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Article

The In-Class Questions of Science and Engineering Students: A Gender-Based Perspective

by
Mariana Martinho
1,*,
Patrícia Albergaria Almeida
2,
Betina Lopes
3 and
António Moreira
3
1
Rector’s Team Support Unit, University of Coimbra, 3004-504 Coimbra, Portugal
2
Independent Researcher, 3800-010 Aveiro, Portugal
3
Research Centre on Didactics and Technology in the Education of Trainers (CIDTFF), Department of Education and Psychology, University of Aveiro, 3810-193 Aveiro, Portugal
*
Author to whom correspondence should be addressed.
Soc. Sci. 2025, 14(12), 689; https://doi.org/10.3390/socsci14120689
Submission received: 15 September 2025 / Revised: 5 November 2025 / Accepted: 23 November 2025 / Published: 28 November 2025
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Gender-Inclusive Education and Teaching in STEM: Strategies, Challenges, and Contradictions)
Versions Notes

Abstract

Research in Educational Sciences has suggested that a student’s participation in the classroom varies according to their gender. In STEM fields of higher education, male students tend to participate more in class than female students. However, with respect to the specific form of participation represented by students’ questioning, the conclusions of the existing studies are not yet perfectly overlapping in their findings. Considering that the posing of questions by students is one of the activities that reveal greater student participation and involvement in class, we aimed to investigate and characterize the questioning patterns of male and female students in chemistry classes and within the contexts of various teaching strategies designed to encourage their questioning. In an effort to contribute to a deeper understanding of student questioning in higher education, and with a particular focus on gender differences, this study also sought to identify the contexts and conditions that are more conducive to questioning by male and female students. This study was conducted in two first-year chemistry classes attended by sciences and engineering students at a Portuguese university, following a mixed methodology. Concerning the students’ questioning patterns, specifically in terms of their frequency and contextual occurrence, our findings showed that although in the first semester the female students asked fewer questions in class than the male students, in proportion to the representation of each gender in the class, this trend was reversed in the second semester. As the year developed and students became more acquainted with each other, female students asked more questions. The number of questions asked in each phase of the study leads us to conclude that, with respect to asking questions, female students benefit from strategies that foster familiarisation with the context. On the other hand, male students do not benefit from an increased familiarisation with the context.

1. Introduction

Research in the field of education has suggested that student participation in the classroom varies according to the students’ gender (Bailey et al. 2020; Ballen et al. 2019; Eddy et al. 2014; Howard and Baird 2000; Neill et al. 2019; Rugambuka and Mazzuki 2023; Severe et al. 2024; Tatum et al. 2013; Yaylacı and Beauvais 2017; York et al. 2021). Some studies have concluded that male students participate more in class than female students (Aguillon et al. 2020; Bailey et al. 2020; Ballen et al. 2017; Eddy et al. 2014; Neill et al. 2019; Severe et al. 2024; York et al. 2021). However, there are also other research efforts that have found just the opposite (Baram-Tsabari et al. 2009; Howard and Baird 2000). A more detailed analysis of each of the studies mentioned shows that all the studies that concluded that male students participate more in class than female students were conducted with higher-education students in STEM fields.
Despite progress in increasing women’s involvement in STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics) and positive evolution in the opportunities and conditions available to women in STEM (Ceci et al. 2023), women remain underrepresented in certain STEM fields (Canfield et al. 2023; Ceci et al. 2023; Malespina and Singh 2023; Wao et al. 2023), where they also experience inequitable treatment and lower levels of inclusion (Dost 2024). Portugal is no exception (CIG 2024). Explicit discrimination, while not entirely gone, has largely been replaced by entrenched but subtle inequalities embedded in the institutions (Parson and Ozaki 2018).
In their classrooms, teachers can choose to address issues of access, inclusion, justice, and equity (Tanner 2013) and promote equality. However, to develop teaching, learning, and assessment strategies that offer equitable experiences to the students of all genders, it is essential to understand gender disparities in students’ participation in STEM classes (Dutta and Arnold 2022).
Being aware of these disparities and understanding which teaching, learning, and assessment strategies are more gender-balanced or are more favourable to each gender enables teachers to make more informed decisions when planning their classes, thus contributing to “narrowing the gap”, in terms of opportunities given to students of each gender.

