Data from: Gender equity at scientific events

Although the proportion of women in science, and in evolutionary biology in particular, has substantially increased over the last century, women remain underrepresented in academia, especially at senior levels. Moreover, their scientific achievements do not always receive the same level of recognition as do men’s, which can be reflected in a lower relative representation of women among invited speakers at conferences or specialized courses. Using announcements sent to the EvolDir mailing list between April 2016 and July 2017, and the symposium programs of three large evolutionary biology congresses held in summer 2017, we quantified the representation of women announced as invited speakers in conferences, congress symposia and specialized courses. We compared the proportion of invited women to a baseline estimated using membership data of the associated scientific societies, and surveyed organizers to investigate their influence and that of potential gender-ratio guidelines on the proportion of invited women. We find that the average proportion of invited women is comparable (conferences), significantly lower (specialized courses) or significantly higher (congress symposia) than the current baseline (32% women). It is positively correlated to the proportion of women among the organizers, and it is on average higher for events whose organizers considered gender when choosing speakers than for those whose organizers did not. To investigate the impact of Equal Opportunity guidelines, we then collected longitudinal data on the proportion of invited women at two series of conferences, covering the 2001-2017 period. The proportion of invited women is higher when Equal Opportunity guidelines are announced. Encouraging women to sit on organizing committees of scientific events, and the establishment of visible Equal Opportunity guidelines, thus could be ways to ensure higher number of invited female speakers in the future. Our results suggest that change, if desired, requires deliberate actions.

尽管近一个世纪以来，科学界女性占比大幅提升，进化生物学领域更是如此，但学术界女性的占比依然偏低，尤其是在高级职位层面。此外，女性的科研成果往往无法获得与男性同等的认可，这一点可从会议或专题课程的特邀讲者中女性占比偏低得到体现。本研究利用2016年4月至2017年7月期间发送至EvolDir邮件列表（EvolDir mailing list）的公告，以及2017年夏季举办的三场大型进化生物学大会的专题研讨会日程，量化了会议、大会专题研讨会及专题课程中被列为特邀讲者的女性占比。我们将特邀女性讲者的占比与通过相关科学学会会员数据估算得到的基准占比进行对比，并对组织者开展调研，以探究组织者自身因素以及潜在的性别比例指南对特邀女性讲者占比的影响。研究发现，特邀女性讲者的平均占比与基准值（女性占比32%）相比，在普通会议中基本持平，在专题课程中显著偏低，而在大会专题研讨会中则显著偏高。该占比与组织者团队中的女性占比呈正相关，且若组织者在遴选讲者时考虑了性别因素，相关活动的特邀女性讲者平均占比要高于未考虑性别因素的活动。为探究机会均等指南的影响，我们还收集了2001年至2017年间两场系列会议的特邀女性讲者占比的纵向数据。当公布机会均等指南时，特邀女性讲者的占比会更高。因此，鼓励女性加入科学活动的组织委员会，以及制定明确的机会均等指南，或许是未来提升特邀女性讲者数量的可行路径。我们的研究结果表明，若期望实现性别比例的改善，则需要采取审慎的行动。