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美国一项覆盖约一万名教职人员的新研究发现，职场中的贬低感是女性离开学术界的最强性别相关因素，作用超过常见的工作与生活平衡议题。研究10月13日发表于《PNAS Nexus》。

正文

A new study of thousands of U.S. faculty members finds that feeling undervalued at work is the strongest gendered reason women leave academia. The findings were published on October 13 in PNAS Nexus. Katie Spoon, now a postdoctoral fellow at Stanford University, and colleagues analysed open answers from a large survey of current and former tenure-track professors.

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美国一项覆盖数千名教职人员的新研究发现，职场中感到不被重视，是女性离开学术界最强的性别相关原因。相关结果于10月13日发表在《PNAS Nexus》。斯坦福大学博士后研究员凯蒂·斯普恩（Katie Spoon）与同事，分析了一项大型调查中现任与前任终身教职序列（tenure-track）教授写下的开放回答。

The survey covered about 10,000 faculty across nearly all institutions that grant Ph.D. degrees in the United States and 29 academic fields. At the end, respondents could describe what needed to change in their jobs, or what would have kept them from leaving. More than 6,600 people wrote detailed replies. Across respondents, 38 percent of women compared with 16 percent of men reported devaluation. Among those who left comments, the gender gap was similar: 41 percent of women versus 18 percent of men.

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该调查覆盖美国几乎所有授予博士学位的院校、约一万名教职人员，以及29个学术领域。问卷末尾请受访者说明工作中哪些方面需要改变，或若已离职，什么因素本可留住他们。超过6600人写下了详细回复。在全部受访者中，38%的女性与16%的男性报告遭遇贬低。在留下评论的人中，性别差距相近：女性41%，男性18%。

Devaluation meant feeling excluded, disrespected, mistreated, or held to different standards. Informal experiences were more common than problems in formal evaluation procedures. Many women also described “institutional betrayal,” when universities failed to take complaints seriously. The pattern held in STEM and non-STEM fields, at nearly 300 institutions, and at every level of prestige. It was strongest for women of color. It was also the only topic that grew more gendered with career age: a gap of 19 points among early career faculty widened to 31 points among late career faculty.

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贬低是指感到被排斥、不被尊重、受到不当对待，或被用不同标准要求。非正式交往中的经历，比正式评估程序中的问题更常见。许多女性还提到“制度性背叛”，即大学未能认真对待投诉。这一模式在STEM与非STEM领域、近300所院校以及各个声望层级都成立，对有色人种女性最为明显。它也是唯一随职业生涯推进而性别差距扩大的议题：早期职业教职的差距为19个百分点，到后期扩大到31个百分点。

That result challenges a common policy focus. Many programs try to help women stay by improving work-life balance or child care. Those issues matter, the authors note, but devaluation explained most of the gender gap in both considering leaving and actually leaving. One senior woman said she still had to fight for every raise. Another said she had to justify course release that a male colleague received without a struggle.

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这一结果挑战了常见的政策重点。许多项目试图通过改善工作与生活平衡或托儿支持来留住女性。作者指出这些问题确实重要，但贬低解释了考虑离职与实际离职中的大部分性别差距。一位资深女性说，她仍须为每一次加薪争取；另一位说，她必须为课程减免说明理由，而一位男同事却能不费周折地获得同样安排。

Outside experts said the study turns many personal stories into usable evidence. Donna Ginther of the University of Kansas said it captures climate problems that are hard to measure. Bruce Weinberg of Ohio State University praised the breadth of the data across career stage and race. Ginther also noted that academic turnover is unusually slow, so department culture may change little even when junior hiring improves. The authors argue that retention efforts need organizational change, not only individual advice about balance. Without that wider response, they suggest, gaps at senior levels are likely to remain.

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外部专家认为，这项研究把大量个人经历变成了可用证据。堪萨斯大学的唐娜·金瑟（Donna Ginther）说，它抓住了难以测量的氛围问题。俄亥俄州立大学的布鲁斯·温伯格（Bruce Weinberg）赞赏数据在职业阶段与种族维度上的广度。金瑟还指出，学术界人员更替异常缓慢，因此即便初级招聘有所改善，院系文化也可能变化不大。作者主张，留任工作需要组织层面的改变，而不仅是关于平衡的个人建议。他们提示，若缺少更广泛的回应，高层级上的差距很可能继续存在。

新闻来源

• Phys.org · Feeling undervalued emerges as strongest link to women leaving academia, survey finds
• Science · For women academics, feeling devalued can be a fatal career blow
• Kellogg School of Management · Devaluation Underlies Gendered U.S. Faculty Departures Across Disciplines and Institutions

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