"Why do girls do better academically than boys?".
There are some key factors, which seem to provide reliable evidence of why girls do better academically than boys. In referring to the Sociology Review magazine article 'Gender differences in education', by Eirene Mitsos and Ken Browne (1998), I have discovered that there are certain sociological reasons for why there are quite alarming gender differences in academic achievement. Here are some of them:.
The women's movement and feminism are well noted for the success that they have received in increasing moral, confidence, and expectations of women.
In challenging the traditional stereotype that the female belongs in the home while the male goes out to work, it has led to women becoming more ambitious about what they can achieve from life. Research by Sociologists and their discovery of females underachievement in the past has led to increased emphasis on equal opportunities in schools, colleges, and the workplace. Despite this, it is still evident that males are the gender that generally have higher paid jobs and hold the majority of positions of power in society. .
Vacancies in semi-skilled and unskilled manual work that have been stereotypically labelled 'male' have declined in recent years, while on the other hand there has been increased employment opportunities for women in the service sector.
In the article, they also make a reference to Sue Sharpe. In her research taken from 'Just like a girl' in 1976, she found that girls priorities were 'love, marriage, husbands, children, jobs and careers, in roughly that order. On repeating her research in 1994, she found quite start contrasts in that women's priorities had changed to 'job, career and being able to support themselves'. Adding this evidence to the fact that there is now more work available for women, it shows there is a lot more incentive for girls to work hard at school in order to gain good qualifications.