Authors and Editors in Mathematics Journals: a gender perspective

Abstract

The under-representation of women in science and especially in the upper positions of the academic career is a matter of great current concern. The aim of this paper is to assess the presence of men and women as authors of papers and as editorial board members of eight first-class international Mathematics journals and to explore inter-gender differences in scientific activity (impact and collaboration). Only 4% of the members of the editorial boards are female scientists, while 10% of authors are women and they contribute to 18% of the papers. No relationship between the share of female authors, the share of female editorial board members and journal prestige is observed. A higher presence of female authors is found in the more applied journals. Women are slightly less cited than men as measured through the number of citations per paper and their contribution to the 10% most cited papers. Very small inter-gender differences in the collaborative behaviour of authors are observed. Underlying factors for explaining the under-representation of women in editorial boards are discussed. The need to encourage female presence in journal boards is pointed out.