Improving equality in scientific careers : The Care Factor proposal

In academia, as well as in other spheres work, there exist some disparities. They are associated with discriminations based on ethnicity, gender, discipline and so on. A relevant issue concerns the hidden (male) cultural model and related tacit assumptions underlying the (academic) evaluation of the scientific productivity. In addition, concerning the latter, several research studies on care-giving highlighted the inversely proportional relation between care activities and scientific production, i.e. a slowdown on scholarly productivity. The latter could prove to be detrimental when the candidate takes part in recruiting or promotion processes, as the number of publications is often used as an important criterion in evaluation. Reconciliation policies and promoting family-friendly cultures, environments and workplaces are certainly useful tools to help dilute this effect. However, they require social and cultural changes that are (unfortunately) not immediate. Hence, practical proposals in the short and medium term to reduce inequalities in scientific careers are urgently needed. For this purpose, “affirmative actions” can help. One of these actions could be the use of the Care Factor, an index to weigh the scientific productivity of a candidate who is involved in child-rearing. It could be a transitional instrument, certainly not permanent, but useful to balance the gap between those who are involved in care activities and those who are not. However, the Care Factor should not be conceived of as a proposal to reward, but not to penalize those who care for children.