Women in Science and Engineering: Network Access, Participation, and Career Outcomes

This multi-year project addresses the research question: How and why social and professional networks make a difference in the career outcomes of women in STEM careers? We define a network to be a web of formal and informal relationships among members that allows the exchange of resources, information, and activities. In the first part of the study, we will collect and analyze survey data from a national random sample of men and women in post doctoral, assistant professor, and associate professor positions in six fields that vary by gender composition. The analysis will focus on the relationships among network access, network participation, and career outcomes. The research will carefully define career outcomes in terms of traditional outputs and advancement, but also in other terms such as satisfaction, recognizing that network participation may lead to a complex mixture of benefits and costs. The second phase of the project comprises a “critical mentor” analysis designed to map and measure network structure and participation for selected mentors and their mentees. We will collect qualitative and quantitative data from mentor interviews, an in-depth survey of mentees, citation indexes, and mentor curriculum vitae. Overall, this analysis promises to elicit a deeper and more sophisticated understanding of the network structures and behaviors that contribute to women’s effective access to critical networks that affect career advancement and success. Housed in the Department of Public Administration, the Research group helps support a Ph.D. program in Science and Technology through funded projects which enable the training of a new generation of multinational social scientists who recognize the growing importance of such issues in society.

For more information on this project, visit the project website.

Co-PIs: Dr. Julia Melkers, Dr. Eric Welch

Funded by the National Science Foundation (Grant# REC-0529642)

Women in Science and Engineering: National Survey of Alters

Egocentric network data, collected in the national survey of STEM faculty for Women in Science project, enable the linking of ego (survey respondent) with his or her immediate alters (the people named by the respondent). The data collected in this round of project will provide the respondents’ assessments of the nature of the relationships that they have with each alter. This creates a network data set which represents “one step out” (i.e. who knows whom) (Wasserman & Faust, 1994) in the collaboration and advice networks of scientists. Analysis will provide a baseline assessment of the effects of network access and participation on career outcomes of individual scientists.

Co-PIs: Dr. Julia Melkers, Dr. Eric Welch

Funded by the National Science Foundation (Grant# REC-0529642)