While reading about backlash from
a European Girls in STEM initiative, I found
this article about female role-models for younger girls. Often times we talk about how to increase female participation in FIRST/STEM, and I feel like role models are a huge part of it.
The article says that the more "feminine/girly" the role model is, the more she discourages younger females in the pursuit of STEM. I feel like this is counter-intuitive, I always thought that if girls could see that loving STEM doesn't mean you have to be less "girly", it would have a positive impact (or at least I appreciated seeing that in a TAs of mine at college).
The reason, the article says, is that girls see being both feminine and STEM-smart as unattainable, and therefor are threatened/intimidated.
Personally, I wonder if the researched asked the girls how "feminine" they see themselves. I think girls [people] don't want to feel pressured to change how they act/dress/etc and so a role-model who is different from them is threatening/hard to identify with.
Thoughts?
Just call me conservative. - dlavery [more] 
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