Thanks for the input Sam. Also, one of the best CAD modelers I’ve ever worked with was a female ME at frog.
The proportion of men to women in the field certainly doesn’t have anything to do with innate ability in my opinion. I think it is more cultural. We have focused a lot of the discussion on culture of the field itself accepting or encouraging a more balanced gender mix. What of the cultural influences in childhood of women away from these types of fields? Do parents encourage their daughters to pursue the typical industrial designer childhood past times? Though they should if that is what a child shows interest in.
As an aside, there was no one in my family who was particularly handy. I seemed to inherit an interest in taking things apart and study them out of thin air. I certainly felt at a disadvantage to my classmates who had fathers with active workshops in the garage where they grew up watching and assisting in all manner of household do it yourself projects. They had a comfort level in the shop that I just could never catch up to.