Gender, Gender Stereotyping, and Socioeconomic Background as Determinants of Economic Knowledge and Learning

Abstract

The question of male-female differences in economic understanding continues to puzzle economic education specialists. The authors of this article report on a research project that sheds further light on this phenomenon. Several hundred secondary school students in Hawaii took the Test of Economic Understanding (TEU) on a pretest/post-test basis. The students were also asked to indicate whether economics is a masculine or feminine topic, and whether they preferred male or female teachers in their social studies classes. One of the findings of this study was that students who do not gender-stereotype economics and who have no preference regarding the gender of their teachers do better on the TEU and learn more economics. Other variables considered were grade level, GPA, intelligence, parents' occupations, holding a part-time job, and reading newspapers frequently.