Gender equality in science: Germany shows the way

Over the past five years, the number of female researchers in Germany has grown more rapidly than that of male researchers and female-only publications are the most internationally collaborative, finds a new study.

The study by Elsevier, launched ahead of the European Gender Summit (November 6-7) in Berlin, found that the number of female researchers in Germany has increased by 25 percent over the past five years. For males, this increase has been 9.8 percent in the same period.

For Germany, female-only publications are the most internationally collaborative, while mixed gender publications are more inter-disciplinary than the mono-gender ones, the study found.

Female researchers in Germany are only slightly less productive than their male counterparts as measured by publication output (2.07 versus 2.34 publications per year).

Their publications in the period 2010-2014 have a lower citation impact (1.68 versus 1.75).

The difference between publication productivity between female and male researchers is smallest for senior researchers.

For German junior researchers, the productivity of male researchers is 9.9 percent higher than that of female researchers. For mid-career researchers it is 17.6 percent.

Germany holds one of the lowest percentages of female researchers in Europe.

"The results of this report should encourage German research institutions to examine their internal structures for possible discriminatory mechanisms that affect the route that young woman scientists take to advance to senior researcher," said Elizabeth Pollitzer, co-founder of the Gender Summit.

"Making full use of the potential of both their male and female researchers will maximize output and quality of research in Germany," Pollitzer added.