A Problem of Gender Representation: Adapting the Bechdel Test to Evaluate the Social Media Presence of Radiology Residency Programs.

RATIONALE AND OBJECTIVES Social media serves as recruitment tools for residency programs, allowing programs to "brand" themselves in an era of virtual interviews. For female applicants, viewing their gender represented on Instagram may influence their pursuit of a program. Our study's goal is to quantify how female-presenting professionals are represented on radiology residency (RR) Instagram pages, as these are increasingly important platforms for resident recruitment. MATERIALS AND METHODS The Bechdel test is a well-known measure of the representation of women in fiction that requires at least 2 women speak to each other about a topic other than a man. We modified this test to evaluate the portrayal of female-presenting professionals on public Instagram galleries of RR programs. For a photo to pass our test, female-presenting persons are shown physically together, without male-presenting professionals, and in a professional setting. To compare gender depiction, a Male Bechdel Test was also used. RR Instagram pages were identified using the Fellowship and Residency Electronic Interactive Database Access (n = 87) and examined with an adapted framework approach to count female and male-presenting individuals in 1044 images. Results were assessed using paired t-tests and a chi-square with McNemar's test. RESULTS Approximately 50% of the RR Instagrams passed the Male Bechdel Test while only 21.3% passed the Female Bechdel Test, a significant difference in gender representation (χ2(1) = 13.255, P = 0.022). Paired sample t-tests revealed that RR Instagram pages are significantly more likely to feature male-presenting professionals in a professional setting (P < 0.0001), feature them with other male-presenting professionals (P = 0.001), and feature them without female-presenting professionals (P = 0.003). CONCLUSION Our results suggest female-presenting radiologists are under-represented on the Instagram profiles of RR programs. While this reflects the dearth of females in this field, programs may improve gender inclusion by more prominently displaying females on social media. This may assist in recruiting minority applicants.

[1]  P. Zapanta,et al.  Virtual Residency Interviews during the COVID-19 Pandemic: The Applicant’s Perspective , 2022, Southern medical journal.

[2]  D. Massel,et al.  Social media growth of orthopaedic surgery residency programs in response to the COVID-19 pandemic , 2022, World journal of orthopedics.

[3]  H. Forman,et al.  Diversity in Radiology: Current Status and Trends Over the Past Decade. , 2022, Radiology.

[4]  P. Bhargava,et al.  Utilization of Social Media Platforms in Diagnostic Radiology Residency Programs in the United States. , 2022, Current problems in diagnostic radiology.

[5]  S. Rais-Bahrami,et al.  Changes in United States Residency Program Online Presence Following COVID-19 , 2022, Teaching and learning in medicine.

[6]  N. Singh,et al.  Evaluation of Emergency Medicine Residency Programs’ use of social media in the setting of the COVID‐19 pandemic , 2022, Journal of the American College of Emergency Physicians open.

[7]  Akhila Ankem,et al.  Impact of COVID-19 on Radiology Residency Selection Process: A Survey of Radiology Residency Programs in the US , 2022, Academic Radiology.

[8]  Nabile M. Safdar,et al.  Leveraging Social Media and Web Presence to Discuss and Promote Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion in Radiology. , 2022, Journal of the American College of Radiology : JACR.

[9]  Lars J. Grimm,et al.  Should Radiology Residency Interviews Remain Virtual? Results of a Multi-institutional Survey Inform the Debate. , 2021, Academic radiology.

[10]  O. Awan,et al.  The Effect of Virtual Interviews and Social Media on Applicant Decision-Making During The 2020-2021 Resident Match Cycle , 2021, Academic radiology.

[11]  D. Jeffe,et al.  Does Medical Students’ Sense of Belonging Affect Their Interest in Orthopaedic Surgery Careers? A Qualitative Investigation , 2021, Clinical orthopaedics and related research.

[12]  J. Davids,et al.  Patterns of General Surgery Residency Social Media Use in the Age of COVID-19 , 2021, Journal of Surgical Education.

[13]  R. Motta,et al.  Is Empowerment of Female Radiologists Still Needed? Findings of a Systematic Review , 2021, International journal of environmental research and public health.

[14]  L. Deitte,et al.  Brave New World: Challenges and Opportunities in the COVID-19 Virtual Interview Season , 2020, Academic Radiology.

[15]  R. Kubik-Huch,et al.  Women in radiology: why is the pipeline still leaking and how can we plug it? , 2020, Acta radiologica.

[16]  A. Baranger,et al.  Sense of belonging within the graduate community of a research-focused STEM department: Quantitative assessment using a visual narrative and item response theory , 2020, PloS one.

[17]  H. Hricak,et al.  Women in radiology: gender diversity is not a metric—it is a tool for excellence , 2019, European Radiology.

[18]  K. Freund,et al.  Gender Differences in Academic Medicine: Retention, Rank, and Leadership Comparisons From the National Faculty Survey , 2018, Academic medicine : journal of the Association of American Medical Colleges.

[19]  Ramon Flecha,et al.  Social impact in social media: A new method to evaluate the social impact of research , 2018, PloS one.

[20]  Lars J. Grimm,et al.  Collaboration Metrics Among Female and Male Researchers: A 5-Year Review of Publications in Major Radiology Journals. , 2018, Academic radiology.

[21]  C. V. D. van der Vleuten,et al.  The pattern of social media use and its association with academic performance among medical students , 2018, Medical teacher.

[22]  Sora C. Yoon,et al.  Factors Influencing the Gender Breakdown of Academic Radiology Residency Programs. , 2017, Journal of the American College of Radiology : JACR.

[23]  C. Tishelman,et al.  Beyond the visual and verbal: Using participant-produced photographs in research on the surroundings for care at the end-of-life. , 2016, Social science & medicine.

[24]  D. Elliott,et al.  How Health Care Professionals Use Social Media to Create Virtual Communities: An Integrative Review , 2016, Journal of medical Internet research.

[25]  A. Jalali,et al.  Go Where the Students Are: A Comparison of the Use of Social Networking Sites Between Medical Students and Medical Educators , 2015, JMIR medical education.

[26]  N. Gale,et al.  Using the framework method for the analysis of qualitative data in multi-disciplinary health research , 2013, BMC Medical Research Methodology.

[27]  Catherine Good,et al.  Why do women opt out? Sense of belonging and women's representation in mathematics. , 2012, Journal of personality and social psychology.

[28]  Andrea Donovan,et al.  Views of radiology program directors on the role of mentorship in the training of radiology residents. , 2010, AJR. American journal of roentgenology.

[29]  Jo Handelsman,et al.  More Women in Science , 2005, Science.

[30]  Kecia M. Thomas,et al.  Advertising and recruitment: Marketing to minorities , 2000 .

[31]  F. Rybicki,et al.  Gender Disparity Among Leaders of Canadian Academic Radiology Departments. , 2019, AJR. American journal of roentgenology.