18 younger (under 25 years) and 18 older (over 39 years) undergraduate women were trained in problem-solving by either a cooperative or traditional lecture technique and in age-consistent, i.e., younger or older participants only, or mixed age, i.e., younger and older participants, groups. Analysis indicated that older subjects did not score as well on the problem-solving task (48.9 vs 43.9) where lower scores indicate better performance, particularly in mixed-age groups (58.2 vs 44.3); older subjects completed the task more quickly (349 sec. vs 466 sec), age-consistent groups completed the task equally quickly regardless of training; and age-inconsistent groups completed the task more quickly when cooperatively trained (183 sec. vs 390 sec).
Examining reasons undergraduate women join physics
