The Gender Gap in Self-Promotion

Abstract We run a series of experiments involving over 4,000 online participants and over 10,000 school-aged youth. When individuals are asked to subjectively describe their performance on a male-typed task relating to math and science, we find a large gender gap in self-evaluations. This gap arises...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:The Quarterly journal of economics 2022-07, Vol.137 (3), p.1345-1381
Main Authors: Exley, Christine L, Kessler, Judd B
Format: Article
Language:English
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Summary:Abstract We run a series of experiments involving over 4,000 online participants and over 10,000 school-aged youth. When individuals are asked to subjectively describe their performance on a male-typed task relating to math and science, we find a large gender gap in self-evaluations. This gap arises when self-evaluations are provided to potential employers, and thus measure self-promotion, and when self-evaluations are not driven by incentives to promote. The gender gap in self-evaluations proves to be persistent and arises as early as the sixth grade. No gender gap arises if individuals are asked about their performance on a more female-typed task.
ISSN:0033-5533
1531-4650
DOI:10.1093/qje/qjac003