The subtle messages that put women off science

Women are being put off working in and studying science by "subtle" messages in the media and society, academics say. Although girls make up more than half GCSE science students - by the time they reach university science departments they are outnumbered by men by a factor of two to one. "It's not that people actually think there are no women in science it's more subtle than that," says Rachel Tibbell, development consultant at the UK Resource Centre for women in science, engineering and technology (UKRC).

She also highlights the lack of female scientists in the media. Further UKRC research suggests scientific experts interviewed on television are five times more likely to be male than female. But are these media images, or lack of them, putting off the female scientists of the future?

Dr Patricia Brekke, a 32-year-old conservation geneticist who has a fellowship at the Institute of Zoology, says: "I wanted to be a female David Attenborough but there was never a female presenter on television. "But I would never have let this stop me - then I was a little bit obsessed," she said at a recent women in science event at London's South Bank sponsored by L'Oreal and the Zoological Society London (ZSL). However, some of today's current scientists suggest that even if women do opt for an academic career in science or technology that they can face sexism once they are at university.

Professor Charlotte Watts, a mathematics professor and an expert in HIV prevention in the developing world, says: "I remember when I was an undergraduate at Oxford, one of my peers saying; 'I didn't know girls could do maths". She also remembers going to conferences where she was the only woman, "I was a nobody, but everybody knew my name, because I was a woman. I got bought a lot of drinks."

But how much has society moved on the issue? There has been a greater increase in the number of girls studying science technology and engineering subjects at A-level than for boys. But progress is slow. Sean McWhinnie, independent research consultant with Oxford Research and Policy, said it would be many years before women are represented in equal numbers in the UK's university science departments. If present rates of increase continue, he predicts men and women will reach parity in 2021 for biosciences, in 2042 for chemistry, in 2060 for physics and in 2109 for civil engineering.

Dr Jones says when women go on maternity leave they are left with big holes in their academic record for the period of time they take out. "I am not sure there is any way of showing you have had a break," she adds.

Mother of two and 37 year old evolutionary biologist Seirian Sumner said: "I never really had maternity leave because I had lots of on-going projects and students to see.

"Also because I am a field biologist I had to take my family to Panama for two months. If I had 'logged out', so to speak, I think it would have been even harder coming back." But eminent plant biologist Professor Ottoline Leyser, author of 'Mothers in Science 64 Ways to Have it All', says there is no reason for women scientists to choose between their career and a family.

bbc.co.uk