How many girls will naturally play with cars, boats, trains and planes instead of dolls? Not that many. I think about 5% of all pilots are women. I think this is unnaturally low, but I don’t think it ever will be more than 20% max. I have heard many women (professional drivers and pilots) say that there is no need to be interested in technical stuff to be a pilot. This is most likely “correct” for a professional pilot, but rather dubious for a private pilot. Besides, it’s like saying there is no need to be interested in human beings if you are to become a doctor or a nurse or a teacher etc. This is also technically “correct”, but why would anyone become a teacher for 6-10 year olds if they aren’t interested in other people?
Another view is to look at aircraft as purely a means of transportation. A necessity (real or perceived), like a car. Then it would be stupid not to get a license.
I think that GA in Europe is too full of anoraks and other obscessive personality types. Women are strongly repelled by that kind of personality.
OTOH it is true that to get really good at something, you have to focus on it, to the detriment of much else, so you have to become an “anorak” 
But that does not mean that everybody participating in some activity has to be an expert in it. Lots of non experts can enjoy it.
Probably, in the US, GA is a more mainstream social thing. Helped of course by a much greater integration of GA into “normal life”, with towns fairly reliably having a runway next door. European GA is mostly runways in the middle of nowhere. The whole scene has over the decades been driven into a corner, where only the really keen are hanging in there.
Speaking of that, does anybody know if the other side also complains about the low number of males in their area of interest?
We need input from women on this but AFAICT the males who get into female activities (I am not using the word “hobbies” because it has strong “male anorak” connotations) are very popular
But men gravitate towards anorak noodling and specialized interests. Vinyl collectors and stamp collectors are never women, always men. It’s perhaps in our nature, somehow.
I had a few women instructors and always preferred them back in the days. They just had a gentler touch in their teaching most of the time, that fit me better. So many testosterone-filled CFI’s and it gets a bit tiresome after awhile.
I wish more women would get into aviation, but the longer I live, the more I realize we come semi-baked already at birth with our gender interests. It’s biology, not nurture. We can change some, but not a great number. I don’t think we’ll ever see that much interest in certain fields from women. Just as we won’t see a lot of interest from males the opposite way. We come pre-programmed (or at least pre-primed) into this world, somehow.
Sure, but would this be different in the US?
What is the percentage of women in GA in France?
UK is about 6%. Airlines are more but they have a recruitment quota of 10% or so.
I agree women are generally better instructors.
If the US number is correct, and sustained, it is an anomaly. I’ve heard that the 6% of women pilot number is pretty consistent across the world.
Which makes it even more interesting from a sociology standpoint: it means that in places like Kenya, India and muslim countries, where the barrier for females to enter traditionally male domains are so much higher than in the west. This just shows us that it’s not a societal barrier, but an interest barrier, i.e. pre-disposition. Look at Kenya Airways and Ethiopian Airways – consistently employing a lot of female airline pilots. How do we explain that they have such high numbers of female pilots, despite huge societal barriers for women in those countries? And here in the west, where those barriers don’t exist, we don’t have higher numbers?
I think it’s time to kick the old notion that we are a product of our environment and that we can expand our interest if we’re just inclusive in the head. It’s clearly not the case.
We need input from women on this but AFAICT the males who get into female activities (I am not using the word “hobbies” because it has strong “male anorak” connotations) are very popular
Well, yeah but I badly pinched myself knitting one day and couldn’t fly for a week so that was once and never again.
Go into a baby clothing store and ask for an item. First question you’ll be asked is: „…boy or girl?“
How many girls will naturally play with cars, boats, trains and planes instead of dolls?
If by naturally you mean „as expected and forged by society“ then yes.
If by naturally you mean „as expected and forged by society“ then yes.
This may be changing. Not based on scientific studies, but just by observing my daughter and her husband and their fiends I feel that many young kids are being brought up in a ‘neutral’ way in terms of clothing, books and toys.
Peter wrote:
Sure, but would this be different in the US?
I have read somewhere, some pilot academy, don’t remember, that most people started because they had someone in close relation, a role model that already were a pilot. Like a father, uncle, older cousin. The US has a higher pilot density to start with. Therefore a higher percentage of women are exposed to aircraft and pilots. Another assumption here is that gender equality has increased during the last years 20-40 years. I guess this also assumes that women are not likely to start without this exposure, while men has a more natural tendency to go in that direction independently.
I’m not sure that made perfect sense, if not, I default to my previous stand that US women are cooler
Snoopy wrote:
If by naturally you mean „as expected and forged by society“ then yes.
I don’t think society has much to do with it. The difference of interest starts way before they can talk.
