Brain training

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https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brain_training

Brain training (also called cognitive training) is a program of regular activities purported to maintain or improve one's cognitive abilities. The phrase “cognitive ability” usually refers to components of fluid intelligence such as executive function and working memory. Cognitive training reflects a hypothesis that cognitive abilities can be maintained or improved by exercising the brain, analogous to the way physical fitness is improved by exercising the body. Cognitive training activities can take place in numerous modalities such as cardiovascular fitness training, playing online games or completing cognitive tasks in alignment with a training regimen, playing video games that require visuospatial reasoning, and engaging in novel activities such as dance, art, and music.

Scientific investigation into the effectiveness of brain training activities have concluded that they have no impact on intelligence or everyday cognitive ability, and that most programs had no peer reviewed published evidence of their efficacy. There is ample debate within the scientific community on the efficacy of brain training programs and controversy on the ethics of promoting brain training software to potentially vulnerable subjects.

Studies and interventions

Cognitive training has been studied by scientists for the past 100 years. The first recorded cognitive training study was published in the Journal of Educational Psychology and attempted to cognitively train students with letter memorization exercises. The researchers found slight improvement in ability to complete the letter memorization task, but no general improvements that could be transferred to other kinds of tasks. Tasks similar to the letter memorization exercise are still used today, however, these tasks are usually referred to as working memory tasks - targeting the subset of memory that is required to maintain and manipulate short-term information.

Cognitive training includes interventions targeted at improving cognitive abilities such as problem-solving, reasoning, attention, executive functions, and working memory. These kinds of abilities are targeted because they are correlated with individual differences such as academic achievement and life outcomes and it is thought that training general cognitive functions will lead to transfer of improvement across a variety of domains. Cognitive reserve is the capacity of a person to meet the various cognitive demands of life and is evident in an ability to assimilate information, comprehend relationships, and develop reasonable conclusions and plans. Cognitive training includes interventions targeted at improving cognitive abilities. One hypothesis to support cognitive training is that certain activities, done regularly, might help maintain or improve cognitive reserve.

Cognitive training studies often target clinical groups such as people with neurodegenerative disorders such as Alzheimer’s and children with ADHD that experience general cognitive deficits. More broadly, it is thought that cognitive training may especially benefit older adults as there is a general decline in fluid intelligence with age as there are decreases in speed of processing, working memory, longterm memory, and reasoning skills. Some researchers argue that the lower performance of older adults on cognitive tasks may not always reflect actual ability as older adults may show performance decrements due to strategy choice, such as avoiding using memory retrieval in memory tasks.

Evidence for neuroplasticity

Cognitive training is grounded in the idea that the brain is plastic. Brain plasticity refers to the ability for the brain to change and develop based on life experiences. Evidence for neuroplasticity includes studies on musical expertise and London taxicab drivers that have demonstrated that expertise leads to increased volume in specific brain areas. A  2008 study that trained older adults in juggling showed an increase in gray matter volume as a result of the training. A study attempting to train the updating component of executive function in young and older adults showed that cognitive training could lead to improvements in task performance across both of the groups, however, general transfer of ability to new tasks was only shown in young adults and not older adults. It has been hypothesized that transfer effects are dependent on an overlap in neural activation during the trained and transfer tasks. Cognitive training has been shown to lead to neural changes such as increased blood flow to the prefrontal cortex in attention training and decreased bilateral compensatory recruitment in older adults. Research indicates that one of the most effective forms of cognitive training may be in the form of cardiovascular fitness. Researchers have shown that decreased cardiovascular fitness is correlated with brain atrophy and that training older adults in a cardiovascular fitness regimen leads to increased volume in the prefrontal and temporal cortex areas and increased performance on memory tasks.

Mental exercises

Mind games for self-improvement fall into two main categories. There are mental exercises and puzzles to maintain or improve the actual working of the brain.

Mental exercises can be done through simple socializing. Social interaction engages in many facets of cognitive thinking and can facilitate cognitive functioning. Cartwright and Zander noted that if an alien was visiting Earth for the first time, they would be surprised by the amount of social contact humans make. Caring for one another and growing up in a group setting (family) shows a certain degree of interdependence that shows deep phylogenetic roots. However, this social contact is declining in the United States. Face-to-face interaction is getting more and more sparse. Family and friend visits, including dinners, aren't as common. The amount of social contact a person receives can greatly affect their mental health. A preference for being with others has a high correlation with well-being and with mental long-term and short-term effects on performance.

There are many things involved in a simple interaction between two people: paying attention, maintaining in memory the conversation, adjusting to a different perspective than your own, assessing situational constraints, and self-monitoring appropriate behavior. It is true that some of these are automatic processes, but attention, working memory, and cognitive control are definitely executive functions. Doing all these things in a simple social interaction helps train the working memory in influencing social inference.

Social cognitive neuroscience also supports social interaction as a mental exercise. The prefrontal cortex function involves the ability to understand a person's beliefs and desires. The ability to control one's own beliefs and desires is served by the parietal and prefrontal regions of the brain, which is the same region emphasizing cognitive control.

Jigsaw puzzles can serve as an engaging intellectual activity

The other category of mental exercises falls into the world of puzzles. Neurocognitive disorders such as dementia and impairment in cognitive functioning have risen as a healthcare concern, especially among the older generation. Solving jigsaw puzzles is an effective way to develop visuospatial functioning and keeping the mind sharp. Anyone can do it, as it is low-cost and can be intrinsically motivating. The important part about jigsaw puzzles is that it is challenging, especially compared to other activities, such as watching television. Engagement in such an intellectual activity predicts a lower risk in developing a cognition disorder later on in life.

There is also the category of the self-empowering mind game, as in psychodrama, or mental and fantasy workshops – elements which might be seen as an ultimate outgrowth of yoga as a set of mental (and physical) disciplines.

The ability to imagine and walk oneself through various scenarios is a mental exercise in itself. Self-reflection in this way taps into many different cognitive capabilities, including questioning rigid viewpoints, elaborating on experience, and knowing oneself through their relational context.

Commercial programs

By 2016, companies offering products and services for cognitive training were marketing them as improving educational outcomes for children, and for adults as improving memory, processing speed, and problem-solving, and even as preventing dementia or Alzheimers. They often have supported their marketing with discussion about the educational or professional background of their founders, some discuss neuroscience that supports their approach—especially concepts of neuroplasticity and transfer of learning, and some cite evidence from clinical trials. The key claim made by these companies is that the specific training that they offer generalizes to other fields—academic or professional performance generally or everyday life.

