Skip to main content

Advertisement

SpringerLink
Log in

Asymmetry of Non-traditional Gendered Decisions: Gender Beliefs and High School Curriculum Track Decisions in Taiwan

  • Original Article
  • Published:
Gender Issues Aims and scope Submit manuscript

Abstract

In Taiwan, the persistent sex segregation in high school curriculum track has been documented since 1982. This study focuses on the gender beliefs held by adolescents, their parents, and their math teachers, examining to what degree the egalitarian gender beliefs affect the high school curriculum track decisions in Taiwan by using the Taiwan Education Panel Survey. Results show that when adolescents’ parents hold egalitarian gender beliefs, both girls and boys have higher odds of choosing non-traditional gender paths. However, the adolescents’ own egalitarian gender beliefs only matter for female adolescents, not for male adolescents. This research explores the mechanisms of egalitarian gender beliefs held by multiple socialization agents on non-traditional gendered education decisions. It advocates on the programs that foster egalitarian gender attitudes, which may narrow the sex segregation in high school curriculum tracks.

This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.

Access this article

Log in via an institution

Price excludes VAT (USA)
Tax calculation will be finalised during checkout.

Instant access to the full article PDF.

Institutional subscriptions

Fig. 1
Fig. 2

Similar content being viewed by others

Notes

  1. 2007 is the last year of TEPS respondents in high school.

  2. For reasons of confidentiality, TEPS does not release sensitive information about school and class cluster. This prevents researchers from linking school, class, and students’ information and keeps respondents anonymous.

  3. My analytic sample is limited to students who enrolled in senior high school and excluded students who enrolled in vocational schools because vocational schools are in different school systems.

  4. The study includes cases that did not complete the parental questionnaire (n = 43) and those that did not complete the teacher questionnaire (n = 236); three cases did not complete either questionnaire. Total cases equal 43 + 236 − 3 = 276.

  5. For variables with no missing data: students’ gender and curriculum choice were used to predict the variables with missing values, listed as follows: father’s education (n = 147, 6%), mother’s education (n = 69, 3%), self-assessment of math ability (n = 23, < 1%), math performance (n = 20, < 1%), student’s gender beliefs (n = 47, < 2%), parents’ gender beliefs (n = 8, < 1%), math teachers’ gender beliefs (n = 30, 1%), and math teachers’ gender (n = 38, 1%) for the multiple imputations.

  6. Instead of using socioeconomic status, I only use parental educational attainment. Family monthly income is excluded from the model due to the high VIF and potential multicollinearity if both were included.

  7. The zero-order correlations between students’ own and parents’ gender beliefs is 0.20, between students’ own and math teachers’ gender beliefs is − 0.03, between parental and math teachers’ gender beliefs is − 0.03.

  8. The zero-order correlations between students’ actual math performance and perceived math performance (self-assessment math ability) is 0.28.

References

  1. Baker, D. P., & Jones, D. P. (1993). Creating gender equality: Cross-national gender stratification and mathematical performance. Sociology of Education, 66, 91–103.

    Google Scholar 

  2. Carrell, S. E., Page, M. E., & West, J. E. (2010). Sex and science: How professor gender perpetuates the gender gap. The Quarterly Journal of Economics, 125, 1101–1144.

    Google Scholar 

  3. Charles, M., & Bradley, K. (2002). Equal but separate? A cross-national study of sex segregation in higher education. American Sociological Review, 67(4), 573–599.

    Google Scholar 

  4. Charles, M., & Bradley, K. (2009). Indulging our gendered selves? Sex segregation by field of study in 44 countries. American Journal of Sociology, 114(4), 924–976.

    Google Scholar 

  5. Chen, C.-C. (2000). The change of departmental, occupational gender segregation, and earnings difference in Taiwan. Journal of Education and Psychology, 23, 285–312 (in Chinese).

    Google Scholar 

  6. Chen, J.-J. (2004). The gender differences of educational expectation: Compare senior high schools to senior vocational high schools. Gender Equity Education Quarterly, 26, 43–57 (in Chinese).

    Google Scholar 

  7. Chen, W.-C. (2013). Causes and consequences of high school curriculum track selection: Gender, belief, teacher's gender, and cognitive development. Taiwanese Sociology, 25, 89–123 (in Chinese).

    Google Scholar 

  8. Chen, W.-C., & Syu, Y.-L. (2011). Accounting for sex segregation in Taiwan higher education: Differences between vocational and academic sectors. Taiwanese Journal of Sociology, 48, 151–199 (in Chinese).

