Gender equity perceptions among social and administrative science faculty: A qualitative evaluation.

BACKGROUND: Anecdotal evidence suggests that gender inequity persists in academic pharmacy. To date, there are limited published data about the perception of gender inequity in academic pharmacy. OBJECTIVE: The objective of this project was to determine themes associated with gender inequity perceptions in social and administrative science faculty from 2 national pharmacy organizations. METHODS: A gender equity task force comprising 13 members from Social and Administrative Sciences (SAS) sections of the American Pharmacists Association and the American Association of Colleges of Pharmacy was formed. The task force designed a semistructured interview guide comprising questions about demographics and core areas where inequities likely exist. When the survey invitation was sent to faculty members of the SAS sections via Qualtrics, faculty indicated whether they were willing to be interviewed. Interviews were conducted by 2 members of the task force via video conferencing application. The interviews were transcribed. Topic coding involving general categorization by theme followed by refinement to delineate subcategories was used. Coding was conducted independently by 3 coders followed by consensus when discrepancies were identified. RESULTS: A total of 21 faculty participated in the interviews. Respondents were primarily female (71%), were white (90%), had Doctor of Philosophy as their terminal degree (71%), and were in nontenure track positions (57%). Most respondents (90%) experienced gender inequity. A total of 52% reported experiencing gender inequity at all ranks from graduate student to full professor. Four major themes were identified: microaggression (57%), workload (86%), respect (76%), and opportunities (38%). Workload, respect, and opportunities included multiple subthemes. CONCLUSION: Faculty respondents perceive gender inequities in multiple areas of their work. Greater inequity perceptions were present in areas of workload and respect. The task force offers multiple recommendations to address these inequities.