Females Surpass Males in Computer Problem Solving: Findings from the Minnesota Computer Literacy Assessment

Abstract

Results from the 1979 Minnesota Computer Literacy Assessment conducted by the Minnesota Educational Computing Consortium, show that high school females performed better than males in some specific areas of programming. The areas of female superiority are those such as problem analysis and algorithmic application where the problems are expressed verbally rather than mathematically. While these findings may result from unique features of computer education in Minnesota, the findings may also be a consequence of the fact that the Minnesota assessment instrument was relatively free of mathematical bias. These findings and those of the 1982 National Assessment of Science on female superiority in “science decision making” imply that women are better than men at tasks usually defined as systems analysis rather than program coding.