though it's often assumed that these differences are innate or are
learned in early childhood. Using academic publishing as a setting, we find
that language differences across male and female authors are initially
negligible: in first drafts of academic manuscripts, men and women write with
similar levels of uncertainty. However, when we trace those early drafts to
their published versions, a substantial gender gap in linguistic uncertainty
arises. That is, women increase their use of cautionary language through the
publication process more than men. We show this increase in the linguistic
gender gap varies substantially based on editor assignment. Specifically, our
author-to-editor matched dataset allows us to estimate editor-specific fixed
effects, capturing how specific editors impact the change in linguistic
uncertainty for female authors relative to male authors (the editor's
author-gender gap). Editors' author-gender gaps vary widely, and correlate with
observable editor characteristics such as societal norms in their
country-of-origin, their work history, and the year that they obtained their
PhD. Overall, our study suggests that a woman's "voice" is partially shaped by
external forces, and it highlights the critical role of editors in shaping how
female academics communicate.
