  A significant gender disparity is widely known to occur within the fields of
science, technology, engineering and mathematics (STEM). Women are both
under-represented in their participation in Australian STEM education (compared
to their fraction within the population at large), and face a much higher
attrition rate from STEM subjects throughout secondary and tertiary education.
Even within STEM careers the proportion of women frequently generally decreases
with increasing position of seniority. In 2015 organisers and members of the
Australian Space Research Community began to analyse the data from participants
of the Australian Space Research Conference, in order to derive statistics
relating to the gender balance of the conference. In this paper, the data from
the most recent conference (held on the Gold Coast, in September 2018) is
analysed, considering the gender demographics of delegates, presenters (within
numerous categories), and awards. This year, we also present the dimensions of
career type and academic level of conference attendees. The resulting trends
are compared to those of other national space research conferences - the
Scientific Meeting of the Astronomical Society of Australia. The results show
that the representation of females dropped to the lowest levels since formal
data collection began in 2015, with females comprising 23% of conference
attendees, and 21% of all session presentations (posters and talks combined).
Gender parity was achieved however amongst the invited Plenary presentations.
Recommendations for removing some of the barriers to female participation in
the conference and encouraging greater gender balance and diversity in future
are discussed.