CogniFit was founded in 1999, Cogmed in 2001, Posit Science in 2002, and Brain Age was first released in 2005, all capitalizing on the growing interest within the public in neuroscience, along with heightened worries by parents about ADHD and other learning disabilities in their children, and concern about their own cognitive health as they aged.

The launch of Brain Age in 2005 marked a change in the field, as prior to this products or services were marketed to fairly narrow populations (for example, students with learning problems), but Brain Age was marketed to everyone, with a significant media budget. In 2005, consumers in the US spent $2 million on cognitive training products; in 2007 they spent about $80 million.

By 2012, "brain training" was a $1 billion industry. In 2013 the market was $1.3 billion, and software products made up about 55% of those sales. By that time neuroscientists and others had a growing concern about the general trend toward what they called "neurofication", "neurohype", "neuromania", and neuromyths.

Regulation and lawsuits

Starting in January 2015, the United States Federal Trade Commission (FTC) sued companies selling "brain training" programs or other products marketed as improving cognitive function, including WordSmart Corporation, the company that makes Lumosity, and Brain Research Labs (which sold dietary supplements) for deceptive advertising; later that year the FTC also sued LearningRx.

The FTC found that Lumosity's marketing "preyed on consumers' fears about age-related cognitive decline, suggesting their games could stave off memory loss, dementia, and even Alzheimer's disease", without providing any scientific evidence to back its claims. The company was ordered not to make any claims that its products can "[improve] performance in school, at work, or in athletics" or "[delay or protect] against age-related decline in memory or other cognitive function, including mild cognitive impairment, dementia, or Alzheimer's disease", or "[reduce] cognitive impairment caused by health conditions, including Turner syndrome, post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD), attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD), traumatic brain injury (TBI), stroke, or side effects of chemotherapy", without "competent and reliable scientific evidence", and agreed to pay a $50 million settlement (reduced to $2 million).

In its lawsuit against LearningRx, the FTC said LearningRx had been "deceptively claim[ing] their programs were clinically proven to permanently improve serious health conditions like ADHD (attention deficit hyperactivity disorder), autism, dementia, Alzheimer's disease, strokes, and concussions". In 2016, LearningRx settled with the FTC by agreeing not to make the disputed assertions unless they had "competent and reliable scientific evidence" which was defined as randomized controlled trials done by competent scientists." For the judgment's monetary component, LearningRx agreed to pay $200,000 of a $4 million settlement.

Effectiveness

Scientific debate on the efficacy of brain training programs

There has been much debate about how useful “brain games” really are.

A 2011 study with over 11,000 participants found that participants improved on the tasks in which they were trained, but there was no transfer to tasks outside of the training tasks. This is a common finding in cognitive training literature, and within cognitive psychology literature in general. Studies that try to train specific cognitive abilities oftentimes only show task-specific improvements, and participants are unable to generalize their strategies to new tasks or problems. In 2016, there was some evidence that some of these programs improved performance on tasks in which users were trained, less evidence that improvements in performance generalize to related tasks, and almost no evidence that "brain training" generalizes to everyday cognitive performance; in addition most clinical studies were flawed. But in 2017, the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine found moderate strength evidence for cognitive training as an intervention to prevent cognitive decline and dementia, and in 2018, the American Academy of Neurology guidelines for treatment of mild cognitive impairment included cognitive training.

To address growing public concerns with regard to aggressive online marketing of brain games to older population, a group of scientists published a letter in 2008 warning the general public that there is a lack of research showing effectiveness of brain games in older adults.

In 2010, the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality found that there was insufficient evidence to recommend any method of preventing age-related memory deficits or Alzheimer's.

In 2014 another group of scientists published a similar warning. Later that year, another group of scientists made a counter statement, organized and maintained by the Chief Scientific Officer of Posit. They compiled a list of published studies on efficacy of cognitive training across populations and disciplines.

In 2014, one group of over 70 scientists stated that brain games cannot be scientifically proven as being cognitively advantageous, whether that be in preventing cognitive decline or improving cognitive functioning. Another group argued the opposite, with over 130 scientists saying that there is valid evidence in the benefits of brain training. The question is how these two groups reached different conclusions in reading the same literature. Different standards on both sides can answer that question. In a more specific manner, there is indeed a great deal of evidence that brain training does indeed improve performance on trained tasks, but less evidence in closely related tasks. There is even less evidence on distantly related tasks.

In 2017, a committee of the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine released a report about the evidence on interventions for preventing cognitive decline and dementia.

In 2017, a group of Australian scientists undertook a systematic review of what studies have been published of commercially available brain training programs in an attempt to give consumers and doctors credible information on which brain training programs are actually scientifically proved to work. Unfortunately, after reviewing close to 8,000 studies about brain training programs marketed to healthy older adults that were studied, most programs had no peer reviewed published evidence of their efficacy and of the seven brain training programs that did, only two of those had multiple studies, including at least one study of high quality: BrainHQ and CogniFit.

In 2019, a group of researchers showed that claims of enhancement following brain training and other training programs have been exaggerated, based on a number of meta-analyses. Other factors (eg genetics) seem to play a bigger role.

Cognitive training for dementia

A 2020 Cochrane review found no certain evidence that cognitive training is beneficial for people with Parkinson’s disease, dementia or mild cognitive impairment. The findings are based on low certainty evidence of seven studies.

 

Lifelong learning

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Lifelong learning is the "ongoing, voluntary, and self-motivated" pursuit of knowledge for either personal or professional reasons. It is important for an individual's competitiveness and employability, but also enhances social inclusion, active citizenship, and personal development.

Development

In some contexts, the term "lifelong learning" evolved from the term "life-long learners", created by Leslie Watkins and used by Professor Clint Taylor (CSULA) and Superintendent for the Temple City Unified School District's mission statement in 1993, the term recognizes that learning is not confined to childhood or the classroom but takes place throughout life and in a range of situations.

In other contexts, the term "lifelong learning" evolved organically. The first lifelong learning institute began at The New School for Social Research (now New School University) in 1962 as an experiment in "learning in retirement". Later, after similar groups formed across the United States, many chose the name "lifelong learning institute" to be inclusive of nonretired persons in the same age range. See Lifelong learning institutes, or outside the US, University of the Third Age.

