The Intersection of Gender and Race: Exploring Chemical Engineering Students' Attitudes

We surveyed 342 first-year engineering students at four U.S. institutions interested in a chemical engineering career about their feelings of belonging in engineering, motivation, and STEM identities. We compared these students by both gender and race/ethnicity on these attitudinal factors. We found several significant differences in belongingness, motivation, and physics and engineering identities for both majority and minority women from their peers. We also found significantly higher mathematics identity for majority men than their peers. Our results provide more nuanced implications for how to support diverse students in chemical engineering classrooms.