    Google Scholar 

  9. Connell, C. (2010). Doing, undoing, or redoing gender: Learning from the working experiences of transpeople. Gender and Society, 24, 30–53.

    Google Scholar 

  10. Correll, S. J. (2001). Gender and the career choice process: The role of biased self-assessments. American Journal of Sociology, 106, 1691–1730.

    Google Scholar 

  11. Correll, S. J., & Ridgeway, C. L. (2003). Expectation states theory. In J. DeLamater (Ed.), Handbook of social psychology (pp. 29–51). New York: Springer.

    Google Scholar 

  12. Deutsch, F. M. (2007). Undoing gender. Gender and Society, 21, 106–127.

    Google Scholar 

  13. Eccles, J. S., Adler, T. F., Futterman, R., Goff, S. B., Kaczala, C. M., Meece, J. L., et al. (1985). Self-perceptions, task perceptions, socializing influences, and the decision to enroll in mathematics. In S. F. Chipman, L. R. Brush, & D. M. Wilson (Eds.), Women and mathematics: balancing the equation (pp. 95–121). New York: Psychology Press.

    Google Scholar 

  14. Eccles, J. S. (1994). Understanding women's educational and occupational choices. Psychology of Women Quarterly, 18, 585–609.

    Google Scholar 

  15. Greenhalgh, S. (1985). Sexual stratification: The other side of ‘growth with equity’ in East Asia. Population and Development Review, 11, 265–314.

    Google Scholar 

  16. Griffith, A. L. (2010). Persistence of women and minorities in STEM field majors: Is it the school that matters? Economics of Education Review, 29, 911–922.

    Google Scholar 

  17. Hsieh, H.-C., Lin, D.-S., & Chen, P.-Y. (2011). Crossing gender boundaries: Gender and college majors in Taiwan. Taiwanese Journal of Sociology, 48, 100–154.

    Google Scholar 

  18. Hsieh, H.-C., & Lee, S.-C. (2014). The formation of gender education policies in Taiwan, 1995–1999. Chinese Education and Society, 47(4), 5–13.

    Google Scholar 

  19. Jo, R. (2004). A letter from a female student studying math and natural science. Gender Equity Education Quarterly, 29, 43–46.

    Google Scholar 

  20. Johnson, A. G. (1997). The forest and the trees: Sociology as life, practice, and promise. Philadelphia: Temple University Press.

    Google Scholar 

  21. Kelly, A. (1985). The construction of masculine science. British Journal of Sociology of Education, 6, 133–154.

    Google Scholar 

  22. Knodel, J., Ofstedal, M. B., & Hermalin, A. I. (2002). The demographic, socioeconomic and cultural context of the four study countries. In A. I. Hermalin (Ed.), The well-being of the elderly in Asia: A four-country comparative study (pp. 25–64). Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press.

    Google Scholar 

  23. Kuo, Y.-C., & Sheu, S.-J. (2011). The impact of mathematics background and gender on the choice of major in Taiwan's Senior High School. Taiwan Economic Review, 39, 541–591 (in Chinese).

    Google Scholar 

  24. Legewie, J., & DiPrete, T. A. (2014). Pathways to science and engineering bachelor degrees for men and women. Sociological Science, 1(1), 41–48.

    Google Scholar 

  25. Legewie, J., & DiPrete, T. A. (2014). The high school environment and the gender gap in science and engineering. Sociology of Education, 87, 259–280.

    Google Scholar 

  26. Leppel, K., Williams, M. L., & Waldauer, C. (2001). The impact of parental occupation and socioeconomic status on choice of college major. Journal of Family and Economic Issues, 22, 373–394.

    Google Scholar 

  27. LeTendre, G. K., Hofer, B. K., & Shimizu, H. (2003). What is tracking? Cultural expectations in the United States, Germany, and Japan. American Educational Research Journal, 40(1), 43–89.

    Google Scholar 

  28. Lim, J., & Meer, J. (2017). Persistent effects of teacher-student gender matches. Cambridge: National Bureau of Economic Research.

    Google Scholar 

  29. Lin, T.-C. (2009). The decline of son preference and rise of gender indifference in Taiwan since 1990. Demographic Research, 20, 377–402.

    Google Scholar 

  30. Liu, J., & Chen, J.-J. (2007). The patterns and trends of sex-segregation on fields of study for higher education: 1972–2003. Journal of Education and Psychology, 30, 1–25.