During the last fifty years, constant scientific and technological innovation and change has had profound effects on how learning is understood. Learning can no longer be divided into a place and time to acquire knowledge (school) and a place and time to apply the knowledge acquired (the workplace). Instead, learning can be seen as something that takes place on an ongoing basis from our daily interactions with others and with the world around us. It can create and shapeshift into the form of formal learning or informal learning, or self-directed learning. Allen Tough (1979), Canadian educator and researcher, asserts that almost 70% of learning projects are self-planned.

Concept

Lifelong learning has been described as a process that includes people learning in different contexts. These environments do not only include schools but also homes, workplaces, and even locations where people pursue leisure activities. However, while the learning process can be applied to learners of all ages, there is a focus on adults who are returning to organized learning. There are programs based on its framework that address the different needs of learners, such as United Nations' Sustainable Development Goal 4 and the UNESCO's Institute for Lifelong Learning, which caters to the needs of the disadvantaged and marginalized learners.

Lifelong learning focuses on holistic education and it has two dimensions, namely, lifelong and broad options for learning. These indicate learning that integrates traditional education proposals and modern learning opportunities. It also entails an emphasis on encouraging people to learn how to learn and to select content, process, and methodologies that pursues self-design and self-perfection. Some authors highlight that lifelong learning is founded on a different conceptualization of knowledge and its acquisition. It is explained not only as the possession of discrete pieces of information or factual knowledge but also as a generalized scheme of making sense of new events, including the use of tactics in order to effectively deal with them.

Lifelong learning is distinguished from the concept of continuing education in the sense that it has a broader scope. Unlike the latter, which is oriented towards adult education developed for the needs of schools and industries, this type of learning is concerned with the development of human potential, recognizing each individual's capacity for it.

Links to theory

Two theories of particular relevance when considering lifelong learning are cognitivism and constructivism. Cognitivism, most notably Gestalt theory, speaks of learning as making sense of the relationship between what is old and what is new. Similarly, Constructivist theory states that "knowledge is not passively received from the world or from authoritative sources but constructed by individuals or groups making sense of their experiential worlds". Constructivism lends itself well to Lifelong learning as it brings together learning from many different sources including life experiences.

Learning economy

Traditional colleges and universities are beginning to recognize the value of lifelong learning outside of the credit and degree attainment model. Some learning is accomplished in segments or interest categories and can still be valuable to the individual and community. The economic impact of educational institutions at all levels will remain significant as individuals continue formal studies and pursue interest-based subjects. Institutions produce educated citizens who buy goods and services in the community and the education facilities and personnel generate economic activity during the operations and institutional activities. Similar to health facilities, educational institutions are among the top employers in many cities and towns of the world. Whether brick-and-mortar or distance education institutions, there is a great economic impact worldwide from learning, including lifelong learning, for all age groups. The lifelong learners, including persons with academic or professional credentials, tend to find higher-paying occupations, leaving monetary, cultural, and entrepreneurial impressions on communities, according to educator Cassandra B. Whyte.

Contexts

Although the term is widely used in a variety of contexts, its meaning is often unclear. A learning approach that can be used to define lifelong learning is heutagogy.

There are several established contexts for lifelong learning beyond traditional "brick and mortar" schooling:

• Home schooling involves learning to learn or the development of informal learning patterns
• Adult education or the acquisition of formal qualifications or work and leisure skills later in life
• Continuing education which often describes extension or not-for-credit courses offered by higher education institutions
• Lifelong learning institutes, which are groups over 50 years of age which meet for noncredit college-level study for intellectual challenge and social enjoyment
• Knowledge work, which includes professional development and on-the-job training
• Personal learning environments or self-directed learning using a range of sources and tools including online applications

E-learning is available at most colleges and universities or to individuals learning independently. There are even online courses being offered for free by many institutions.

One new (2008 and beyond) expression of lifelong learning is the massive open online course (a MOOC), in which a teacher or team offers a syllabus and some direction for the participation of hundreds, sometimes thousands, of learners. Most MOOCs do not offer typical "credit" for courses taken, which is why they are interesting and useful examples of lifelong learning.

Emerging technologies

Lifelong learning is defined as "all learning activity undertaken throughout life, with the aim of improving knowledge, skills and competences within a personal, civic, social and/or employment-related perspective". It is often considered learning that occurs after the formal education years of childhood (where learning is instructor-driven—pedagogical) and into adulthood (where the learning is individually-driven—andragogical). It is sought out naturally through life experiences as the learner seeks to gain knowledge for professional or personal reasons. These natural experiences can come about on purpose or throughout life's unpredictable course. 'Knowledge results from the combination of grasping experience and transforming it' (Kolb 1984: 41). The concept of lifelong learning has become of vital importance with the emergence of new technologies that change how we receive and gather information, collaborate with others, and communicate.

Assistive technology

As technology rapidly changes, individuals must adapt and learn to meet everyday demands. However, throughout life, an individual's functional capacities may also change. Assistive technologies are also important considerations under the umbrella of emerging technology and lifelong learning. Access to informal and formal learning opportunities for individuals with disabilities may be dependent upon low and high tech assistive technology.

Web 2.0

The emergence of Web 2.0 technologies has great potential to support lifelong learning endeavors, allowing for informal, just-in-time, day-to-day learning. Constant change is emerging as the new normal. To thrive, organizations and individuals must be able to adjust, and enhance their knowledge and skills to meet evolving needs. This means the most important thing someone can learn is how to learn. An understanding of web 2.0 tools is critical to keeping up with a changing world and the information explosion.

Workplace learning

Professions typically recognize the importance of developing practitioners becoming lifelong learners. Nowadays, formal training is only a beginning. Knowledge accumulates at such a fast rate that one must continue to learn to be effective (Williams, 2001). Many licensed professions mandate that their members continue learning to maintain a license. (Merriam, Caffarella, & Baumgartner, 2007). Having said this, what are the characteristics or skills that a lifelong learner must develop. Reflective learning and critical thinking can help a learner to become more self-reliant through learning how to learn, thus making them better able to direct, manage, and control their own learning process (Candy, 1990). Sipe (1995) studied experimentally "open" teachers and found that they valued self-directed learning, collaboration, reflection, and challenge; risk taking in their learning was seen as an opportunity, not a threat. Dunlap and Grabinger (2003) say that for higher education students to be lifelong learners, they must develop a capacity for self-direction, metacognition awareness, and a disposition toward learning (Merriam, Caffarella, & Baumgartner, 2007).

Metacognition

While the study of metacognition originally gave educational psychologists insights into what differentiated successful students from their less successful peers, it is increasingly being used to inform teaching that aims to make students more aware of their learning processes, and show them how to regulate those processes for more effective learning throughout their lives.

