The countries that minted the most female college graduates in fields like science, engineering, or math were also some of the l

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问题    The countries that minted the most female college graduates in fields like science, engineering, or math were also some of the least gender-equal countries. According to a paper by Gijsbert Stoet and David Geary, psychologists at Leeds Beckett University and the University of Missouri respectively, this is because the countries that empower women also empower them, indirectly, to pick whatever career they’d enjoy most and be best at.
   "Countries with the highest gender equality tend to be welfare states," they write, "with a high level of social security." Meanwhile, less gender-equal countries tend to also have less social support for people who, for example, find themselves unemployed. Thus, the authors suggest, girls in those countries might be more inclined to choose stem professions, since they offer a more certain financial future than, say, painting or writing.
   When the experts looked at the "overall life satisfaction" rating of each country — a measure of economic opportunity and hardship — they found that gender-equal countries had more life satisfaction. The life-satisfaction ranking explained 35 percent of the variation between gender equality and women’s participation in stem. That correlation echoes past research showing that the genders are actually more segregated by field of study in more economically developed places.
   The upshot of this research is neither especially feminist nor especially sad: It’s not that gender equality discourages girls from pursuing science. It’s that it allows them not to if they’re not interested.
   The findings will likely seem controversial, since the idea that men and women have different inherent abilities is often used as a reason, by some, to argue we should forget trying to recruit more women into the stem fields. But, as the University of Wisconsin gender-studies professor Janet Shibley Hyde put it, that’s not quite what’s happening here.
   "Some would say that the gender stem gap occurs not because girls can’t do science, but because they have other alternatives, based on their strengths in verbal skills," she said. "In wealthy nations, they believe that they have the freedom to pursue those alternatives and not worry so much that they pay less."
   Instead, this line of research, if it’s replicated, might hold useful takeaways for people who do want to see more Western women entering stem fields. In this study, the percentage of girls who did excel in science or math was still larger than the number of women who were graduating with stem degrees. That means there’s something in even the most liberal societies that’s nudging women away from math and science, even when those are their best subjects. The women-in-stem advocates could, for starters, focus their efforts on those would-be stem stars.

选项

答案 在理科、工科和数学等专业产出女毕业生最多的国家往往也是性别平等状况最差的国家。吉斯波特-斯托耶特和大卫-吉尔分别是利兹贝克特大学和密苏里大学的心理学家,两位学者在其最近发表的论文中指出,上述情况的产生原因是赋予女性权利的国家也间接赋予了女性选择自己最为心仪、最为擅长的职业的权利。 两位学者在其文中还提到,“两性地位平等程度最高的国家往往是福利国家,社会保障水平也往往很高”。与此同时,两性平等状况较差的国家对民众,如失业者的社会扶持也往往较少。对此情况,两位学者认为,此类国家中女性更倾向于选择理工专业的原因在于,相比美术或者写作之类的专业,这些专业更有“钱”途。 对各国“总体生活满意度”评级(对经济机遇和困难程度进行评测)进行分析后,两位研究者发现,两性较为平等的国家中人们的生活满意度更高。生活满意度排行解释了两性平等度和女性理工科选择率之间存在的35%的差距。此研究结果也验证了先前研究的结论。根据先前研究,越是经济发达的地区,两性在学科专业选择方面的差异也愈加明显。 上述研究的结论并不十分符合女权主义理论,不过也并不令人悲观:性别平等不会妨碍女生选择理工科,而是允许女性对某专业缺乏兴趣时可以选择放弃。 上述发现也许看似存有争议,因为有些人认为男性和女性天生禀赋不同,因而理工专业不应该再多招女性。但正如威斯康星大学专门从事性别研究的珍妮特-谢博利-海德教授所言,在她们学校,情况并非如此。 她说: “有些人认为,理工科的性别差距之所以存在,不是因为女孩学不好理工科,而是女生天生善于口头表达,所以有别的路可以选择。在富裕国家里,女孩子不用担心自己将来工资低,她们相信自己有选择其他道路的自由。” 因而,如果此项研究得到证实,对于那些希望看到更多西方女性进入理工专业的人们而言,它恰恰提供了有价值的启示。该研究显示,在理科和数学方面表现优异的女孩比例依然超出最终获得理工科学位的女性数量。这意味着,即使在最自由的社会中,即便女性最擅长数学或者理科,但还是有某种力量会把女性推离此类专业。不过,提倡女性学理工科的人们可以首先关注那些在理工科有望取得卓越成就的新秀。

解析    本文选自于《大西洋月刊》(The Atlantic)2018年的一篇报道,属于新闻评论文体,从理工科女生数目相对较少这一现象入手,通过调查研究得出结论:越是性别平等的国家,理工科女生也越少。随后,文章基于这一研究结果,进一步探讨男女性别差异和社会状况也决定了较少的女性选择理工科专业。 《大西洋月刊》是美国最受推崇的杂志之一,文章体裁涉及文学、政治、科学与艺术等多个方面。该刊物坚持无党派、无偏见原则,文章总体客观公正也不乏幽默轻松之氛围。上述考题文章整体上逻辑清晰,用词简洁,过渡衔接机制使用得当,但从翻译角度而言,译者需要了解学术研究的文体特征,同时借助原文内部衔接推测词义,从而更为准确地理解原文并以恰当的汉语重构译文。
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