2023 ASEE Annual Conference & Exposition

Prior studies have demonstrated that engineering students with LGBTQ+ identities feel marginalized in engineering spaces and refer to the climate as chilly and heteronormative. One salient theme in prior literature is social-technical dualism, which is the separation of technical and social aspects of engineering that typically excludes social aspects from engineering education experiences. The mechanisms that perpetuate social-technical dualism, and therefore a heteronormative engineering culture, are not yet well understood. The purpose of this analysis was to understand how social-technical dualism is perpetuated or maintained in undergraduate engineering spaces through the experiences of LGBTQ+ engineers. We conducted focus groups (n=4) and individual interviews (n=3) of students with these characteristics and thematically coded the interview transcripts. We found three main themes pertaining to the perpetuation of social-technical dualism in STEM: modeled professionalism, silence, and identity concealment. Modeled professionalism refers to how heteronormative professionalism is modeled by professors, teaching assistants, and faculty researchers. We refer to these people as dominant figures in engineering, because they play a substantial role in shaping how LGBTQ+ students perceive and develop engineering values. One way dominant figures in engineering typically reinforce the chilly, heteronormative culture of engineering is by showing how straightness is a key aspect of professionalism in engineering. However, our findings also show that dominant figures also have the influence to drastically change LGBTQ+ students’ perspective of professionalism when they choose to counter heteronormative narratives. The second theme, culture of silence, explores how LGBTQ+ feel unable or unwilling to give voice to their discomfort in the face of microaggressions and heteronormativity. LGBTQ+ students experience a lack of visible solidarity from their peers, contributing to a silent, chilly experience in engineering classrooms and lab environments. Our third theme, identity concealment, interrogates how students conceal their LGBTQ+ identities as a mechanism for survival in engineering. A lack of LGBTQ+ dominant figures in engineering, a culture of silence, and reinforcement that straightness is a professional requirement in engineering has perpetuated a cycle of identity concealment, where students without visible LGBTQ+ STEM role models feel less comfortable in their ability to safely come out in STEM spaces. One the other hand, some participants expressed that having an out mentor encouraged them to persevere in their field and resist heteronormative professionalism in engineering environments. Understanding the mechanisms that perpetuate social-technical dualism in engineering is paramount to creating inclusive, safe environments for LGBTQ+ students. We suggest ways in which dominant figures in engineering, such as professors, teaching assistants, and faculty researchers can disrupt the chilly, heteronormative culture of engineering by modeling inclusive classroom and lab practices. Additionally, we offer insights on how students negotiate their identity visibility in a chilly, heteronormative, and silent culture.