Educators can employ Cognitive Strategy Instruction (CSI) as a means to help learners develop their metacognition. Again, learners who are better equipped to create learning strategies for themselves will have more success in achieving their cognitive goals.

As lifelong learning is "lifelong, lifewide, voluntary, and self-motivated" learning to learn, that is, learning how to recognize learning strategies, and monitor and evaluate learning, is a pre-condition for lifelong learning. Metacognition is an essential first step in developing lifelong learning.

Delors Report and the four pillars of learning

Main article: Delors Report

The Delors Report proposed an integrated vision of education based on two key paradigms: lifelong learning and the four pillars of learning. The report proposed a holistic conceptual framework of learning, that of the 'four pillars of learning'. It argued that formal education tends to emphasize the acquisition of knowledge to the detriment of other types of learning essential to sustaining human development. It stressed the need to think of learning over the life course, and to address how everyone can develop relevant skills, knowledge and attitudes for work, citizenship and personal fulfillment. The four pillars of learning are:

1. Learning to know
2. Learning to do
3. Learning to be
4. Learning to live together

It is important to note that the four pillars of learning were envisaged against the backdrop of the notion of 'lifelong learning', itself an adaptation of the concept of 'lifelong education' as initially conceptualized in the 1972 Faure publication Learning to Be.

In practice

In India and elsewhere, the "University of the Third Age" (U3A) provides an example of the almost spontaneous emergence of autonomous learning groups accessing the expertise of their own members in the pursuit of knowledge and shared experience. No prior qualifications and no subsequent certificates feature in this approach to learning for its own sake and, as participants testify, engagement in this type of learning in later life can indeed 'prolong active life'.

In Sweden the successful concept of study circles, an idea launched almost a century ago, still represents a large portion of the adult education provision. The concept has since spread, and for instance, is a common practice in Finland as well. A study circle is one of the most democratic forms of a learning environment that has been created. There are no teachers and the group decides on what content will be covered, scope will be used, as well as a delivery method.

Sometimes lifelong learning aims to provide educational opportunities outside standard educational systems—which can be cost-prohibitive, if available at all. On the other hand, formal administrative units devoted to this discipline exist in a number of universities. For example, the 'Academy of Lifelong Learning' is an administrative unit within the University-wide 'Professional and Continuing Studies' unit at the University of Delaware. Another example is the Jagiellonian University Extension (Wszechnica Uniwersytetu Jagiellonskiego), which is one of the most comprehensive Polish centers for lifelong learning (open learning, organizational learning, community learning).

In recent years, 'lifelong learning' has been adopted in the UK as an umbrella term for post-compulsory education that falls outside of the UK higher education system – further education, community education, work-based learning and similar voluntary, public sector and commercial settings.

Most colleges and universities in the United States encourage lifelong learning to non-traditional students. Professional licensure and certification courses are also offered at many universities, for instance for teachers, social services providers, and other professionals. Some colleges even enable adults to earn credit for the college-level learning gained through work, volunteer and other experiences.

Bangladesh Open University (BOU) has six schools and is offering 23 formal and 19 nonformal programs. The number of enrolled students in formal programs for 2016 was 433,413. Most of the courses of BOU are for professional development and most of the students are professional people who are getting scope to study in flexible hours. BOU is the only public institution in the country that imparts education in distance mode. In place of campus based teaching, this university uses technology including electronic devices to reach people in different corners of the country.

In Canada, the federal government's Lifelong Learning Plan allows Canadian residents to withdraw funds from their Registered Retirement Savings Plan to help pay for lifelong learning, but the funds can only be used for formal learning programs at designated educational institutions.

Priorities for lifelong and life-wide learning have different priorities in different countries, some placing more emphasis on economic development (towards a learning economy) and some on social development (towards a learning society). For example, the policies of China, Republic of Korea, Singapore and Malaysia promote lifelong learning in a human resource development (HRD) perspective. The governments of these countries have done much to foster HRD whilst encouraging entrepreneurship.

Impact on long-term economic growth

Mainstream economic analysis has highlighted increased levels of primary and secondary education as a key driver of long-term economic growth. Data show that initial levels of educational attainment explain about half the difference in growth rates between East Asia and sub- Saharan Africa between 1965 and 2010. At the individual level, the knowledge and skills workers acquire through education and training make them more productive. Provision of good quality education can improve the knowledge and skills of a whole population beyond what traditional or informal systems can achieve. For business, educated and highly skilled workers foster productivity gains and technological change, through either innovation or imitation of processes developed elsewhere. At the societal level, education expansion helps build social and institutional capital, which has a strong impact on the investment climate and growth; it also helps in building social trust, developing participatory societies, strengthening the rule of law and supporting good governance.

Implications for an aging society

According to the Alzheimer's Society, it is estimated that more than a million Canadians will suffer from Alzheimer's diseases by 2030. "Exercising the brain may preserve it, forestalling mental decline" (Grady, 2012). In North America—and presumably globally—to proactively curb potential economic issues as the baby boomers continue to age, we need to look at society through a lifelong learning lens. Consider community programs to engage retirees and foster their cognitive health. Taking a proactive approach to keep our elderly population engaged through learning and their brains exercised as Grady described, the strain on the health care system and not to mention the families of the elderly would be lessened. The US Department of Health and Human Service published a study that suggests that older people with a mild cognitive impairment receive 8.5 hours more of care each week from their family and those with a severe impairment received 41.5 more hours than those without a cognitive impairment (USDHHS, 2007). Who pays for this? As a society we are living longer—85 years for men and 90 years for women—making cognitive health vitally important.

Autodidacticism

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Autodidacticism

Autodidacticism (also autodidactism) or self-education (also self-learning and self-teaching) is education without the guidance of masters (such as teachers and professors) or institutions (such as schools). Generally, autodidacts are individuals who choose the subject they will study, their studying material, and the studying rhythm and time. Autodidacts may or may not have formal education, and their study may be either a complement or an alternative to formal education. Many notable contributions have been made by autodidacts.

Etymology

The term has its roots in the Ancient Greek words αὐτός (autós, lit. 'self') and διδακτικός (didaktikos, lit. 'teaching'). The related term didacticism defines an artistic philosophy of education.

Terminology

Various terms are used to describe self-education. One such is heutagogy, coined in 2000 by Stewart Hase and Chris Kenyon of Southern Cross University in Australia; others are self-directed learning and self-determined learning. In the heutagogy paradigm, a learner should be at the centre of their own learning.

