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Conference Program

Overview and details of the sessions of this conference. Please select a date or location to show only sessions at that day or location. Please select a single session for detailed view (with abstracts and downloads if available).

Daily Overview

Session

G.01. Bias, Schooling, and Trajectories in STEM: How to Go Beyond the Gender Gap
Location: Scienze Politiche (CU002): Aula XI "Aldo Moro"

Convenor(s): Marialuisa Villani (Department of Political and Social Sciences, University of Bologna, Italy); Alessia Macagno (Department of Psychology, University of Turin, Italy); Francesca Bianchi (Department of Biomedical Sciences for Health, University of Milan, Italy); Francesca Arnaboldi (Department of Biomedical Sciences for Health, University of Milan, Italy); Silvia Facchinetti (Department of Economics, Management and Quantitative Methods, University of Milan, Italy)

Presentation 1

Beyond Aspirations: Gender Stereotypes, Educational Expectations and STEM Choices among Italian Upper-Secondary Students

Marialuisa Villani¹, Alessia Macagno², Silvia Facchinetti³, Francesca Arnaboldi³, Francesca Bianchi³

1: University of Bologna, Italy; 2: Università degli Studi di Torino; 3: 3Università degli Studi di Milano

Gender inequalities remain deeply embedded within STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics) fields. In Italy, only 16.6% of women aged 25–34 hold a STEM degree compared with 34.5% of men (ISTAT, 2023). This gap reflects the persistence of cultural stereotypes and the limited visibility of female role models in scientific careers(Bilimoria & Lord, 2014; Cheryan et al., 2017). Previous research highlights how social and professional role models shape educational aspirations and influence both students’ and families’ decision-making processes regarding educational pathways (De Vita & Giancola, 2017; Jaoule-Grammare 2024).

Although girls increasingly display higher expectations toward tertiary education (OECD 2025), contributing to the ongoing feminisation of higher education in Italy, STEM fields remain strongly gendered. Structural and cultural mechanisms coexist: while women’s investment in higher education has expanded across Western countries, traditional beliefs portraying STEM disciplines as more suitable for boys continue to influence educational choices, reinforced by gendered performance expectations in mathematics during schooling. Educational expansion therefore coexists with persistent gendered representations of professions.

The project WHEN – Women in science: wHere wE staNd? investigated gender stereotypes related to STEM careers among upper-secondary students, examining how these perceptions shape educational and occupational expectations and how social origin interacts with university choice processes (Arnaboldi et al. 2025).

The study involved 1,642 students enrolled in the fourth and fifth year of upper-secondary schools who participated, between 2023 and 2025, in university orientation initiatives organised by the University of Milan. For the present analysis, we focus on students attending Scientific Lyceum (Italian academic-track upper secondary school) programmes. The analytical sample includes 430 students who completed the pre-intervention questionnaire and a subsample of 205 students who completed both pre- and post-intervention surveys. Data were analysed using paired-sample t-tests, chi-square tests and ANOVA.

Preliminary findings reveal persistent gender stereotypes: male students tend to underestimate female peers’ mathematical abilities, while female students identify work–family reconciliation as a major perceived barrier to scientific careers. However, post-intervention results indicate a reduction in stereotypical perceptions, particularly among female students, who report lower levels of discouragement related to the perceived incompatibility between scientific careers and private life.

By linking gender stereotypes, social origin and educational expectations within a pre–post intervention design, this study contributes to understanding how gender inequalities in STEM are produced not only through structural constraints but also through anticipatory processes shaping students’ imagined futures and perceived opportunity structures (Jaoule-Grammare 2024).