Member Avatar for newbie_to_cpp

Who make better programmers? Men or Women? :) Just curious coz all around the world, in academics, women surpass men. But in this field, i guess its men :). What you say? I am a male by the way!

  • 7 Contributors
  • 7 Replies
  • 123 Views
  • 12 Hours Discussion Span
  • Latest Post Latest Post by NicAx64

Dani AI

Generated

This is a common but misleading question. Gender by itself is not a reliable predictor of who will be a better programmer. The thread already shows a mix of views — from noting different inclinations to stressing practice and pointing out that interview impressions are anecdotal — and those perspectives are useful, but they don’t settle the empirical question.

What large datasets show is about representation, not aptitude. Women are underrepresented in many computing roles; for regional and historical snapshots see NCWIT’s “By the Numbers” and the Stack Overflow Developer Survey for how representation varies by cohort and year (NCWIT By the Numbers, Stack Overflow Developer Survey). Underrepresentation reflects education, hiring, retention and workplace culture, not an inherent difference in coding ability.

For practical hiring or self-assessment, rely on evidence-based methods rather than impressions. Structured interviews, work-sample tests and graded take-home projects are better predictors of on-the-job performance than unstructured chats. For a quick primer on selection-method validity see the summary of selection research ().

Concrete, short checklist:

  • Screen on work samples or small, time-boxed coding tasks rather than on first impressions.
  • Use a standard rubric and at least two reviewers for code exercises.
  • Include a short paired-programming or design conversation to evaluate communication and thought process.
  • Track outcomes (hired candidate performance) and adjust the process.

Treat individual ability as the result of practice, feedback and opportunity (as hinted). Focusing on fair, repeatable evaluation will surface talent regardless of gender.

Recommended Answers

All 7 Replies

Member Avatar for mrnutty

Are you serious? Narue's is gonna kill you lol. Your question is like comparing oranges to apples. Its really useless.

Member Avatar for mike_2000_17

I think it's a bit of a silly question. It is known that men and women have different and often complementary abilities (or at least inclinations for certain abilities). Since programming requires such a wide array of skills, I think you would probably find as good programmers in both genders, but maybe their particular skills might be camped on different aspects of programming (that could be quite an interesting study to do!). But I think there is hardly any way you can say whether men or women are definitely better. In fact, most psychologist would tell you that women often do better in academics mostly because the academic system (the form of courses and exams) are better suited for the female-psyche (especially for younger children and teenagers). Also, maybe programming is a bit more popular with men because of its nature (women tend to prefer so-called empathic professions like medicine, nursing, psychology, etc. because they prefer to work with people while men prefer to work with "things" like building or fixing stuff).

Final note, you know that this forum is under the reign of our all-mighty goddess of coding: Narue. I would anticipate a strong reply from her on this thread.

Edited by mike_2000_17 because: n/a
Member Avatar for newbie_to_cpp

Thanks Mike. I did'nt mean to discredit any gender here. I agree with what you pointed that when it comes to choosing profession, most women choose empathic professions. But if they choose this field, definitely they can be more creative than men.

I think it's a bit of a silly question. It is known that men and women have different and often complementary abilities (or at least inclinations for certain abilities). Since programming requires such a wide array of skills, I think you would probably find as good programmers in both genders, but maybe their particular skills might be camped on different aspects of programming (that could be quite an interesting study to do!). But I think there is hardly any way you can say whether men or women are definitely better. In fact, most psychologist would tell you that women often do better in academics mostly because the academic system (the form of courses and exams) are better suited for the female-psyche (especially for younger children and teenagers). Also, maybe programming is a bit more popular with men because of its nature (women tend to prefer so-called empathic professions like medicine, nursing, psychology, etc. because they prefer to work with people while men prefer to work with "things" like building or fixing stuff).

Final note, you know that this forum is under the reign of our all-mighty goddess of coding: Narue. I would anticipate a strong reply from her on this thread.

Member Avatar for Stefano Mtangoo

Who make better programmers? Men or Women? :) Just curious coz all around the world, in academics, women surpass men. But in this field, i guess its men :). What you say? I am a male by the way!

We have at least Narue(female) and Ancient Dragon (Male) and they are both competent and helpful friends here. I'm confident to call them C++ experts. So what's your question?

Gender have nothing to do with their being that way but rather learning and practice and learning and practice and L&P&L&P...to death!

Member Avatar for Narue

>Who make better programmers? Men or Women?
Based on my experience conducting interviews, I'd say men make better programmers on average. Of course, that's completely anecdotal with no scientific rigor, so it's worthless as an answer to your question. I'm not aware of any studies on the subject; you'll simply need to form your own opinion.

Member Avatar for arkoenig

Most of the programmers I know--but by no means all of them--are male. I think that reflects interest much more than it reflects talent or aptitude. For that matter, I've seen some spectacularly bad male programmers as well.

Member Avatar for NicAx64

Oh man ! OFFTOPIC here !

Hmm I'm late here to the male female war.
Dudue ! one thing exists !

Oh man you'r male right,Think about a female girl.
She can just marry and have enjoy what her husband (that means poor hardworking males )
is offering to her.So may be good coders are males,but what for?, but the most unlucky
person is the male. :( :( :( :( :( :( :( :(

"IF I can become a girl then I do so, Then I could stay at home and just marry
some hardworking male person and eat without a effort!"


all the males are prisoners in this world.Believe me :( , so sad !
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ySu9qfYfEW4 :( :( :( :(
only males in this world have to earn money :( :( :( :(

--sorry dudu's--

Be a part of the DaniWeb community

We're a friendly, industry-focused community of developers, IT pros, digital marketers, and technology enthusiasts meeting, networking, learning, and sharing knowledge.