Modern education

Autodidacticism is sometimes a complement of modern education. As a complement to education, students would be encouraged to do more independent work. The Industrial Revolution created a new situation for self-directed learners.

Before the twentieth century, only a small minority of people received an advanced academic education. As stated by Joseph Whitworth in his influential report on industry dated from 1853, literacy rates were higher in the United States. However, even in the U.S., most children were not completing high school. High school education was necessary to become a teacher. In modern times, a larger percentage of those completing high school also attended college, usually to pursue a professional degree, such as law or medicine, or a divinity degree.

Collegiate teaching was based on the classics (Latin, philosophy, ancient history, theology) until the early nineteenth century. There were few if any institutions of higher learning offering studies in engineering or science before 1800. Institutions such as the Royal Society did much to promote scientific learning, including public lectures. In England, there were also itinerant lecturers offering their service, typically for a fee.

Prior to the nineteenth century, there were many important inventors working as millwrights or mechanics who, typically, had received an elementary education and served an apprenticeship. Mechanics, instrument makers and surveyors had various mathematics training. James Watt was a surveyor and instrument maker and is described as being "largely self-educated". Watt, like some other autodidacts of the time, became a Fellow of the Royal Society and a member of the Lunar Society. In the eighteenth century these societies often gave public lectures and were instrumental in teaching chemistry and other sciences with industrial applications which were neglected by traditional universities. Academies also arose to provide scientific and technical training.

Years of schooling in the United States began to increase sharply in the early twentieth century. This phenomenon was seemingly related to increasing mechanization displacing child labor. The automated glass bottle-making machine is said to have done more for education than child labor laws because boys were no longer needed to assist. However, the number of boys employed in this particular industry was not that large; it was mechanization in several sectors of industry that displaced child labor toward education. For males in the U.S. born 1886–90, years of school averaged 7.86, while for those born in 1926–30, years of school averaged 11.46.

One of the most recent trends in education is that the classroom environment should cater towards students' individual needs, goals, and interests. This model adopts the idea of inquiry-based learning where students are presented with scenarios to identify their own research, questions and knowledge regarding the area. As a form of discovery learning, students in today's classrooms are being provided with more opportunity to "experience and interact" with knowledge, which has its roots in autodidacticism.

Successful self-teaching can require self-discipline and reflective capability. Some research suggests that the ability to regulate one's own learning may need to be modeled to some students so that they become active learners, while others learn dynamically via a process outside of conscious control. To interact with the environment, a framework has been identified to determine the components of any learning system: a reward function, incremental action value functions and action selection methods. Rewards work best in motivating learning when they are specifically chosen on an individual student basis. New knowledge must be incorporated into previously existing information as its value is to be assessed. Ultimately, these scaffolding techniques, as described by Vygotsky (1978) and problem solving methods are a result of dynamic decision making.

The secular and modern societies gave foundations for a new system of education and a new kind of autodidacts. While the number of schools and students rose from one century to the other, so did the number of autodidacts. The industrial revolution produced new educational tools used in schools, universities and outside academic circles to create a post-modern era that gave birth to the World Wide Web and encyclopaedic data banks such as Wikipedia. As this concept becomes more widespread and popular, web locations such as Udacity and Khan Academy are developed as learning centers for many people to actively and freely learn together. The Alliance for Self-Directed Education (ASDE) is also formed to publicize and provide guidance or support for self-directed education.

In history, philosophy, literature, film and television

The first philosophical claim supporting an autodidactic program to the study of nature and God was in the philosophical novel Hayy ibn Yaqdhan (Alive Son of the Vigilant), whose titular hero is considered the archetypal autodidact. The story is a medieval autodidactic utopia, a philosophical treatise in a literary form, which was written by the Andalusian philosopher Ibn Tufail in the 1160s in Marrakesh. It is a story about a feral boy, an autodidact prodigy who masters nature through instruments and reason, discovers laws of nature by practical exploration and experiments, and gains summum bonum through a mystical mediation and communion with God. The hero rises from his initial state of tabula rasa to a mystical or direct experience of God after passing through the necessary natural experiences. The focal point of the story is that human reason, unaided by society and its conventions or by religion, can achieve scientific knowledge, preparing the way to the mystical or highest form of human knowledge.

Commonly translated as "The Self-Taught Philosopher" or "The Improvement of Human Reason", Ibn-Tufayl's story Hayy Ibn-Yaqzan inspired debates about autodidacticism in a range of historical fields from classical Islamic philosophy through Renaissance humanism and the European Enlightenment. In his book Reading Hayy Ibn-Yaqzan: a Cross-Cultural History of Autodidacticism, Avner Ben-Zaken showed how the text traveled from late medieval Andalusia to early modern Europe and demonstrated the intricate ways in which autodidacticism was contested in and adapted to diverse cultural settings.

Autodidacticism apparently intertwined with struggles over Sufism in twelfth-century Marrakesh; controversies about the role of philosophy in pedagogy in fourteenth-century Barcelona; quarrels concerning astrology in Renaissance Florence in which Pico della Mirandola pleads for autodidacticism against the strong authority of intellectual establishment notions of predestination; and debates pertaining to experimentalism in seventeenth-century Oxford. Pleas for autodidacticism echoed not only within close philosophical discussions; they surfaced in struggles for control between individuals and establishments.

In the story of Black American self-education, Heather Andrea Williams presents a historical account to examine Black American's relationship to literacy during slavery, the Civil War and the first decades of freedom. Many of the personal accounts tell of individuals who have had to teach themselves due to racial discrimination in education.

The working-class protagonist of Jack London's Martin Eden (1909) embarks on a path of self-learning to win the affections of Ruth, a member of cultured society. By the end of the novel, Eden has surpassed the intellect of the bourgeois class, leading him to a state of indifference and ultimately suicide.

Jean-Paul Sartre's Nausea (1938) depicts, as a secondary character, an autodidact.

Comic-book superhero Batman is frequently depicted as an autodidactic polymath who has acquired a vast range of skills over the years either by various trainers or having trained himself, and his expertise in various disciplines is virtually unmatched in the DC comics universe.

In The Ignorant Schoolmaster (1987), Jacques Rancière describes the emancipatory education of Joseph Jacotot, a post-Revolutionary philosopher of education who discovered that he could teach things he did not know. The book is both a history and a contemporary intervention in the philosophy and politics of education, through the concept of autodidacticism; Rancière chronicles Jacotot's "adventures", but he articulates Jacotot's theory of "emancipation" and "stultification" in the present tense.