1.1. Students’ Questions

One form of oral participation of students in class is precisely the questions that students ask teachers (Mundt and Hänze 2023). Furthermore, students’ questions are one of the activities that reveal greater involvement and participation in class (Chi and Wylie 2014; Harunasari and Halim 2019).
As emphasized in the literature, questioning constitutes a critical component of the knowledge construction process (Scharf and Dera 2021; Tawfik et al. 2020). As Cuccio-Schirripa and Steiner (2000) elaborate, questions arise when students compare their own mental organisation of pre-existing knowledge with new information and try to incorporate this new information into their pre-existing mental framework. Such reorganisation of the mental schema as a result of this process of incorporating new information can lead to learning (Cuccio-Schirripa and Steiner 2000).
Students’ questions therefore play a central role in teaching–learning processes, having an extensive, and well-established, list of benefits for students’ learning (Aflalo 2021; Chin and Osborne 2008; Graesser and Olde 2003; Yu and Chen 2014; Yu and Wu 2020).
From the perspective of students, incentivizing student questioning promotes their cognitive development (Aslan Altan 2022) and the development of other higher-order thinking skills (Aslan Altan 2022; Cuccio-Schirripa and Steiner 2000; Sasson et al. 2018; Yu et al. 2014) considered key for the 21st century, such as critical thinking (Chang et al. 2024; Freestone and Mason 2019; Vieira et al. 2011; Scharf and Dera 2021), problem solving (Cheng and Wan 2017; Kaberman and Dori 2009; Zoller 1987), self-regulated learning and metacognition (Graesser and Olde 2003; Kaberman and Dori 2009; Yu 2009; Yu and Wu 2020), and creative thinking (Chappell et al. 2008; Freestone and Mason 2019; Raz et al. 2023). Encouraging students to question also promotes active learning (Graesser and Olde 2003; Yu et al. 2014; Yu and Wu 2020), lifelong learning (Long et al. 2015; Teixeira-Dias et al. 2009), and scientific literacy (Kohen et al. 2020; Santoso et al. 2018; Shwartz et al. 2006).
Additionally, encouraging students to pose questions also brings many advantages for their teachers. Among the benefits to teaching, student questions allow the teacher to diagnose students’ prior knowledge, understand their thinking processes, assess their cognitive levels and comprehension, identify their interests, understand what they would like to learn, and detect any misconceptions, gaps, or alternative conceptions that individual students may have. Based on such diagnoses, teachers can reorganize their future lessons and make the required pedagogical adjustments, in order to better respond to the real needs of students (Baram-Tsabari and Yarden 2005; Chin and Osborne 2008; Dogan and Yucel-Toy 2022; Kaberman and Dori 2009; Gil Llinás and Márquez 2023; Maplethorpe et al. 2022; Marbach-Ad and Sokolove 2000; Mundt and Hänze 2023; Parson and Ozaki 2018; Woods-Townsend et al. 2016; Yu and Wu 2020). Ultimately, students’ questions allow teachers to guide their own work.
Despite all of the known benefits of encouraging students’ questions, more research is needed to determine which strategies for encouraging student questioning are more gender-balanced or work best with students of each gender.

