Study: Women more likely than men to get tenure-track jobs at university science departments

A surprising new study suggests that female candidates are twice as likely as men to gain tenure-track positions in science-related university departments, all other things being equal.

"It is a propitious time for women launching careers in academic science," researchers from the Cornell Institute for Women in Science wrote in the study, published in the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.

The study authors surveyed almost 900 faculty members at 371 national universities. The authors presented the profiles of fictional job candidates, asking participants whom they would hire for assistant professorship positions in biology, engineering, economics, and psychology. The female candidates ranked higher in almost every case, the researchers found.

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"We interpreted our findings to mean that anti-female bias in academic hiring has ended," the study authors wrote in a CNN op-ed. "Changing cultural values, gender-awareness training, and trends such as the retirement of older faculty members have brought us to a time when women in academic science are seen as more desirable hires than equally competent men."