Outrunning the gender gap – boys and girls compete equally

The authors found no differences in average performance changes between boys and girls when children were exposed to competitive settings. In other words, girls and boys competed equally. This result persisted even when the children were asked to compete in sports that were strongly associated with one gender:

• When asked to compete, both boys and girls improved their performance significantly in running (2.1% for girls, 1.1% for boys) and skipping rope (42% for girls, 39% for boys), but performed worse in dancing (-13% for girls, -15% for boys). In all three tasks, there was no significant difference in the change in performance between girls and boys, and the results were consistent for all ages of participants.
• Surprisingly, this result was unrelated to the perceived nature of the tasks performed. On average, the children in the study rated running as a more boyish task, whereas skipping rope and dancing were clearly identified as female sports. Girls, however, believed running to be a more gender-neutral activity as opposed to boys, who thought it to be more boyish. Girls also thought that dancing was a more gender-neutral activity, whereas boys thought it to be more girlish.
• Both boys and girls view competing in a given task as more boyish than the general task itself.
• Neither girls nor boys were influenced by the gender of their opponent.

In sum, the experiment found no significant gender difference in children’s performance response to competitive settings, i.e. girls and boys in Sweden competed equally. As these results seem to contradict previous findings, the authors recommend taking into consideration different cultural and normative attitudes towards gender equality in the Swedish context as a potential explanation.

The authors selected 11 primary school classes in the Stockholm area that participated in the study between 2008 and 2009. Children were randomly assigned to a treatment and a control group. All students had to participate in three different tasks during their normal physical exercise classes: in running, their performance was measured by how fast they ran 60 meters. In skipping rope, performance was measured as the number of jumps each child completed without missing. In dancing, students had to learn a short choreography with ten exercises, and were awarded one point for each correct movement. At the first stage, all students were asked to perform each task individually. At the second stage, students in the treatment group were paired with an opponent based on their initial performance, and were then asked to repeat the tasks. Students in the control group performed all three tasks individually at both stages, controlling for gender differences in factors such as tiredness. 

To control for gendered perceptions of the three tasks, the authors conducted a separate survey in which children (aged 9 to 10) were asked how boyish or girlish they considered running, skipping rope and dancing to be.