Life-Experiences of Female Students in Physics: The Outsiders Within

Dagmar Heeg; Lucy Avraamidou

doi:10.29333/ejmste/10991

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Dagmar Heeg ¹, Lucy Avraamidou ¹ ^*

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¹ University of Groningen, NETHERLANDS^* Corresponding Author

Abstract

The purpose of this multiple case study was to examine the kinds of experiences that were critical to the physics trajectories of four purposefully selected undergraduate female physics students in central Europe. The data were collected through individual semi-structured interviews and were analyzed following an inductive approach and a combination of open and in-vivo coding. The findings showed that: (a) all participants experienced a lack of sense of belonging in physics because of stereotypes and biases about the role of women in physics, which were evident both in classroom discourses and lack of recognition by their instructors and their male peers; (b) the intersection of gender and physics identity served as a barrier to the participants’ perceived recognition (by others) as competent physics persons as well as their sense of belonging in physics; and, (c) all participants pointed to the lack of role-models and specifically women of color in academia.

Keywords

physics education
life-history
gender
case study

License

This is an open access article distributed under the Creative Commons Attribution License which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.

Article Type: Research Article

EURASIA J Math Sci Tech Ed, Volume 17, Issue 7, July 2021, Article No: em1983

https://doi.org/10.29333/ejmste/10991

Publication date: 19 Jun 2021

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Article Downloads: 1202

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Declaration of Conflict of Interest: No conflict of interest is declared by author(s).

Data sharing statement: Data supporting the findings and conclusions are available upon request from the corresponding author(s).

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How to cite this article

APA

Heeg, D., & Avraamidou, L. (2021). Life-Experiences of Female Students in Physics: The Outsiders Within. Eurasia Journal of Mathematics, Science and Technology Education, 17(7), em1983. https://doi.org/10.29333/ejmste/10991

Vancouver

Heeg D, Avraamidou L. Life-Experiences of Female Students in Physics: The Outsiders Within. EURASIA J Math Sci Tech Ed. 2021;17(7):em1983. https://doi.org/10.29333/ejmste/10991

AMA

Heeg D, Avraamidou L. Life-Experiences of Female Students in Physics: The Outsiders Within. EURASIA J Math Sci Tech Ed. 2021;17(7), em1983. https://doi.org/10.29333/ejmste/10991

Chicago

Heeg, Dagmar, and Lucy Avraamidou. "Life-Experiences of Female Students in Physics: The Outsiders Within". Eurasia Journal of Mathematics, Science and Technology Education 2021 17 no. 7 (2021): em1983. https://doi.org/10.29333/ejmste/10991

Harvard

Heeg, D., and Avraamidou, L. (2021). Life-Experiences of Female Students in Physics: The Outsiders Within. Eurasia Journal of Mathematics, Science and Technology Education, 17(7), em1983. https://doi.org/10.29333/ejmste/10991

MLA

Heeg, Dagmar et al. "Life-Experiences of Female Students in Physics: The Outsiders Within". Eurasia Journal of Mathematics, Science and Technology Education, vol. 17, no. 7, 2021, em1983. https://doi.org/10.29333/ejmste/10991