Dr Ruth Woodfield

Biography

I studied philosophy at undergraduate and postgraduate level before undertaking a doctorate in Science & Technology Policy Studies at the Science Policy Research Unit. I have been teaching Sociology at Sussex for over 10 years. My primary research interests are gender in the context of science, technology and work, especially gender-atypical working environments and gender in the context of higher education. I am also very interested in research methods, and the philosophy underpinning different methodological approaches. My research is located within the Gender, Inequality and Work group here in the Sociology department, and I am Research Leader of this group.

Community and Business

Ruth is a member of the Senior Researchers' Group for the Community and University Partnership Programme (CUPP).

In conjunction with the Brighton Dome and Festival Offices, Ruth is the organisor of the Sussex Salon Series, a series of topical public debates between University of Sussex academics, external experts, and the community: http://www.sussex.ac.uk/lps/newsandevents/events/sussexsalonseries

My main research interest is gender, and I explore the causes and effects of this fundamental social category using qualitative and quantitative methods, and by analysing empirical data in the context of a range of theoretical approaches. I have mostly worked on gender differences and inequalities in the context of a variety of organisational contexts and arenas: Scientific and Technical organisations, the Fire & Rescue Service, Primary Teaching, Higher Education. I also have a research interest in methodologies and the philosophical assumptions underpinning them.

My first book Women, Work and Computing (2000 Cambridge University Press) was an ethnography of gender differences within an occupational computing culture, and  I continue to research in the area of gender, science and technology. My second book, What Women Want From Work: gender and occupational choice in the 21st century (Palgrave MacMillan, October 2007), is an exploration of how women's occupational choices are formed and experienced and contains case studies of the Fire and Rescue Service and Primary Teaching. 

I am currently focusing on a sociological exploration of gender differences in perceptions and understanding of climate change, its associated risks and possible mitigations, and in the discrepancy between self-report measures and behaviour.

My work on gender differences in education focuses on on exploring factors that influence higher education student experience and attainment. I have undertaken projects using both qualitative and quantitative data to study these, and related, issues. One, large-scale, quantitative project based at Sussex University - An analysis of factors affecting undergraduate progress and attainment - resulted in a number of papers exploring the relationship between factors including personality traits and degree outcome and gender and degree outcome. A further study sponsored by the Society for Research into Higher Education's Younger Researcher/Carfax Award, 2001 - An exploration of factors underlying lower male attendance rates at university - looked at the relationships between gender and attendance patterns at undergraduate level. A third ESRC-funded HE project - Undergraduate student perceptions of first year experience - analysed qualitative data collected from students via email and focused on a large range of topics, including, for example, their attitudes to difference modes of assessment within their studies. I have worked on the analysis of a large HESA-supplied dataset, focusing on the relationship between gender and degree outcome by subject area, especially the difference between degree outcomes for the Arts and Sciences, and the relationship between graduates' age and their post-university employment experiences for a project funded by the Eurpean Social Fund Equal programme. Most recently I have worked on gender differences in higher education with a view to explaining why men's access, retention and attainment rates are lower than women's, and the divergent ways in which men and women sometimes experience and engage with HE. 

Research Supervision

Current doctoral students

• Haydn Evans - A critical realist assessment of performance management in schools.
• Elizabeth Ibegbulam - A Participatory Research Approach Assessment of 14 Year Olds' Subject Choices, Their Perceptions Of IT And IT Work
• Jong-Soon Ahn - The Study of Maternal Employment in South Korea: Mothers' Choices and Constraints
• Eleftherios Zenerian - Clusters, social capital, information diffusion, economic performance and innovation 
• Jill Armstrong - An exploration of agency and choice in highly successful women workers
• Mukesh Khatwani - Women teachers in Pakistan higher education
• Nick Beard - Subsidiarity in the EU after Lisbon: A Feminist Perspective on Victims of Sex-Trafficking and Domestic Violence Victims

Previous doctoral students:  

• Francesca Conti - At Home and Abroad: an exploration of Italian graduate migration.

• Christopher Shaw - An analysis of the establishment of 2 degrees as the acceptable level of global warming.
• Tamsin Hinton Smith - A qualitative email survey of single-parents' experience of higher education.
• Ozge Atkas - Social Capital & Inequalities amongst Istanbul squatters
• Emma Scott -To What Extent is the Indian IT Sector Gender Neutral?
• Andy Mantell - Huntington's Disease:The Carer's Story.
• Sarah Earl-Novell - Gender Differentiation in First Class Academic Achievement at University.
• Kate Calamatta - An ethnographic alanysis of gender differences in the horse riding industry.
• Lucy Solomon - A qualitative survey of mature student experiences of higher education (with particular focus on age and gender)

Sociology of Education

Sociological Research Methods

Gender Through the Life Course

Sociology Project

Student Consultation

As teaching is finished I will not be having standing office hours for the remainder of the academic year.

However, if you'd like to arrange to see me, do email me so that we can find a time to meet: r.woodfield@sussex.ac.uk

Woodfield, Ruth and Thomas, Liz (2012) Male students: engagement with academic and pastoral support services. Project Report. Equality Challenge Unit, London.

