It would probably explain why fewer women enjoy playing games past puberty, too, but I don't think it's just others discouraging women.

I believe that there are many women who don't like working amongst objectified images of females. Eventually, most women will identify with those images. Just look at the Sunshine Girl calendars and other pinups in male dominated industries. Any woman who could be immune to that has either a. cut herself off from her own sexuality, b. has the thickest skin I've ever seen.

I agree that there are likely lots of factors - and if you start with girls who grew up not gaming, because few games interested them, and they grew up into women who are *definitely* not interested in gaming, because the only games they know feature women as hypersexualized non-characters, hypersexualized sidekick characters, or hypersexualized main characters...well, you probably won't get too many interested in the business, beacuse they haven't exactly seen its best work.

The good news is that gaming programming is a great career that allows talented, smart people to be both analytical and creative, with the added perk of possibly changing the culture for the better. There's a reason that the Sims are making a fortune - it appeals to a. people who don't just want to blow things up and b. also have wallets :-)

I am all for more equality in the work place, however:

"To combat this, conference speaker Ernest Adams helpfully advised women to use initials rather than first names on their CVs"

CV Writing 101 states - when writing a CV, ensure it has your full name and salutation. Bad advice from Ernest Adams IMHO.

I am, as Jennifer Warick calls me, the wacky Inga Paterson. As always, when comments are taken out of context they can appear ill considered. My remark, that was enjoyed, was made during a longer discussion about the factors that influence young people in their choice of study. There is well-documented research to support the fact that parents have a large influence in their offspring’s choice of study. I mooted the point that there could be issues surrounding this fact worth considering in the discussion about why so few girls apply for computer games courses.
The reasons so few girls apply to study computer games and computer arts courses are multi-faceted and have no single fix-all solution. I think it’s important to consider all possible contributing issues and, where possible, find ways to address each. Obviously schoolteachers, guidance staff, parents, and siblings, amongst others play a role in influencing the career choice of young people. Computer games and computer arts courses are first generation and therefore, relatively young. Likewise, career opportunities in these areas are also relatively new.

It is not a criticism to suggest that parents and teachers may not be fully aware of the diverse and creative range of career opportunities that exist within the games and new media industries. Which, may be compounded by the popular press that has a tendency to present the more salacious aspects of the games industry, obscuring its real depth and breadth.
As gaming becomes part of family entertainment, alongside viewing TV and movies, awareness of the range of career prospects in digital media will grow, but until then we can support girls in their desire to enter the games industry by raising awareness in the teacher/parent generation of the variety of career options that exist.

I am very dedicated to encouraging more girls to enter the games and computer arts industry and I’m always trying to find alternative ways to help this happen. This includes inviting parents, teachers and school students to attend informative sessions about the variety of possible career options in the creative industries.

Regards,
Inga

Actually, I did not call Dr. Paterson "wacky" in this post. And my name is Warwick (hey, I don't care what you print, just spell my name right).

That said, for more information on this provocative and important topic, I would refer interested parties to the source material, the Guardian article linked to above. Unfortunately, the link now points to a very different article that it did when I wrote this post nearly six months ago - and the new one is entirely free of references to parental influence, "sleaze," and CV writing tips.

So here's the link to the original material:

http://education.guardian.co.uk/higher/news/story/0,,1545084,00.html

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