Major Conclusions

II. MAJOR CONCLUSIONS

The representation of women has increased substantially in many scholarly disciplines and professions.

Many professional and scientific disciplines have experienced significant increases in the proportion of women among their ranks. For example, women now represent approximately 50% of accountants, 34% of journalists, 27% of lawyers, and 24% of physicians. Looking at the doctoral science and engineering workforce, approximately 19% are women -- up from 9% in 1973 (National Science Foundation, 1992, 1993). Within this group, psychology and other disciplines sharing similar characteristics have witnessed major shifts in gender composition: One of every four life and social scientists is a woman as compared to 15% and 10% in 1973. The proportion of women doctoral psychologists also rose substantially from 21% to 38% in 1991.

This growth in the participation of women in areas requiring advanced training is not surprising, given shifts in the composition of the educational pipeline. The gender gap in college participation rates (the proportion of high school graduates enrolling in college) has nearly disappeared; in 1991, 41% of college-age women (those aged 18 to 24) and 42% of men had enrolled in college, compared to 30% and 35% in 1981 (Carter & Wilson, 1993). Since 1979, more than half of all college and university enrollments have been women, and, in 1990, women represented 55% of the 14.1 million college students in the U.S. (Ottinger and Skula, 1993). Consequently, the numbers and proportions of women earning baccalaureate, professional, and graduate degrees in all fields have grown dramatically. For example, the proportion of baccalaureate degrees awarded to women has grown from 43% in 1971 to 54% two decades later. The percentage of women earning doctoral degrees also has increased substantially for every major academic discipline (Ries and Thurgood, 1993).

The increasing representation of women in psychology has been especially dramatic.

Although women's participation has increased in many occupations, the growth has been particularly striking in psychology. As noted above, psychology has the largest percentage of women in its ranks among the science and engineering disciplines -- nearly two of every five doctoral psychologists are women. Furthermore, characteristics of those currently in the educational pipeline suggest that this percentage will continue to inch upward in the near future. As of 1991, the proportions of bachelor's, master's, and doctoral degrees awarded in psychology to women were 73%, 69%, and 61%, respectively. Within psychology graduate programs, women constitute the majority.

A look at the very early stages of the pipeline (i.e., the intended major of college freshmen) suggests that this situation will not quickly be reversed. A strong correlation between predoctoral intentions and doctoral production appears to exist in psychology. For example, in 1985, 5% of all female freshmen (an estimated 40,420) indicated that their intended major was psychology (Astin, Green, and Korn, 1987). These preferences expressed themselves 3 years later when 6% (or 26,586) of all bachelor's degrees were awarded to women in psychology. In contrast, only 1% (an estimated 12,000) of all male freshmen planned to major in psychology; 3 years later about 3% (or 12,618) of baccalaureate degrees awarded to men were granted in psychology (Snyder and Hoffman, 1991). If this trend continues, these data suggest that women are likely to persist as the larger presence in the undergraduate and graduate student populations of colleges and universities.

The growth in women's participation in psychology can be attributed partially to increased demands for psychological personnel and their improved access to training and employment.

Based on their examination of selected occupations undergoing dramatic increases in women's representation, Reskin and Roos (1993) identified four major determinants of occupational gender shift. That is, increased representation typically is a product of one or more of the following forces:

A shortage of men occurs from a growing demand for workers in the field;

A specific demand for women workers is created by such factors as client need or, in particular, legislative directives (e.g., EEOC regulations and affirmative action mandates);

Women's participation in the occupation increases as more and more women complete the necessary advanced training and become equipped with the necessary skills and qualifications;

Men are in short supply because they have decreased in numbers due to the deteriorating status of the occupation.