The 1997 drama film Good Will Hunting follows the story of autodidact Will Hunting, played by Matt Damon. Hunting demonstrates his breadth and depth of knowledge throughout the film but especially to his therapist and in a heated discussion in a Harvard bar.

One of the main characters in The Elegance of the Hedgehog (2006), by Muriel Barbery, is an autodidact. The story is told from the viewpoint of Renee, a middle-aged autodidact concierge in a Paris upscale apartment house and Paloma, a 12-year-old daughter of one of the tenants who is unhappy with her life. These two people find they have much in common when they both befriend a new tenant, Mr. Ozu, and their lives change forever.

In the Hindu epic, the Mahabharata, Ekalavya is depicted as a tribal boy who was denied education in the science of arms from royal teachers from the house of Kuru. Ekalavya went to the forest, where he taught himself archery in front of an image of the Kuru teacher, Drona, that he had built for himself. Later, when the royal family found that Ekalavya had practiced with the image of Drona as his teacher, Drona asked for Ekalavya's thumb as part of his tuition. Ekalavya complied with Drona's request, thus ending his martial career.

In Suits, the protagonist (Mike Ross) possesses a highly competent knowledge of the law despite not receiving any formal education in any law school. His knowledge is attributable to both his affinity for reading (autodidacticism), in addition to his eidetic memory.

Dr. Spencer Reid in Criminal Minds, played by Matthew Gray Gubler, is an autodidact with an eidetic memory.

In architecture

Tadao Ando is a famous autodidact architect of the twenty-first century

Many successful and influential architects, such as Mies Van Der Rohe, Frank Lloyd Wright, Violet-Le-Duc, and Tadao Ando were self-taught.

There are very few countries allowing autodidacticism in architecture today. The practice of architecture or the use of the title "architect", are now protected in most countries.

Self-taught architects have generally studied and qualified in other fields such as engineering or arts and crafts. Jean Prouvé was first a structural engineer. Le Corbusier had an academic qualification in decorative arts. Tadao Ando started his career as a draftsman, and Eileen Gray studied fine arts.

When a political state starts to implement restrictions on the profession, there are issues related to the rights of established self-taught architects. In most countries the legislation includes a grandfather clause, authorising established self-taught architects to continue practicing. In the UK, the legislation, allowed self-trained architects with 2 years of experience to register. In France, it allowed self-trained architects with 5 years of experience to register. In Belgium, the law allowed experienced self-trained architects in practice to register. In Italy, it allowed self-trained architects with 10 years of experience to register. In The Netherlands, the "wet op de architectentitel van 7 juli 1987" along with additional procedures, allowed architects with 10 years of experience and architects aged 40 years old or over, with 5 years of experience, to access the register.

However, other sovereign states chose to omit such a clause, and many established and competent practitioners were stripped of their professional rights. In the Republic of Ireland, a group named "Architects' Alliance of Ireland" is defending the interests of long-established self-trained architects who were recently deprived of their rights to practice as per Part 3 of the Irish Building Control Act 2007.

Theoretical research such as "Architecture of Change, Sustainability and Humanity in the Built Environment" or older studies such as "Vers une Architecture" from Le Corbusier describe the practice of architecture as an environment changing with new technologies, sciences, and legislation. All architects must be autodidacts to keep up to date with new standards, regulations, or methods.

Self-taught architects such as Eileen Gray, Luis Barragán, and many others, created a system where working is also learning, where self-education is associated with creativity and productivity within a working environment.

While he was primarily interested in naval architecture, William Francis Gibbs learned his profession through his own study of battleships and ocean liners. Through his life he could be seen examining and changing the designs of ships that were already built, that is, until he started his firm Gibbs and Cox.

Future role

The role of self-directed learning continues to be investigated in learning approaches, along with other important goals of education, such as content knowledge, epistemic practices and collaboration. As colleges and universities offer distance learning degree programs and secondary schools provide cyber school options for K-12 students, technology provides numerous resources that enable individuals to have a self-directed learning experience. Several studies show these programs function most effectively when the "teacher" or facilitator is a full owner of virtual space to encourage a broad range of experiences to come together in an online format. This allows self-directed learning to encompass both a chosen path of information inquiry, self-regulation methods and reflective discussion among experts as well as novices in a given area. Furthermore, massive open online courses (MOOCs) make autodidacticism easier and thus more common.

A 2016 Stack Overflow poll reported that due to the rise of autodidacticism, 69.1% of software developers appear to be self-taught.

Women in engineering

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Women_in_engineering 

 

A female engineer working on an optical communications system test.

Women are often under-represented in the academic and professional fields of engineering, however many females have contributed to the diverse fields of engineering historically and currently. A number of organizations and programs have been created to understand and overcome this tradition of gender disparity. Some have decried this gender gap, saying that it indicates the absence of potential talent. Though the gender gap as a whole is narrowing, there is still a growing gap with minority women compared to their white counterparts. Gender stereotypes, low rates of female engineering students, and engineering culture are factors that contribute to the current situation where men are dominated in the engineering field.

History

Main article: History of women in engineering

The history of women as designers and builders of machines and structures predates the development of engineering as a profession. Prior to the creation of the term "engineer" in the 11th century, women had contributed to the technological advancement of societies around the globe. By the 19th century, women who participated in engineering work often had academic training in mathematics or science. Ada Lovelace was privately schooled in mathematics before beginning her collaboration with Charles Babbage on his analytical engine that would earn her the designation of the "first computer programmer." In the early years of the 20th century, greater numbers of women began to be admitted to engineering programs, but they were generally looked upon as anomalies by the men in their departments.

A 1953 Society of Women Engineers board meeting.

The first University to award an engineering's bachelor's degree for women was University of California, Berkeley. Elizabeth Bragg was the recipient of a bachelor's degree in civil engineering in 1876, becoming the first female engineer in the United States. Prior to the 19th century, it was very rare for women to earn bachelor's degree in any field because they did not have the opportunity to enroll in universities due to gender disparities. Some universities started to admit women to their colleges by the early 1800s and by the mid-1800s they started to admit them into all academic programs including engineering.

