The "girls can't do math" stereotype is not just wrong, its false in the sense that we should just stop saying it. Its more akin to a bad told myth, brining harm where ever its being retold.
The #1 preferred profession from a woman in Sweden is economist, based on yearly polls. If one look at university education, women dominate the class room in every areas of match except one subject (abstract math), and then men only reach above 50% in abstract math after the 3rd year.
So the stereotype is not true. Its not true as in, women are as able to handle math as men, but it also not true because women actually work with math more commonly than men in real life. Its not true in any aspect what so ever, so please, please stop spreading the myth. Its only doing harm. If you need to describe a stereotype, take one that's not this one.
If abstract math is the only "pure" mathematics is open to debate :).
On other hand, in 1st, 2th, and 3th year, there are still more women in abstract math classes than men. I do not think any "who is better at what" can be said, beyond the stereotype "women are bad at math" can be explicitly be stated as false.
> On other hand, in 1st, 2th, and 3th year, there are still more women in abstract math classes than men.
This is almost definitely false. While the male/female gender ratio is reasonably close to even for math majors (I think it's 60/40 m/f?), it is nowhere close to even for many heavy math-based disciplines. Engineering and computer science degrees are very male-dominate and the students routinely spill over into math classes.
FWIW, I majored in math at a university that was 10th highest in the student female to male ratio. I counted some of the classes for fun, and I remember counting a slight male majority most of the time. One semester I believe I counted a 57% male population over my math classes.
> I do not think any "who is better at what" can be said, beyond the stereotype "women are bad at math" can be explicitly be stated as false.
This certainly seems to be true. High school females are starting to outperform males in math, while males continue to dominate math graduate school. Reasons are unknown, but in general we can say that "girls aren't bad at math".
See top post about this being specifically about Swedish statistics. For specifics, it was data reported by the universities themselves, calculated by the overseeing body for education, and published in Swedish news media 2011 last time I saw it.
When people speak of "abstract math", they generally mean mathematics, because they use the term "math" far too loosely. In a very real sense, a person can be taught to "do math" all the way through Calculus III, Linear Algebra, and even Differential Equations and still not have any real aptitude for mathematics.
The #1 preferred profession from a woman in Sweden is economist, based on yearly polls. If one look at university education, women dominate the class room in every areas of match except one subject (abstract math), and then men only reach above 50% in abstract math after the 3rd year.
So the stereotype is not true. Its not true as in, women are as able to handle math as men, but it also not true because women actually work with math more commonly than men in real life. Its not true in any aspect what so ever, so please, please stop spreading the myth. Its only doing harm. If you need to describe a stereotype, take one that's not this one.