Our article on “Women’s Experience of Role Models in IT” is now published.
Relevant role models are individuals that we can identify with. Our study among women in IT in Norway shows that:
Most women identify relevant role models among other women, rather than among men.
Few women identify role models in in fields of information technology.
Many women missed having female role models in IT.
And many found “substitute” role models from other fields, national politics or among networks of female friends.
Female role models are, as one of the women we interviewed said,
“important as a door opener. […] I think that makes things easier. It is not necessary, but it makes things easier.”
You can read the full paper (open access) here, where we present a model of responses reflecting a lack of female role models in IT: https://www.idunn.no/modeller/18_womens_experience_of_role_models_in_it_landmark_women
Corneliussen, H. G., Seddighi, G., & Dralega, C. A. (2019). Women’s Experience of Role Models in IT: Landmark women, substitutes, and supporters. In Ø. Helgesen, E. Nesset, G. Mustafa, P. Rice, & R. Glavee-Geo (Eds.), Modeller: Universitetsforlaget. DOI: 10.18261/9788215034393-2019-18.