# Gender trends in computer science authorship

## TL;DR

This paper analyzes 11.8 million computer science papers up to 2019, revealing a persistent gender gap in authorship that is unlikely to close this century without intervention, contrasting with faster progress in other fields.

## Contribution

It provides a large-scale, up-to-date analysis of gender trends in computer science authorship and collaboration, highlighting the slow closing of the gender gap over 50 years.

## Key findings

- Gender gap in authorship persists and is unlikely to close this century.
- Cross-gender collaborations are slowly increasing over time.
- Parity in authorship has been reached in fields like Medicine and Sociology.

## Abstract

A large-scale, up-to-date analysis of Computer Science literature (11.8M papers through 2019) reveals that, if trends from the last 50 years continue, parity between the number of male and female authors will not be reached in this century. In contrast, parity is projected to be reached within two to three decades or may have already been reached in other fields of study like Medicine or Sociology. Our analysis of collaboration trends in Computer Science reveals shifts in the size of the collaboration gap between authors of different perceived genders. The gap is persistent but shrinking, corresponding to a slow increase in the rate of cross-gender collaborations over time. Together, these trends describe a persistent gender gap in the authorship of Computer Science literature that may not close without systematic intervention.