1.2. Gender Differences in Students’ Questions

Not all the strategies for encouraging students’ questioning work equally well with all students and are equally inclusive of female and male students (Lorenzo et al. 2006; Tanner 2013). In fact, several studies have identified differences in the questions posed by students of each gender (Baram-Tsabari et al. 2006; Baram-Tsabari and Yarden 2005; Graesser and Olde 2003; Jurik et al. 2013; Yu and Cheng 2022). However, research has not yet revealed consistent results, which may be related to the diversity of contexts in which questions are formulated, such as the level of education, the subject area, the culture of the country, the strategies implemented to encourage questioning, the teaching modalities (face-to-face and online), and even the multiplicity of the question classification systems that have been applied, which is extensive.
However, if we consider gender differences in student questioning in studies conducted only with STEM students in higher education it is possible to identify a pattern (Aguillon et al. 2020; Nadile et al. 2021a, 2021b). Most of these studies concluded that in higher-education STEM classes female students ask fewer questions than male students. In fact, although most students feel uncomfortable asking questions in university STEM classes, female students feel significantly more reluctant and uncomfortable (2.9 times more so) than male students when it comes to asking questions in class (Nadile et al. 2021b; Parson and Ozaki 2018).
Such asymmetries between the students of each gender bearing on their reluctance to pose questions in STEM classes cannot be ignored, if we want to ensure equity in STEM. It is, indeed, very important to be able to pose questions in class. However, in STEM subjects, posing questions is of critical importance, as questioning is at the heart of scientific thinking and problem-solving. In fact, one of the key mandates of science is precisely to ask questions about the nature of the material world and to be able to answer them (Chin and Osborne 2008; Scharf and Dera 2021).
Despite the identification of this trend, it is not yet perfectly clear which incentives for questioning work best with students of each gender and which strategies are most conducive to prompting questioning by students, according to gender, in STEM subjects.
This study was, thus, designed to investigate the existence of gender-related differences in question-related behaviour among first-year STEM students in chemistry—given the apparent lack of consensus across different STEM disciplines—as well as to explore the contexts in which female and male students may feel more motivated or uninhibited in asking questions of the lecturer. Moreover, it was also the authors’ aim to examine which instructional strategies or conditions were more conducive to fostering questioning among female and male students in STEM subjects, as it is not yet fully clear which incentives for questioning are most effective for students of each gender.

2. Materials and Methods

The research described here is based on a PhD research project designed with the aim of contributing to a deeper understanding of student questioning in higher education, focusing on gender differences. The research questions that guided this study were as follows: What differences can be observed between male and female first-year university students in their questioning patterns in Chemistry? and Which contexts/conditions favour male or female student questioning patterns? These questions were formulated to explore potential gender-related variations in students’ frequency of questioning, within the context of university-level chemistry courses.
In an attempt to make university education in chemistry more equitable, and taking into account gender specificities, various teaching, learning, and assessment strategies were designed and implemented, having in mind the encouragement of student questioning and creating situations conducive to questioning by both female and male students.
Among all the strategies implemented to encourage student questioning, within this manuscript, we will focus only on the structured oral questioning and on the pauses taken during lectures for students to ask questions, both of which were exclusively implemented in-class. The other strategies, on the contrary, were implemented online or during artificial activities created exclusively to prompt questions from students.
The first strategy herein considered, structured oral questioning during lectures, consisted of the teacher asking several questions in class as a way of structuring the organisation of the content. The teacher’s questions during class have previously been highlighted as an important way to organise content, encourage students’ reasoning, and promote their understanding (Yang 2017). These questions were asked orally and addressed to all students present in class, and, at the same time, projected to the class through the PowerPoint® presentation used to support the lessons. Students also had access to these questions through the course guide, which included printouts of the slides presented in class.
In addition, at various times during the classes, the teacher reminded students of the value of oral questions in class for their studies, assuring them that these would never harm them in terms of their assessment. This reminder was intended to alleviate any fears about the possible negative impact that a poorly formulated or less relevant question might have on the assessment of the student asking it. During the classes, the teacher also referred to the questions asked by the students to illustrate different types of questions. Teaching students to distinguish between “good” and “bad” questions, giving examples, and frequently asking them “good” questions makes them more sensitive to the quality of the questions and also leads students to ask more and better questions (Dillon 1988; Marbach-Ad and Sokolove 2000).
The second strategy was taking pauses during lectures specifically for students to ask questions. Generally, once during each class, the teacher interrupted the lesson, taking a break of 2–3 min, so that students had the opportunity to reflect on what had been said and to discuss their doubts and questions about the concepts covered with their classmates. The teacher then invited the students to verbally express the questions they would like to ask and, when they did so, gave them the respective answers.
In lecture halls such as those used for most first-year higher-education classes, teaching is traditionally teacher-centred, so very few students feel confident enough to interrupt the class and express their doubts orally in front of the class. Even in the absence of questions from students, teachers should assume that students have something to ask (Pearson and West 1991). One way to counteract the established tendency to discourage oral questions from students in class and provide opportunities for students to express their doubts is to create forced pauses in the lesson so that questioning can happen, making it clear that these pauses are intended for listening to and answering students’ questions (Dillon 1988; Rowe 1974). These periods of silence allow for more complex thinking (Costa 2006). Furthermore, when these pauses are taken in class, giving students an opportunity to express their doubts, there is an increase in the frequency of questions asked by students (Hyman 1980; Rowe 1974).
As for the participants, this study involved first-year university students enrolled at the University of Aveiro (Portugal) in various degrees in the areas of Science, Technology, and Engineering, specifically Environmental Engineering; Geological Engineering; Materials Engineering; Integrated Master’s Degree in Physical Engineering; Physics; and Meteorology, Oceanography and Geophysics (MOG). The number of students involved in the study is shown in Table 1, which specifies the numbers of students by gender.
All first-year students enrolled in such degrees had to attend two curricular units of chemistry, one in the first semester and another in the second semester.
All chemistry classes were observed during the first month of classes of the first semester, here named phase A of the study, and throughout the entire second semester of the same academic year, here named phase B of the study. The students involved across the two semesters were nearly the same, with the exception of those who transferred to another course or who had withdrawn from the course, which resulted in fewer students of both genders in the second semester.
The first month of the first semester served as a pilot study, which allowed us to assess whether the strategies (both those described in this manuscript and others initially considered) required any adjustments, whether the number of audio recorders distributed around the classroom was sufficient, and whether the position of the researcher within the classroom was appropriate for effective data collection.
During the observations made in classes, all oral questions asked by the students were recorded. A grid was developed to record questions, and this was completed by the researcher during each class. Audio recorders were also distributed throughout the classroom to enable playback of any questions that could not be recorded in real time. The researcher attended all lectures of the two classes both semesters, maintaining a non-participatory observation. In an attempt to minimize any discomfort students might feel regarding the researcher’s presence, the researcher was present at all activities in which the students participated. In line with the suggestions of Woods (1995), spending a lot of time with the students contributes to establishing a closer relationship between the researcher and the students, which, according to Coutinho (2011), is conducive to a better understanding of the phenomenon under study.
As shown in Table 1, there was a significant imbalance between the numbers of male and female students enrolled in the course units, with approximately 36% of the enrolees being female students and 64% being male students in both semesters. Such asymmetry could not be (and was not) ignored, as will be addressed in the following analysis.

