• Question: Do you get stereotyped a lot?

    Asked by goatscheese to Adam, Geoff, Rob, Sheila, Suzie on 14 Mar 2011 in Categories: .
    • Photo: Geoff McBride

      Geoff McBride answered on 14 Mar 2011:

      Yes ether that or people say I don’t look like a scientist. Sometimes I enter meetings with my glasses on even though I don’t need them most of the time.

    • Photo: Sheila Kanani

      Sheila Kanani answered on 14 Mar 2011:

      I hope not! And I hope it is getting better.
      I have felt some stereotypes before though. Sometimes at meetings people think I’m the “tea girl” because I’m female and I look too young to be a research scientist, other times people have thought I’m so-and-so’s girlfriend not a scientist in my own right.
      But I try and deal with these and I try and blow them out the water, by addressing them and by making sure I am really good at what I do and give really good scientific presentations at conferences etc so that people remember me. I also use them to my advantage if I can!

    • Photo: Adam Tuff

      Adam Tuff answered on 14 Mar 2011:

      Not really – I don’t think I look like a scientist. When people ask me what I do, I always make them guess…I’ve had some amazing guesses from people…from a bank manager, to a band roadie! No one ever guesses nuclear physicist!

    • Photo: Robert Simpson

      Robert Simpson answered on 14 Mar 2011:

      I think that scientists are stereotyped in films and on TV. Most scientists are just normal people – not the white-haired mad professors they are often portrayed as. Am I stereotyped personally? Not much. If I am stereotyped it’s usually for being a man , i.e. people assume I must like football and sports, and I really don’t!

    • Photo: Suzie Sheehy

      Suzie Sheehy answered on 14 Mar 2011:

      Most of the time no, I don’t get stereotyped, my colleagues appreciate me for my science rather than the way I look or because I’m a woman. I have (only once) been mistaken for a secretary when I was a PhD student, but probably only because I knew what was going on!
      But in general my experience in science is that there is far less stereotype or sexism when you’re actually on the “inside” rather than as it is portrayed in the media.

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