The Matilda Effect in Science Communication: An Experiment on Gender Bias in Publication Quality Perceptions and Collaboration Interest

An experiment with 243 young communication scholars tested hypotheses derived from role congruity theory regarding impacts of author gender and gender typing of research topics on perceived quality of scientific publications and collaboration interest. Participants rated conference abstracts ostensibly authored by females or males, with author associations rotated. The abstracts fell into research areas perceived as gender-typed or gender-neutral to ascertain impacts from gender typing of topics. Publications from male authors were associated with greater scientific quality, in particular if the topic was male-typed. Collaboration interest was highest for male authors working on male-typed topics. Respondent sex did not influence these patterns.