The myth about men being better than women in the field of mathematics has long been debunked.
Who is better in Mathematics?
Are boys innately better than girls when it comes to mathematics? Or is it just another myth that’s already busted. Test score analysis shows in many studies conducted between male and female analytic competency.
Friday, an interesting study was published in the Journal Science of Learning. The study was about brain imaging in children showing similar mechanisms and neural network transmission while solving mathematical problems for both genders.
According to Jessica Cantlon, professor for developmental neuroscience,
The study observed that the behavior of young girls and boys during mathematical tests showed statistically equivalent performance. Results are indistinguishable from both categories which makes a strong case for our study.
But Cantlon was not satisfied with the results so she and her team went deeper by inviting 104 kids ages between 3 to 10 to take part in their study. The children were given a series of cognitive tests and were shown engaging videos of mathematical lessons, all of this while being monitored by an MRI scanner.
Neuroimaging
This was the first-ever that neuroimaging was used in evaluating the mathematical response of different biological genders.
Neuroimaging showed that areas of the brain respond differently between watching lessons related to mathematics and those that are not. By determining the areas of the brain where a response is evident during mathematical exercises, the research team has singled out the part on where to focus on.
The next observation being made was between the neural response of girls and boys during the exercises.
What we have observed is that the areas of the brain that responded for girls are identical to the areas responsive to boys. Both brain networks are identical.
Cantlon’s study just busted once again the common knowledge that boys are stronger in STEM subjects as compared to girls. The team believes that it is just some sort of stereotyping that steers away women from STEM fields starting at a young age.
We have to be cognizant of social indifferences that involve genders, we do not realize that we are the ones blindly creating gender inequalities among us.
