Paper short abstract:

This paper contributes to the STS literature on gender in/of science, exploring how early career women scientists perceive the academic culture they work in and local inclusion measures, promoting an action perspective.

Paper long abstract:

The STS literature on gender in science shows how academic cultures, scientists' identity-making and gender intersect in multiple and heterogeneous ways. Still, gender is often reduced to be just as a barrier for women in making an academic career. Empirical studies of academic culture shows that gender stereotypes are shown to influence perceptions of competence and merit in peer review processes (i. e Reuben et al. 2014; Shepardson og Pizzini 1992; Tregenza 2002 ). Others have emphasized how discourses of ambition are inherently gendered, resulting in patterns of gender inequality (Benschop, Brink, Doorewaard og Leenders 2013). Scientists' self-understanding is shaped by diverse understandings of research purposes (Pielke 2007), but also influenced by gendered perceptions of the self (Søndergaard 2003). Also, the "leaking pipeline" argument highlights gender as mainly an exclusion issue. This focus on gender balance problems have provided difficult to translate into effective actions to change the situation. Thus, this paper is built on the idea that it is more fruitful to turn the attention towards inclusion mechanisms (cf. Sørensen, Faulkner and Rommes 2011) and how they may influence the perceptions of future career options among women early career academics. How do women in such positions experience their work culture, and what do they see as efficient strategies for improving the gender balance? The paper is based on qualitative interviews with early career women scientists at NTNU. The interviewees are selected from departments with different levels of gender balance and gender balance change patterns.