A Big (Male) Fish in a Small Pond: Gender Differences in the Relationship between Ability Rank and STEM Career Aspirations among Chinese Students

Although empirical evidence has shown that cognitive ability (or intelligence) plays a critical role in the pursuit of STEM careers (science, technology, engineering, and math) among adolescents, little is known about the underlying mechanisms linking cognitive ability to the development of STEM careers. Social-psychological frameworks suggest that we may learn more about the impact of cognitive ability by contextualizing the meaning of an individual’s ability in reference to other students’ ability in the school settings. Building on social comparison theory and stereotype threat theory, we argue that ability rank influences aspiration in STEM careers, even net of underlying ability. Ability rank may shape students’ academic self-concept on math, which may in turn affect aspiration in STEM careers. Alternatively, ability rank may increase students’ STEM aspiration through repeated teacher recognition for their ability and math skills. To evaluate these research questions, we draw on data from China Educational Panel Survey (CEPS) 2013-14 and leverage quasi-experimental variations in class-level ability composition within the same school-grade. We find that higher ability rank increases the likelihood of pursuing STEM careers only among male students, and this gender difference is partly due to the gender gap in math self-concept, but not math teachers’ differential recognition by gender of the student. Our finding also suggests that gender-math stereotype moderates the relationship between ability rank and STEM career aspirations: among students without gender-math stereotype, there is no gender gap in the effect of relative ability on aspiration in STEM careers. Our study sheds some light on the underrepresentation of women in China STEM fields by documenting gender differences in the way in which male and female students are responsive to their relative position within school.