Boys Better at Math Than Girls? It Just Doesn’t Add Up, Study Says

Girls did as well as boys in math in a large international study reported Friday, debunking the myth that males are naturally better than females in working with numbers.

Gila Hanna of the Ontario Institute for Studies in Education in Canada studied data collected in 1981 and 1982 on sex-related differences in the mathematics achievement of eighth-graders in 20 countries.

The data, collected by the International Assn. for the Evaluation of Educational Achievement, came from 37,043 girls and 37,410 boys. From 1,000 to 5,000 students participated in each country.

“Statistical analyses showed that in half of the countries there were no gender differences. In the other 10 countries, there were differences ranging from 2 to 6 percentage points,” Hanna wrote in reporting her findings.

“These differences tended to be in the girls’ favor in algebra, while in geometry and measurement they tended to be in the boys’ favor. But, in general, the results suggest the differences between boys and girls in Grade 8 mathematics vary from country to country and that even the largest differences are very small,” Hanna said.

In the sample collected in the United States, which consisted of 3,452 girls and 3,202 boys, there were no differences between boys and girls in algebra, arithmetic or statistics. Boys did only about 2% better in measurement.

“Mathematics achievement seems to depend much more on teaching methods, curriculum coverage and quality of instruction than on the gender of the pupil,” said Hanna, who presented her findings at a meeting of the American Assn. for the Advancement of Science.

“It would appear that non-biological factors played a role in those countries where the study found some evidence of gender differences,” Hanna said.