Berry, Jane, Foster, Ed, Lefever, Ruth, Raven, Neil, Thomas, Liz and Woodfield, Ruth (2011) Male access and success in higher education. Discussion Paper. The Higher Education Academy, York.

Woodfield, Ruth (2011) Age and first destination employment from UK universities: are mature students disadvantaged? Studies in Higher Education, 36 (4). pp. 409-425. ISSN 0307-5079

Barrow, Michael, Reilly, Barry and Woodfield, Ruth (2009) The Determinants of Undergraduate Degree Performance: How Important is Gender? British Educational Research Journal, 35 (4). pp. 575-597. ISSN 0141-1926

Woodfield, Ruth (2009) Women's Leadership in the Fire Service: A Report based on Women's Leadership Workshop participants' verbal and written contributions. Unset.

Farsides, Tom and Woodfield, Ruth (2007) Individual and gender differences in good and first-class undergraduate degree performance. British Journal of Psychology, 98 (3). pp. 467-483. ISSN 0007-1250

Woodfield, Ruth (2007) What women want from work: gender and occupational choice in the 21st century. Women's Studies at York Series . Palgrave MacMillan, London. ISBN 9780230549227

Woodfield, Ruth and Earl-Novell, Sarah (2006) An Assessment of the extent to which subject variation in relation to the award of First class degrees between the Arts and Sciences can explain the 'gender gap'. British Journal of Sociology of Education, 27 (3). pp. 355-372. ISSN 0142-5692

Woodfield, Ruth (2006) Gender and computing at university in the UK. In: Encyclopedia of Gender and Information Technology. Idea Group Reference, pp. 365-371. ISBN 9781591408154

Woodfield, Ruth (2006) Women and recruitment to the IT profession in the UK. In: Encyclopedia of Gender and Information Technology. Pennsylvania State University Press, London, pp. 1238-1244. ISBN 9781591408154

Woodfield, Ruth (2006) Work and its limitations. Sociology, 40 (3). pp. 567-575. ISSN 00380385

Woodfield, Ruth, Jessop, Donna and McMillan, Lesley (2006) Gender differences in undergraduate attendance rates. Studies in Higher Education, 31 (1). pp. 1-22. ISSN 0307-5079

Woodfield, Ruth and Farsides, Tom (2006) Individual and gender differences in good and first-class undergraduate degree performance. British Journal of Psychology, 98. pp. 467-483. ISSN 0007-1269

Woodfield, Ruth, Earl-Novell, Sarah and Solomon, Lucy (2005) Gender and mode of assessment at university: Should we assume female students are better suited to coursework and males to unseen examinations? Assessment and Evaluation in Higher Education, 30 (1). pp. 33-48. ISSN 0260-2938

Woodfield, Ruth (2003) Female Recruitment Levels to the Fire & Rescue Service. Discussion Paper. Unset.

Woodfield, Ruth and Farsides, Tom (2003) Individual differences and undergraduate academic success: the roles of personality, intelligence and application. Personality and Individual Differences, 34. pp. 1225-1243. ISSN 0191-8869

Woodfield, Ruth and Earl-Novell, Sarah (2002) Gender and performance in HE: the impact of mode of assessment. Institute for Learning and Teaching in Higher Education Journal.

Woodfield, Ruth (2002) Student perceptions of the first year experience of university 2000-2001 - results from a qualitative email survey. University of Sussex, Report to University of Sussex .

Woodfield, Ruth (2002) Women and information systems development: not just a pretty (inter)face. Information Technology and People, 15 (2). pp. 119-138. ISSN 09593845

Woodfield, Ruth, Platt, Jennifer, Willison, Rebecca and Reed, Tim (2001) Social relations and intellectual evaluation in self and peer assessment of Sociology Students. In: Assessing Sociologists in Higher Education. Ashgate. ISBN 9780754616450

Woodfield, Ruth (2000) Women, Work and Computing. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge. ISBN 9780521771894

McCrae, Robert R, Costa Jr, Paul T, Ostendorf, Fritz, Angleitner, Alois, Hrebickova, Martina, Avia, Maria D, Sanz, Jesus, Sanchez-Bernardos, Maria L, Kusdil, M Ersin, Woodfield, Ruth, Saunders, Peter R and Smith, Peter B (2000) Nature over nurture: temperament personality and lifespan. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 78 (1). 173 - 186. ISSN 0022-3514

Woodfield, Ruth (1999) Explaining Gender Differences in Higher Education: Preliminary results from a Sussex Panel Survey ,. Project Report. University of Sussex.

Woodfield, Ruth (1999) Explaining gender differences in achievement in higher education: preliminary results from a British panel survey. In: Hard Work in the Academy: Research and Interventions on Gender Inequalities. Helsinki University Press, Helsinki, pp. 93-101. ISBN 9789515704566

Woodfield, Ruth (1998) Working women and social labour. Other. Unset.

Woodfield, Ruth (1993) The future use and diffusion of electronic data interchange in Europe: the UK case. Project Report. Unset.

Woodfield, Ruth and Brady, T (1993) The Social Implications of New Office Technologies in the UK. Technical Report. Unset.