Women catch up: Gender differences in learning programming concepts

Laurie Murphy, Brad Richards, Renée McCauley, Briana B. Morrison, Suzanne Westbrook, Timothy Fossum

Research output: Chapter in Book/Report/Conference proceedingConference contribution

35 Scopus citations

Abstract

This paper describes a multi-institutional study that used categorization exercises (known as constrained card sorts) to investigate gender differences in graduating computer science students' learning and perceptions of programming concepts. Our results show that female subjects had significantly less pre-college programming experience than their male counterparts. However, for both males and females, we found no correlation between previous experience and success in the major, as measured by computer science grade point average at graduation. Data also indicated that, by the time students completed their introductory courses, females reported nearly equal levels of mastery as males of the programming concepts. Furthermore, females generally considered the programming concepts to be no more difficult than did the men.

Original languageEnglish (US)
Title of host publicationProceedings of the Thirty-Seventh SIGCSE Technical Symposium on Computer Science Education
Pages17-21
Number of pages5
DOIs
StatePublished - 2007
Externally publishedYes
Event37th SIGCSE Technical Symposium on Computer Science Education - Houston, TX, United States
Duration: Mar 1 2006Mar 5 2006

Publication series

NameProceedings of the Thirty-Seventh SIGCSE Technical Symposium on Computer Science Education

Conference

Conference37th SIGCSE Technical Symposium on Computer Science Education
Country/TerritoryUnited States
CityHouston, TX
Period3/1/063/5/06

Keywords

  • Card sort
  • Gender differences
  • Programming experience

ASJC Scopus subject areas

  • Computer Science(all)
  • Education

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