    Google Scholar 

  31. Lu, Y.-H. (2011). Changes in gender-role attitudes in Taiwan, 1991–2001. Taiwanese Journal of Sociology, 48, 51–94.

    Google Scholar 

  32. Ma, X., & Johnson, W. (2008). Mathematics as the critical filter: Curricular effects on gendered career choices. In H. M. G. Watt & J. S. Eccles (Eds.), Gender and occupational outcomes: Longitudinal assessments of individual, social, and cultural influences (pp. 55–83). Washington, DC: American Psychological Association.

    Google Scholar 

  33. McDaniel, A. (2012). Women’s advantage in higher education: towards understanding a global phenomenon. Sociology Compass, 6(7), 581–595.

    Google Scholar 

  34. Myeong, J.-O., & Crawley, F. E. (1993). Predicting and understanding korean high school students' science-track choice: Testing the theory of reasoned action by structural equation modeling. Journal of Research in Science Teaching, 30(4), 381–400.

    Google Scholar 

  35. Ridgeway, C. L., & Correll, S. J. (2004). Unpacking the gender system: A theoretical perspective on gender beliefs and social relations. Gender and Society, 18, 510–531.

    Google Scholar 

  36. Sechiyama, K. (2013). Patriarchy in East Asia: A comparative sociology of gender. Leiden: Brill.

    Google Scholar 

  37. Serbin, L. A., Powlishta, K. K., Gulko, J., Martin, C. L., & Lockheed, M. E. (1993). The development of sex typing in middle childhood. Monographs of the Society for Research in Child Development, 58(2), i-95.

    Google Scholar 

  38. Sherman, J. (1980). Mathematics, spatial visualization, and related factors: Changes in girls and boys, grades 8–11. Journal of Educational psychology, 72(4), 476.

    Google Scholar 

  39. Shim, W.-J., & Paik, S. (2014). The effects of high school track choice on students’ postsecondary enrollment and majors in South Korea. Asia Pacific Education Review, 15(4), 573–583.

    Google Scholar 

  40. Spencer, S. J., Steele, C. M., & Quinn, D. M. (1999). Stereotype threat and women's math performance. Journal of Experimental Social Psychology, 35, 4–28.

    Google Scholar 

  41. Trelfa, D. (1998). The development and implementation of education standards in Japan. In H. Stevenson, S.-Y. Lee, & R. Nerison-Low (Eds.), Office of educational research and improvement: The educational system in Japan: Case study findings (pp. 23–78). Washington, DC: US Department of Education.

  42. Suen, M.-W., & Chen, Y.-C. (2013). The influences and mechanism of gender stereotypes and perceived intentions of significant others on the senior high school girls' willingness of discipline choosing. Journal of Education and Psychology, 36, 57–85 (in Chinese).

    Google Scholar 

  43. Wu, H.-Y. (1982). A study of guidance on high school students’ curriculum track decision. The Chinese Guidance Association Journal, 18, 25–40.

    Google Scholar 

  44. Yang, C.-L. (2005). Gendered interest and ability: An inquiry into subject choice of senior high school students. Taiwan Journal of Sociology of Education, 5, 113–153.

    Google Scholar 

Download references

Acknowledgements

The author is grateful to Debby Carr, Pat Roos, Sharon Bzostek, Julia Flagg, Kelly Kato, Libby Luth, Theresa Simpson, and the anonymous reviewers for their comments on drafts of this article. The article is entirely the responsibility of the author.

Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Sociology Department, Rutgers University, 26 Nichol Ave., New Brunswick, NJ, 08901, USA

    Tsai-Yen Han

Authors
  1. Tsai-Yen Han
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

Corresponding author

Correspondence to Tsai-Yen Han.

Ethics declarations

Conflict of interest

The author declares that the author has no conflict of interest.

Additional information

Publisher's Note

Springer Nature remains neutral with regard to jurisdictional claims in published maps and institutional affiliations.

Electronic supplementary material

Below is the link to the electronic supplementary material.

Supplementary file1 (PDF 105 kb)

Rights and permissions

Reprints and permissions

About this article

Check for updates. Verify currency and authenticity via CrossMark

Cite this article

Han, TY. Asymmetry of Non-traditional Gendered Decisions: Gender Beliefs and High School Curriculum Track Decisions in Taiwan. Gend. Issues 38, 25–46 (2021). https://doi.org/10.1007/s12147-020-09253-4

Download citation

  • Published:

  • Issue Date:

  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s12147-020-09253-4

Keywords

Search

Navigation