3. Results

Although in this research we acknowledge that we intend to contribute to knowledge in the area of gender differences in terms of student questioning, in practice we classified students’ questions according to the gender of the speaker, with the speaker’s gender being classified based on the student’s physical appearance and tone of voice.
The number and the percentage of questions asked by students, generally and per gender, in each phase of the study are presented in Table 2.
Given that the gender composition of the class can affect student participation and questioning in the classroom, and considering the large numerical asymmetry between genders, in order to compare the average number of questions asked by students of each gender, it was necessary to consider the number of students of each gender enrolled in each semester. For this reason, Table 2 also includes the ratio of questions asked by students of each gender in relation to the number of students of that gender enrolled in each semester of the study.
As shown in Table 2, in both phases, there was a significant asymmetry in the number of questions asked by students, according to gender.
In phase A, when students were still unfamiliar with each other, with the teacher, and with the larger context of higher education, as they had just begun their higher-education journey, it was found that female students only posed a total of nine questions, corresponding to a ratio of 0.14 questions per female student, while male students asked 36 questions, corresponding to a ratio of 0.32 questions per male student.
In phase B, when students had become sufficiently familiar with the lecturer, with their colleagues, and even with the presence of the researcher, and, hopefully, comfortable with the context, female students posed a total of 52 questions, corresponding to a ratio of 0.90 questions per female student, while male students asked, again, 36 questions, corresponding to a ratio of 0.35 questions per male student.
In other words, given the gender ratio and assuming each question had been asked by a different student, in phase A, approximately 32% of male students would have asked oral questions during lectures, while only 14% of female students would have done so. On the other hand, in phase B, approximately 35% of male students would have asked oral questions during lectures, while the percentage of female students who had expressed a question would increase to 90%.

