Study: Gender gaps in college majors vary with students’ prior academic records

The authors used the High School Longitudinal Study of 2009 and the Baccalaureate and Beyond Longitudinal Study of 2016. Those datasets provided sex, LGBTQ+ identity, academic preparation, interests, and major selection and persistence data for thousands of U.S. students. The analysis compared straight cisgender men and women as well as LGBTQ+ men and women across a wide range of majors, including STEM, business, nursing, and education.

• Male-majority fields (physics, engineering, computer science, business, economics): Straight cisgender men with below-average grades and test scores were substantially overrepresented relative to similarly prepared straight cisgender women. The overrepresentation shrank among students with the strongest high school records.

• Persistence in majors: Prior academic performance did not fully explain who stayed in a major. Observable academic and demographic controls could not account for the full pattern of persistence and attrition.

• LGBTQ+ representation: LGBTQ+ students were underrepresented in many male-majority fields regardless of sex. LGBTQ+ men were also underrepresented in nursing and some other health-related fields where women are typically the majority.

• Female-majority fields: The distribution was mixed. Evidence did not show a consistent pattern of straight cisgender women being concentrated among lower-preparation students. Some models indicated LGBTQ+ women were overrepresented in female-majority majors only among those with the highest prior achievement, suggesting they may need stronger credentials to enter those fields.

What this means for educators and policymakers

• Broad interventions that treat all students the same may miss variation by prior achievement. Programs aiming to diversify majors should consider how students at different achievement levels experience fields differently.

• Data collection that includes sexual orientation and gender identity alongside academic measures can reveal underrepresentation patterns that standard sex-only comparisons miss.

• Because persistence patterns are not fully explained by preparation, institutions should evaluate classroom climate, advising, and departmental practices as part of retention strategies.

The study expands the picture of how gender and LGBTQ+ identities map onto major choice and persistence. Representation gaps are not uniform: they depend on students' prior academic records and cannot be fully explained by those records alone. The findings suggest targeting both pre-college preparation and in-college environments when addressing underrepresentation.