Girls equal boys in math

Girls and boys are now performing equally on standardized high school math tests across North America, ending a "gender gap" that lasted for decades, new research says.

 
An American math expert says the results should put to rest the theories that girls' brains can't do math.
 
The main study focuses on more than seven million U.S. high school students, who periodically write math tests that are standardized across the country. It also looked at SAT tests given to university applicants.

Janet Hyde, a psychologist at the University of Wisconsin, reports the difference between boys' and girls' scores has finally become so small that it isn't statistically significant.
 
"The gender gap has been narrowing over time," she said, noting Canada has seen the same changes.
 
International tests done by an organization called Program for International Student Assessment found the math gender gap in Canada had become "so small that it's not important," based on tests of 26,000 high school students in 2003.
 
Hyde's analysis is published today in Science, a major international research journal.
 
"There are all these people out writing books about the male brain and the female brain being different, (saying) that girls' brains can't do math," she said. "Which is just ridiculous because the data show that they can."
 
Hyde said the gap probably arose in times when boys more often expected to pursue jobs requiring math. That has now changed, she said.