Kechley Bruna "Meaning of difference" How self esteem and knowledge influences performance

While I read chapter four "The meaning of difference" I found it intriging that their was no real scientific proof that shows that men were more intelligent than women. The old claim that men's larger brains led to their higher intelligence proved to be false. The false claim that men are better in math actually lowers the self esteem of women who inturn perform lower in academic areas. When women realized that they were capable of doing the same things as men the college and workforce rates increased. This confirms the old notion that knowledge is power.Gaining knowledge that men werent intelectually superioir women gained the power and motivation to be independent and go for the careers they once felt was out of their reach. An Atlantic article states that from 1890-1985 the participation in the work force of women between the ages of twenty five to forty soared from fifteen to seventy one percent. This increase follwed the second world war that allowed women to experience the workforce while the men went to war. After seeing first hand that they were capable of working, women gained confidence in themselves and rejected the subordinate roles set for them by society.The correlation I detected was that after gaining more knowledge about thier capabilities women were able to perform better, secularly and academiclly. The text also brought out that white male scientist try to find or even create evidence to justify the gender sterotypes.