Bias Tidbits Multidisciplinary Work A forthcoming paper in the American Journal of Evaluation by Irwin Feller discusses the issues, noting that in disciplines where research is “problem oriented” such as engineering, multidisciplinary research may be viewed more positively than in many science disciplines (including social sciences) where research issues tend to be more structured along methodological lines.

Service There appears to be a dichotomy in the inequity of committee assignments of women and other minorities in academia. On the one hand, these faculty members often assume a higher service responsibility; yet on the other hand they tend to be underrepresented on more important committees, especially at the senior level. “Women do more service than men (Carnegie Foundation 1990)”, “although at low decision-making levels (Bagihole 1993.)”

Bias Tidbits Mentoring and Guidance Virginia Valian [2] describes a long-term program at the Johns Hopkins School of Medicine to deal with bias against women on the faculty of medicine. Some findings were that women were put up for promotion later than men, and they received lower salaries. Reasons for this included evaluators failing to identify qualified women and women not knowing the criteria for promotion. Mentors of males were more likely to pass useful information than mentors of females. Mentors invited males to chair conferences six times as often as females. Meetings held in evenings and weekends were a significant bias identified in the study.

Bias Tidbits Committee Assignments Women and ethnic minorities are often asked to serve as advisors to women and minority students, raising their advising loads considerably; and they are often asked to serve as token representatives of their groups on university committees. These tasks divert time from scholarly productivity and are not rewarded in ways that support the careers of those who serve [1].

Bias Tidbits Co-authorship Findings of research are consistent with the view that the likelihood of repeat co-authorship declines with free riding. While procedures for tenure and promotion generally ask that authors of multi-authored papers self-report their role in the research, there are clear incentives for misreporting. This gives rise to the frequent use of mechanisms, such as order of authorship and repeat authorship as signals.

Bias Tidbits Service Women, especially at the senior level, tend to be underrepresented on highly valued and respected committees. A Study on the Status of Women Faculty in Science at MIT (1999) says: 1) To increase number of women faculty “advise department heads to place senior women faculty on appropriate search committees.” 2) To improve status of, ensure equity for senior women: Seek out women for influential positions within Department and Institute administrations, including as Heads and as members and Chairs of key committees. Involve tenured women faculty in the selection of administrators, and consult with women faculty to ensure the continued commitment of administrators to women faculty issues.

Bias Tidbits Race and Ethnicity untenured faculty silence: Minority have more difficulty than majority in addressing fairness issues. Majority remain silent about departmental doctoral programs and hiring decisions. This behavior is very different from under-represented faculty who remain silent on critical issues such as: unfair salaries, limited space, unfair merit pay distribution. The majority do NOT remain silent on these issues that directly relate to themselves.

Bias Tidbits Gender Institutional transformation ensuring the promotion of women in science and engineering must begin through the efforts of leadership. One area of concern is the need to educate the workforce about potential forms of bias that may affect the advancement of women. Gender bias is not limited to one sex. Studies have shown that females and males tend to give a slight disadvantage to women and a slight advantage to men in our professional endeavors even when qualifications are equal.

Bias Tidbits Committee Assignments Given the small numbers of women and minority faculty at Georgia Tech (like Stanford and MIT), many decision-making bodies do not include members of these groups. While gender and race does not necessarily predispose one to awareness about equity issues, when only a single member of an under-represented group serves on a committee and is concerned about these issues, it can be harder for that person to feel comfortable expressing these concerns related to group identity [1,2].