You make many assumptions here, on many different levels. Regarding parent's comment:
1. Iran was but one example of the uneven rates of participation in science. Of course there may be many interesting reasons for this. There are many reasons for most things.
2. Parent didn't actually jump to many conclusions as far as I can tell. You may be projecting. What conclusion did they make based on the 70%?
Finally, your list of factors that might influence the % of women studying science in Iran is weirdly general. Are those factors more prevalent in Iran than other places? Literature and gender studies are not alternatives to "useful" fields of study, they are useful. Culture matters. It's not just fun, it's hard and filled with contradictions and challenges. But you are right that it's not lucrative, and becoming less so. Maybe studying the arts is not so big in Iran as other countries and the sciences are more of a default choice?
Now maybe I'm the one projecting, but it feels like you want parent commenter to discount the 70% on the basis of some weak hypothetical guesswork about possible reasons to do so. This is how cognitive bias works. Answering the 70% question is interesting, and we should see what we can learn about it, and how that compares to our instincts.
> Literature and gender studies are not alternatives to "useful" fields of study, they are useful. Culture matters.
I believe "useful" in this context refers to having a higher chance of being able to land a job with a decent pay.
It's not unheard of parents of non affluent families trying hard to convince their children to pursue career paths that would give them certain economic self sufficiency rather than something they might like more, when economic success in that field is (perhaps incorrectly) perceived as a gamble.
1. Iran was but one example of the uneven rates of participation in science. Of course there may be many interesting reasons for this. There are many reasons for most things.
2. Parent didn't actually jump to many conclusions as far as I can tell. You may be projecting. What conclusion did they make based on the 70%?
Finally, your list of factors that might influence the % of women studying science in Iran is weirdly general. Are those factors more prevalent in Iran than other places? Literature and gender studies are not alternatives to "useful" fields of study, they are useful. Culture matters. It's not just fun, it's hard and filled with contradictions and challenges. But you are right that it's not lucrative, and becoming less so. Maybe studying the arts is not so big in Iran as other countries and the sciences are more of a default choice?
Now maybe I'm the one projecting, but it feels like you want parent commenter to discount the 70% on the basis of some weak hypothetical guesswork about possible reasons to do so. This is how cognitive bias works. Answering the 70% question is interesting, and we should see what we can learn about it, and how that compares to our instincts.