With regard to psychology, the information collected and reviewed in this Case Study has led us to the following conclusions about the plausibility of the first three influences being responsible for the witnessed shifts in gender composition:

During the 1970s and 1980s, there was a growing demand for and resultant shortage of psychological personnel. As described elsewhere, the field experienced growth, fueled by the United States' moving toward a service economy that placed particular value on human-oriented services (e.g., education and health care) and the increasing reliance on the production and application of specialized knowledge in all sectors (Pion and Lipsey, 1984). One indicator of this growth is the tripling of doctoral psychologists in the labor force -- from an estimated 22,014 in 1973 to 68,195 in 1991 -- that was coupled with no marked increase in unemployment (National Science Foundation, 1994). Growth in women's representation occurred in all subfields, although the most dramatic increases were in the health service provider subfields and those with a distinct applied emphasis (e.g., educational psychology).
This pattern of occupational growth and low unemployment resulting in improved access of women to occupations typically held by men is not unusual (e.g., Reskin and Roos, 1990). However, occupational growth does not ensure a decline in sex segregation (Reskin, 1993).

These changes in the demand for psychologists coincided with changes in society that affected female aspirations and legal edicts that led to equal opportunity. As outlined in Section II of the full report, legislation was an important factor in easing women's entry into educational programs and employment since at the very least employers' resistance to considering women in their applicant pool was discouraged. In some areas, the need for women psychologists also was influenced by the changing nature of the client population: For example, women have been a major consumer of outpatient psychotherapy, and several changes engendered by the women's movement encouraged these women to seek female therapists. Another illustration involves the increasing perception of the need for women faculty who can serve as mentors and role models to female graduate students -- now the majority in many departments.

As previously described, more and more women have been acquiring the necessary training and qualifications to function as teachers, researchers, and health service providers in psychology. The majority of undergraduate and graduate psychology degrees are now awarded to women. Currently, two of every three graduate students are women, along with three of every four undergraduate majors. In part, this increased representation has been a product of affirmative action programs instituted in the early 1970s. Furthermore, the discipline as a whole has worked at making the training process more responsive to achieving gender parity -- e.g., the modification of accreditation criteria that outlaw discrimination, the acceptance of part-time internships as a way to fulfill predoctoral training requirements, and the dissemination of guidelines and information on the status of women in psychology departments.

It is likely that the growth in women's participation in psychology can also be traced to diminished numbers of men choosing to enter the discipline, particularly since the early 1980s, due to the declining status or prestige of the occupation.

As discussed in Section III of the full report, more men than women (by a significant margin) entered the doctoral psychological workforce during the 1970s. This was true for both the health service provider subfields and the nonclinical areas of the discipline. However, during the 1980s, this pattern was reversed. Although the numbers of men and women both grew, the growth in numbers of women exceeded that for men. Whereas the increase in men during this time period totaled an estimated 10,960 individuals, the corresponding figure for women was 14,246 or 30% higher.
In fact, the increase in the number of men for psychology as a whole was lower for this 10-year span than that for the previous 8 years. This stemmed from many fewer additions of men in the nonclinical areas of psychology than in those involved in the provision of direct services. That is, the number of male doctoral psychologists who were in the workforce in such areas as experimental, social, and developmental psychology grew by an estimated 7,006 individuals between 1973 and 1981. The corresponding increase between 1981 and 1991 was 50% lower (an estimated increase of 3,493). This is in contrast to the health service provider areas where the increase in the pool of doctoral male psychologists between 1981 and 1991 was most likely only equal to or even somewhat smaller than the growth between 1973 and 1981. These figures are not surprising, given the decreases in annual doctorate production for men described in Section III of the full report. (Because no data are available for 1971, the period of 1973-1981 and 1981-1991 are not of the same duration. As such, we are forced to rely on speculation as to the direction and magnitude of the difference). Are these declines a result of the declining status or reputation of the discipline? If so, they are cause for concern.
Based on the data that we examined, it appears that the 1980s were a time when psychology may have been viewed as a somewhat questionable career option. For those interested in research and teaching, the academic labor market was often described as stagnant, and a somewhat variable environment existed for behavioral and social science research (Gerstein et al., 1988). Although psychology fared better than the social sciences in terms of research dollars, funding was increasingly viewed as capricious and difficult to obtain. As Uebersax and Ferguson (1989) reported, the fluctuations in funding during the 1970s and early 1980s adversely affected research efforts, often delaying the launching of new projects and deterring prospective researchers from expending the effort to pursue research and academic careers. Declines in the submission of investigator-initiated applications and in success rates for submitted applications did little to enhance the attractiveness of psychology as a research career.
During this period, the use of part-time and temporary faculty members became more common (American Association of University Professors, 1992), and the criteria for tenure and promotion tightened. Faculty salaries, already viewed by many as inadequate, steadily lost ground relative to inflation.
For the scientist-practitioner and practitioner career in the health service provider areas, the 1980s remained somewhat more attractive to both genders and particularly to women. Opportunities in independent practice continued to grow, and less stigma appeared to be associated with the receipt of mental health services; similarly, the acceptability of consulting a psychologist for these services appeared to grow among the public. At the same time, increasing social pressures to contain health care expenditures consistently chipped away at the professional autonomy of psychologists, and the increasing restrictions on the amount and scope of mental health benefits, along with the growing competition from mental health service providers in other professions, had financial implications for earnings. These changes may have been increasingly perceived by men as liabilities; as Astin and Astin (1992) found, women undergraduates remain much more likely than men to indicate science practitioner rather than research scientist roles as a career choice.
It should be noted that the increased pressures in academia and health service delivery systems were not unique to psychology. In some ways, psychology fared better in terms of attractiveness to potential recruits than such disciplines as sociology (Roos and Jones, 1993). Given the current and future pressures facing the field, however, further erosion could occur.