4. Discussion

Although the students involved in the study in each phase were approximately the same, it should be noted that, in order to compare the responses of students of each gender in each phase to the strategies implemented to encourage questioning, it is necessary to take into account that the periods during which the questions were collected varied. In phase A, which took place during the first semester of the study, classes were observed only during the first month of classes. In phase B, which took place during the second semester, observations were made during all classes throughout the entire semester.
Between phase A and phase B, the ratio of questions asked by male students to the number of male students enrolled in the course remained approximately constant, at 0.32 in phase A and 0.35 in phase B. However, in phase A of the study, classes were observed (and students’ questions collected) for only one month, while in phase B, classes were observed throughout the semester. Considering that an academic semester corresponds to approximately four months, if the frequency of questions had remained constant throughout the semester and if each question had been asked by a different student, each male student would have asked, on average, 1.28 questions (=4 × 0.32) during the entire first semester of the study, considerably more than during the entire second semester, 0.35 questions. Although this analysis did not take into account the date on which each question was asked, the decrease in the number of questions asked by male students from phase A to phase B may indicate that male students ask many questions at the beginning of the year but stop asking questions as the semester progresses.
Conversely, the ratio of questions asked by female students to the number of female students enrolled at UC varied considerably between phase A and phase B of the study. As we have seen, the ratio of female questions increased from 0.14 in phase A to 0.90 during phase B. Assuming that an academic semester corresponds to approximately four months, if the frequency of questions had remained constant throughout the semester and if each question had been asked by a different student, each female student would have asked, on average, throughout the first semester of the study, 0.56 questions (=4 × 0.14), which is considerably less than during the entire second semester, 0.90 questions. Given that the students enrolled across the two semesters of the study were roughly the same, this observation leads us to conclude that female students’ ease and/or willingness to ask questions is more favoured by their perception of familiarity with the context than is the case for male students. In phase B, which took place in the second semester, the students would already be more adapted to the “university world”, would already be familiar with the lecturer (in this case, it was the same lecturer in both semesters), would already know their colleagues better, would possibly have already studied and engaged in group work with some of them, and would also be accustomed to the presence of the researcher in class, and therefore felt less inhibited about expressing their doubts. Notably, considering only the number of questions asked, the results obtained suggest that familiarity with the context encourages female students to ask questions.
Contrary to the findings of previous studies (Aguillon et al. 2020; Nadile et al. 2021a, 2021b), our results reveal a distinct pattern in students’ questioning behaviours. While at the beginning of the academic year female students asked fewer questions than their male counterparts, which is consistent with the aforementioned studies, this trend reversed markedly in the second semester. By that time, female students asked substantially more questions than male students, indicating a shift in the number of questions that was not observed in prior research.
These findings suggest that it would be valuable for future research to investigate the evolution of questioning behaviour by gender over time in STEM classrooms. Longitudinal studies could provide deeper insights into how and why the numbers of questions from female and male students change throughout the academic year, helping to identify factors that encourage or inhibit student engagement and contributing to the development of more inclusive instructional strategies.

5. Conclusions

In phase A of the study, coinciding with the first month of classes, each male student asked, on average, more questions, relative to the number of questions from female students and given the numbers of students of each gender enrolled in the course. On the other hand, in phase B, coinciding with the entire second semester of the academic year, it was found that each female student was much more likely to ask questions, as compared to the number of questions from male students and relative to the total number of students of each gender enrolled in the course.
The main conclusion of our research was, thus, that efforts to increase the number of questions posed by female students in class would benefit from strategies that promote familiarisation with the context. Apparently, female students feel the need to have a greater contextual understanding of the classroom environment they are in and to get to know their classmates and teacher better, before they feel comfortable enough to ask questions and make the decision to ask questions.

6. Limitations

From a perspective of critical self-assessment of the work carried out during the course of the study it was inevitable that we should reflect on how it was implemented and on aspects that could be improved. The main limitation of the study was related to the distinction between the genders of the students, because, in fact, there are many “shades” of each gender (Ainsworth 2015). Thus, it cannot be ruled out that in our study there may have been greater intragender differences than those identified when considering students of each gender. In our study, the gender of the students was assigned according to their physical appearances, in the case of oral questions, or according to their names, in the case of written questions, and was coded as a binary variable.
Although the option to code students’ gender as a binary variable, and assigning it according to their name or visible physical characteristics may constitute a limitation of the study and may initially seem reductive, given, on the one hand, the relatively small percentage of the population that self-identifies as belonging to gender identity minorities (Cartwright and Nancarrow 2024; Freeman 2020) and, on the other hand, the high number of students involved in the study, it was considered that this approach would not invalidate the study.
Another limitation of the study concerns the fact that all data were collected by a single female researcher. It would have been valuable to include both a male and a female researcher to reduce potential discomfort among students when interacting with an investigator of a different gender. Comparing the present findings with those from a similar study conducted by a male researcher, or by a mixed-gender research team, could provide further insight.
Our study was primarily descriptive in nature, and inferential statistical analyses were not conducted, because the study aimed to provide a descriptive overview rather than test hypotheses. Therefore, further studies should be developed to test the statistical significance of the observed patterns.

