Sex and Gender Differences in Educational Outcomes

Abstract

The Asia-Pacific region includes countries with a wide range of ethnic and racial groups and with a great variety of cultural traditions. Within these traditions, women and men may have very different roles in the societies in which they live, work and play. However, the expansion of educational services within the region during the twentieth century has raised the issues of whether there should be equality of educational opportunities for girls and boys and whether equality of educational outcomes should be expected between the sexes. The proper handling of the biological and psychological differences between boys and girls remains a challenging problem for education in all countries. Consequently, it is necessary to consider whether boys and girls have different innate abilities, have different capacities to read or to calculate, to memorize or to formulate and to express their ideas. Moreover, it is important to consider whether they have different emotional drives to participate or to succeed and need different types of preparation for the different tasks required of them in their adult lives. It is also inappropriate to assume that research conducted in North America, which often dominates the debate in educational settings, necessarily applies outside the particular culture in which that research was conducted. This article is primarily concerned with differences between the sexes in educational outcomes. Where possible it considers changes that have occurred in outcomes over time and whether there are differences in these outcomes between countries in the Asia-Pacific region. The existence of change or differences over time and between countries provides evidence that such differences as are observed are societally based. In addition, in situations where the societies are themselves changing, it must be asked whether further change in the differences between the sexes in educational outcomes might be expected.