The participation of women in the various employment sectors and work roles, along with their career advancement, has been more mixed.

The data reported in Section III of the full report highlight two important trends: (1) Women in psychology who are employed full time have increased their participation in every major employment sector; and (2) similar increases, although of considerably smaller magnitude, have occurred in terms of men's participation in the workforce. Such global indicators of participation, while emphasizing the entrance of women into the psychological workforce, do not speak to gender equity in terms of status and continued advancement. Section IV of the full report examined a handful of "status indicators" that address gender equity in terms of career advancement, salary structures, and other measures of recognition. Although a summary judgment is difficult due to the limited number and noncomparability of these indicators, it is safe to say that the overall pattern is mixed.

For example, the representation of women in college and university faculties has grown, particularly in the assistant and associate ranks, and women now comprise nearly half of all new faculty appointments made in graduate departments. Whether they will obtain tenure and progress through the ranks is unknown. Data from various national surveys indicate that women's interest in research is high, and there is some evidence to suggest success at obtaining external research funding (e.g., the increasing proportion of NIH grants awarded to women). At the same time, the presence of more women than men in "off-line" positions (e.g., lecturer, adjunct, etc.) is worrisome, given the precarious and undercompensated nature of such positions. Furthermore, with respect to gender disparities in salaries, one key variable responsible for the narrowing of the salary differential appears to have been the losses in earning power experienced by men. The underrepresentation of women in senior academic management positions persists.

Although women's leadership work in organized psychology has increased markedly since the early seventies, participation remains low. A prime example is the publication process, evidenced by the low representation of women among the editors and associate editors of major psychological journals. Such roles influence what is considered important for dissemination in the field. Also, given the importance of publications in major journals for academic tenure and promotion decisions, leadership in this area is of vital importance.

More women are involved in major boards and committees of the Association, along with the staffing of Central Office, thus, helping formulate and implement policy for the discipline. However, very few women have been elected to presidency of the Association, and men still comprise the majority of the Board of Directors. It does seem that the encouragement of women's participation in such leadership roles is vital. Work such as that carried out by the Committee on Women in Psychology must continue. As noted by other researchers on occupational segregation in several other areas (e.g., Reskin and Roos, 1990), it does not appear that the increased presence of women necessarily leads to their increased status and influence.

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