Gender inequalities in the educational space

Abstract

Gender segregation in the labor market and in the educational sphere testifies to the existence of significant factors that influence the choice of girls and boys in the sphere of professional activity and their subsequent going up the career ladder. The research aims to identify gender inequalities and substantiate the dominant values and types of rational behavior of male and female students of economic universities, taking into account the motives and criteria for choosing the future profession of the economist. A marketing study was conducted, in which 800 first-year students of economic faculties from seven universities of Ukraine took part. To analyze the existence of correlation links between the values, selection criteria and gender identity, a sample group was formed, which included 150 girls and 150 boys. The results of the research show that the values of personal development (desire for education, free development of one's abilities) and urban values (namely personal success, social mobility, spheres of application of abilities) are dominant among the girls. For the boys, the values of social recognition, economic values by the type of need are significant. These data testify to the prevalence of rational action in the behavior of boys, oriented to individual goals and means of achievement, while the girls have a rational action oriented to the absolute value, that is, a value-rational action, regardless of external success. The analysis of gender inequality in the educational sphere has been further developed on the basis of the results of the marketing research that confirmed the existence of differences in the motives and criteria for choosing a university and profession of girls and boys, which determines the variability of the values of the latter and makes it possible to predetermine the dominant type of their rational action and the direction of formation of loyalty of future male and female students, taking into account gender differences.