Author Contributions

Conceptualization, M.M. and P.A.A.; methodology, M.M. and P.A.A.; validation, P.A.A.; formal analysis, M.M.; investigation, M.M.; resources, M.M.; data curation, M.M.; writing—original draft preparation, M.M.; writing—review and editing, M.M., B.L. and A.M.; visualization, M.M.; supervision, P.A.A., B.L. and A.M.; project administration, P.A.A. and B.L.; funding acquisition, M.M. and P.A.A. All authors have read and agreed to the published version of the manuscript.

Funding

This research was funded by FCT—Fundação para a Ciência e a Tecnologia, I.P. and by the Human Potential Operational Programme (POPH)—European Social Fund (ESF) of the European Union, grant reference SFRH/BD/74511/2010.

Institutional Review Board Statement

Ethical review and approval were waived for this study by the University of Aveiro. This is because, at the time the research was conducted (academic year 2011/2012), the institution had not yet established a formal ethics committee for educational research, and no such approval was required. The PhD project itself was formally approved by the University in the 2010/2011 academic year. All data were collected under conditions of full anonymity, and no identifiable information of participants is present in the manuscript.

Data Availability Statement

The raw data supporting the conclusions of this article will be made available by the corresponding author to interested researchers upon request.

Conflicts of Interest

The authors declare no conflict of interest.

Abbreviations

The following abbreviations are used in this manuscript:
FFemale students
MMale students
STEMScience, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics

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Table 1. Number of students of each gender enrolled in the curricular unit in each semester.
Table 1. Number of students of each gender enrolled in the curricular unit in each semester.
Phase A
1st Semester		Phase B
2nd Semester
Total number of students enrolled177161
GenderFMFM
Number of students of each gender6311458103
Percentage of students of each gender (%)35.664.436.064.0
Table 2. Number of questions asked by students of each gender during lectures.
Table 2. Number of questions asked by students of each gender during lectures.
Phase A
1st Semester		Phase B
2nd Semester
Period of observationsFirst month of classesEntire semester
Number of questions per phase4588
GenderFMFM
Number of questions posed by students of each gender9365236
Percentage of questions posed by students of each gender20805941
Ratio of questions posed by students of each gender 10.14 (9/63)0.32 (36/114)0.90 (52/58)0.35 (36/103)
1 Although it may not be mathematically meaningful to assert that each student of a given gender asked, for example, 0.3 questions, in abstract terms, this value, as well as the others indicated in Table 2, allows us to draw some conclusions when compared with the analogous number for students of the opposite gender.
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Martinho, M.; Almeida, P.A.; Lopes, B.; Moreira, A. The In-Class Questions of Science and Engineering Students: A Gender-Based Perspective. Soc. Sci. 2025, 14, 689. https://doi.org/10.3390/socsci14120689

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Martinho M, Almeida PA, Lopes B, Moreira A. The In-Class Questions of Science and Engineering Students: A Gender-Based Perspective. Social Sciences. 2025; 14(12):689. https://doi.org/10.3390/socsci14120689

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Martinho, Mariana, Patrícia Albergaria Almeida, Betina Lopes, and António Moreira. 2025. "The In-Class Questions of Science and Engineering Students: A Gender-Based Perspective" Social Sciences 14, no. 12: 689. https://doi.org/10.3390/socsci14120689

APA Style

Martinho, M., Almeida, P. A., Lopes, B., & Moreira, A. (2025). The In-Class Questions of Science and Engineering Students: A Gender-Based Perspective. Social Sciences, 14(12), 689. https://doi.org/10.3390/socsci14120689

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