In the United States, the entry into World War II created a serious shortage of engineering talent, as men were drafted into the armed forces. To address the shortage, initiatives like General Electric on-the-job engineering training for women with degrees in mathematics and physics and the Curtiss-Wright Engineering Program among others created new opportunities for women in engineering. Curtiss-Wright partnered with Cornell, Penn State, Purdue, the University of Minnesota, the University of Texas, Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute and Iowa State University to create an engineering curriculum that lasted ten months and focused primarily on aircraft design and production.

During this time, there were few public attacks on female engineers. Chiefly, these attacks were kept quiet inside institutions due to the fact that women did not pressure aggressively to shift the gender gap between men and women in the engineering field. Another reason why these “attacks” were kept private is due to how men believed that it was impossible for engineering to stop being a male-dominated field.

Women's roles in the workforce, specifically in engineering fields, changed greatly during the Post–World War II period. As women started to marry at later ages, have fewer children, divorce more frequently and stopped depending on male breadwinners for economic support, they started to become even more active in the engineering labor force despite the fact that their salaries were less than men's.

Women also played a crucial role in programming the ENIAC from its construction during the World War II period through the next several decades. Originally recruited by the Army in 1943, female ENIAC programmers made considerable advancements in programming techniques, such as the invention of breakpoints, now a standard debugging tool.

In addition to the wartime shortage of engineers, the number of women in engineering fields grew due to the gradual increase of public universities admitting female students. For example, Georgia Tech began to admit women engineering students in 1952, while the École Polytechnique in Paris, a premier French engineering institution, began to admit female students in 1972.

As a result, gender stereotypical roles have changed due to industrialization resolution.

Factors contributing to lower female participation

Gender stereotypes

Stereotype threat may contribute to the under-representation of women in engineering. Because engineering is a traditionally male-dominated field, women may be less confident about their abilities, even when performing equally. At a young age, girls do not express the same level of interest in engineering as boys, possibly due in part to gender stereotypes. There is also significant evidence of the remaining presence of implicit bias against female engineers, due to the belief that men are mathematically superior and better suited to engineering jobs. The Implicit Association Test (IAT) shows that people subconsciously connect men with science and women with art, according to the results from over half a million people around the world between 1998 and 2010. This unconscious stereotype also has negative impact on the performance for women. Women who persist are able to overcome these difficulties, enabling them to find fulfilling and rewarding experiences in the engineering profession.

Due to this gender bias, women's choice in entering an engineering field for college is also highly correlated to the background and exposure they have had with mathematics and other science courses during high school. Most women that do choose to study engineering regard themselves as better at these types of courses and as a result, they are capable of studying in a male-dominated field.

Women's self-efficacy is also a contributor to the gender stereotype that plays a role in the underrepresentation of women in engineering. Women's ability to think that they can be successful and perform well is correlated to the choices they make when choosing a college career. Women that show high self-efficacy personalities are more likely to choose to study in the engineering field. Self-efficacy is also correlated to gender roles because men often present higher self-efficacy than women, which can also be why when choosing a major most women opt to not choose the engineering major.

Lower rates of female students in engineering degree programs

Over the past few years, 40% of women have left the engineering field. There are many factors leading to this, such as being judged about going into a difficult major such as engineering, or working in difficult workplace conditions. According to the Society of Women Engineers one in four females leave the field after a certain age.

Women are under-represented in engineering education programs as in the workforce (see Statistics). Enrollment and graduation rates of women in post-secondary engineering programs are very important determinants of how many women go on to become engineers. Because undergraduate degrees are acknowledged as the "latest point of standard entry into scientific fields", the under-representation of women in undergraduate programs contributes directly to under-representation in scientific fields. Additionally, in the United States, women who hold degrees in science, technology, and engineering fields are less likely than their male counterparts to have jobs in those fields.

This degree disparity varies across engineering disciplines. Women tend to be more interested in the engineering disciplines that have societal and humane developments, such as agricultural and environmental engineering. They are therefore well-represented in environmental and biomedical engineering degree programs, receiving 40-50% of awarded degrees in the U.S. (2017–18), and are far less likely to receive degrees in fields like mechanical, electrical and computer engineering.

A study by the Harvard Business Review discussed the reasons why the rate of women in the engineering field is still low. The study discovered that rates of female students in engineering programs are continuous because of the collaboration aspects in the field. The results of the study chiefly determined how women are treated differently in group works in which there are more male than female members and how male members “excluded women from the real engineering work”. Aside from this, women in this study also described how professors treated female students differently “just because they were women”.

Despite the fact that fewer women enroll in engineering programs across the nation, the representation of women in STEM-based careers can increase when college and university administrators work on implementing mentoring programs and work-life policies for women. Research shows that these rates are difficult to increase since women are judged as less competent than men to perform supposedly “masculine jobs”.

Engineering culture

Autodidact computer chip designer and inventor, Jeri Ellsworth, at the Bay Area "Maker Faire" in 2009.

Another possible reason for lower female participation in engineering fields is the prevalence of values associated with the male gender role in workplace culture. For example, some women in engineering have found it difficult to re-enter the workforce after a period of absence. Because men are less likely to take time off to raise a family, this disproportionately affects women.

Males are also associated with taking leadership roles in the workplace. By holding a position of power over the women, they may create an uncomfortable environment for them. For example, women may receive lower pay, more responsibilities, or less appreciation as compared to men. However, women may have more potential to become good leaders: studies have indicated that females have more key leadership skills, for example, the ability to motivate employees, build relationships, and take initiative.

Communication is also a contributing factor to the divide between men and women in the workplace. A male to male communication is said to be more direct, but when a man explains a task to a woman, they tend to talk down, or “dumb down” terms. This comes from the stereotype that men are more qualified than women, and can cause men to treat women as inferiors instead of equals.

Part of the male dominance in the engineering field is explained by their perception towards engineering itself. A study in 1964 found that both women and men believed that engineering was masculine in nature.

In the past few decades, women's representation in the workforce in STEM fields, specifically engineering, has significantly improved. In 1960 women made up around 1% of all the engineers and by the year 2000 women have made up 11% of all engineers.

Several colleges and universities nationwide are attempting to decrease the gender gap between men and women in the engineering field by recruiting more women into their programs. Their strategies include increasing women's exposure to stem-courses during high school, planting the idea of positivism relating gender from the engineering culture, and producing a more female-friendly environment inside and outside the classroom. These strategies have helped institutions encourage more women to enroll in engineering programs as well as other STEM-based majors. For universities to encourage women to enroll in their graduate programs, institutions have to emphasize the importance of recruiting women, emphasize the importance of STEM education in the undergraduate level, offer financial aid, and develop more efficient methods for recruiting women to their programs.

