Replica Plating

This chapter describes how Esther Lederberg, in daring to re-purpose her compact makeup pad as a kind of ink stamp, developed the new Replica Plating Technique but later her husband Joshua seemed to claim sole credit for this discovery. The Lederbergs demonstrated the effectiveness of the new plating technique in their study of spontaneous bacterial mutations, using the technique to resolve a longstanding question of bacterial mutations: Did mutations occur spontaneously or was some other process of adaptation involved? While at first, Joshua defended Esther’s co-equal contribution to the invention of replica plating, in later publications, he seemed to claim sole credit, by ignoring her contributions. This is a classic example of the Matilda Effect, when a male colleague is given sole credit for an invention by unfairly ignoring the female colleague’s contribution. Some of the Lederbergs’ colleagues recognize Esther as the primary inventor of replica plating, since she had the reputation of an experimental genius; others assumed that the creative insight was Joshua’s.

How Do People Perceive Sexual Harassment Targeting Transgender Women, Lesbians, and Straight Cisgender Women?

Third-party observers’ opinions affect how organizations handle sexual harassment. Prior research has focused on perceptions of sexual harassment targeting straight cisgender women. We examined how targets’ sexual orientation and gender identity impact these perceptions. In three preregistered studies, straight cisgender participants imagined a coworker confided that a male colleague had sexually harassed her. The target was a transgender woman, a lesbian woman, or a woman whose sexual orientation and gender identity were unspecified. In Study 1 (N=428), participants reported believing that sexual harassment targeting lesbians and women with unspecified identities was most likely motivated by attraction and power, whereas sexual harassment targeting transgender women was seen as most likely motivated by power and prejudice. Despite these differences in perceived motivation, in Study 2 (N=421) perceptions of appropriate consequences for the perpetrator did not vary based on the target’s identity. Study 3 (N=473) demonstrated that the specific behavior of which sexual harassment is assumed to consist differs based on the target’s identity. Whereas women with unspecified identities and lesbians were assumed to face stereotypical attraction-based harassment, transgender women were assumed to face gender harassment. Stereotypes about sexual harassment can bias third-party assumptions, invalidating experiences that do not match pervasive stereotypes.

Examining the Psychosocial Barriers of Female Students in Academic Settings of Sindh: The Case of Public Sector University of Sindh, Pakistan

The collective responsibilities and rights of female students are ignored in the academic domain of Sindh, Pakistan. The third world countries are a mirror image of it and highlight their declining condition in the educational perspectives of female education. The twelve Psychosocial barriers are highlighted in this study. They are analyzed to know about their extent in female students in one of the Public sector universities of Sindh, Pakistan. The quantitative design was adopted, and a questionnaire was used as the instrument to measure percentages and frequencies. A five-point Likert Scale was selected for the process of data collection measurement from thirty female participants of the English department. The thirty female students represented four academic stages in a co-academic setting. After the analysis of data through SPSS software, the results affirmed that female students do face problems to pursue their higher education in the shape of psychological fears, uncomfortable situations, adoption of different rough attitudes against her existence in academics, dominancy of the male colleague in academic and societal boundaries, cultural and parental disparities in mind sets that ultimately results to the unawareness of societal conservative norms established in educational setting of Universities in Sindh, Pakistan.