Statistics

Percentage of female undergraduate students with engineering degree in Australia, Canada, the UK, and US

Country	% of women	year
Australia	14%	2010
Canada	21.8%	2017
India	29.7%	2018
United Kingdom	17.57%	2016-2017
United States	19.7%	2015-2016

United States

Main article: Women in engineering in the United States

In 2014, there were 7.9% female freshmen among all first-year students planning to study in STEM (science, technology, engineering, and mathematics) related majors. In comparison, 26.9% male freshmen intended to major in STEM. For female students who chose engineering, over 32% decided to switch to a different major.

Since 1997, the percentage of Asian females enrolling in engineering majors has risen from about 30% to 34% but somehow also dropped in 2002. African American females have increased their representation in engineering from 21% to 33% in the same time frame. Mexican American and Puerto Rican females have had an increase in their representation from 25% to 31%. Even if ethnicities are included in these statistics, men from all ethnicities still outnumber the proportion of women who enroll in engineering bachelor programs.

The percentage of master's degrees awarded to women has not changed much from 2003 (22.3%) to 2012 (23.1%). The percentage of doctoral degrees awarded to women in engineering increased from 11.6% in 1995, to 17.4% in 2004, to 21.1% in 2008, then to 22.2% in 2012.

There is a significant drop-off rate regarding the number of women who earn a bachelor's degree and the women who afterward enroll in graduate school. Over the last 35 years, women have been more likely than men to enroll in graduate school right after receiving their bachelor's degree. Women who do not enroll in a graduate program right after earning their bachelor's degree tend to be caregivers who face work-family conflicts in the context of family women. The workforce remains the area of lowest representation for women. There were 13% female engineers in 2016. Usually, the salary of female engineers is 10% less than male engineers. The retention of female engineers is also disproportionally low; in 2006, 62.6% of qualified male engineers were employed in engineering professions, as opposed to 47.1% of qualified female engineers.

Female engineering students in class

Canada

Though women tend to make up more than half of the undergraduate population in Canada, the number of women in engineering is disproportionately low. In 2017, 21.8% of undergraduate engineering students were women, and 20.6% of undergraduate engineering degrees were awarded to women. The enrollment of women in engineering climbed from 16% in 1991 to over 20% in 2001, but by 2009 this number had fallen to 17%. One commentator attributed this drop to a number of factors, such as the failure of higher education programs to explain how engineering can improve others' lives, a lack of awareness of what engineers do, lack of networking opportunities and discomfort of being in a male-dominated environment and the perception that women must adapt to fit in.

In the 1990s, undergraduate enrollment of women in engineering fluctuated from 17% to 18%, while in 2001, it rose to 20.6%. In 2010, 17.7% of students in undergraduate engineering were women.

2016 percentage of women enrolled in tertiary education programs in Canada

Province	Undergraduate	Graduate	Doctoral
Alberta	22%	23.3%	23.3%
British Columbia	16.5%	27.5%	27.5%
Manitoba	16%	22.9%	22.9%
New Brunswick	15.9%	19.3%	19.3%
Newfoundland and Labrador	20.9%	20.6%	20.6%
Northwest Territories	—	—	—
Nova Scotia	18.7%	15.8%	15.8%
Nunavut	—	—	—
Ontario	17.7%	21.4%	21.4%
Prince Edward Island	—	—	—
Quebec	16.3%	20.4%	20.4%
Saskatchewan	19%	27.9%	27.9%
Yukon Territory	—	—	—
Canada	17.7%	21.9%	21.9%

In 2017, the disciplines with the highest proportion of undergraduates who are women were environmental, biosystems, and geological engineering. Four out of the five disciplines with the largest percentages of undergraduate who are women were also the disciplines with the fewest overall undergraduate students enrolled. The lowest proportion of women were found in mechanical (14.2%), software (14.6%), and computer engineering (14.8%).

The number of women enrolled in undergraduate, graduate, and doctoral engineering programs tends to vary by province, with the proportion in Newfoundland and Labrador, Prince Edward Island, and Alberta.

The percentage of engineering faculty who are women increased from 13.4% in 2013 to 15.5% in 2017. The University of Toronto has the highest number of female professors in Canada (21) and École Polytechnique de Montréal (18), University of Waterloo (17) and the University of British Columbia (16).

CCWE1992 goals for 1997 and actual 2009 percentage of women involved in engineering in Canada

Women in...	1997	2009
1st year undergraduate	25-25%
Undergraduate programs		17.4%
Master's studies	20%	24.1%
Doctoral studies	10%	22%
Faculty members: professors	5%	Full: 7% Associate: 11% Assistant: 18%
Eng. degree graduates	18%	17.6%
Profession		10.4%

In 2011, the INWES (International Network of Women Engineers and Scientists) Education and Research Institute (ERI) held a national workshop, Canadian Committee of Women in Engineering (CCWE+20), to determine ways of increasing the number of women in the engineering field in Canada. CCWE+20 identified a goal of increasing women's interest in engineering by 2.6% by 2016 to a total of 25% through more incentives such as through collaboration and special projects. The workshop identifies early education as one of the main barriers in addition to other factors, such as: "the popular culture of their generation, the guidance they receive on course selection in high school and the extent to which their parents, teachers, and counsellors recognize engineering as an appropriate and legitimate career choice for women." The workshop report compares enrollment, teaching, and professional statistics from the goals identified in 1997 compared to the actual data from 2009, outlining areas of improvement (see table, right).

United Kingdom

According to the Women's Engineering Society's statistics document, 12.37% of engineers in the UK are female in 2018. 25.4% of females from 16 to 18 years old plan to have a career in the engineering field, compared to 51.9% of males from the same age group.

The Royal Academy of Engineering reported in 2020 that the gender pay gap in the engineering profession is smaller than the average for all UK employment. The mean (10.8%) and median (11.4%) pay gap for engineers in the sample analysed is around two thirds the national average. In 2017, the average salary for female engineers across all engineering fields was £38,109, whereas the average salary for male engineers across all fields was £48,866. The industry average salary is £48,000.

Portrayal in popular culture

The 2016 Hollywood film Hidden Figures follows three African American women engineers' work at NASA in 1960. The film was nominated for the 89th Academy Award for Best Picture. In 2019, Mary Robinette Kowal published SF novel The Calculating Stars, which also tells the story of women engineers working in NASA around the same period. The novel received Nebula Award for Best Novel and Hugo Award for Best Novel.