The full title is ‘Invisible Women: Exposing Data Bias in a World Designed for Men’
Here is the description:
Imagine a world where your phone is too big for your hand, where your doctor prescribes a drug that is wrong for your body, where in a car accident you are 47% more likely to be seriously injured, where every week the countless hours of work you do are not recognised or valued. If any of this sounds familiar, chances are that you’re a woman.
Invisible Women shows us how, in a world largely built for and by men, we are systematically ignoring half the population. It exposes the gender data gap – a gap in our knowledge that is at the root of perpetual, systemic discrimination against women, and that has created a pervasive but invisible bias with a profound effect on women’s lives.
Award-winning campaigner and writer Caroline Criado Perez brings together for the first time an impressive range of case studies, stories and new research from across the world that illustrate the hidden ways in which women are excluded from the very building blocks of the world we live in, and the impact this has on their health and wellbeing. From government policy and medical research, to technology, workplaces, urban planning and the media – Invisible Women reveals the biased data that excludes women. In making the case for change, this powerful and provocative book will make you see the world anew.
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I have. Loved this book
This book should be read by everyone. It rocked me.
I read it right after I read Cathy O’Neil’s Weapons of Math Destruction, in data collection in the way that big data and algorithms are being used all across society against both women and POC. They fit together really well but together they ended up making me feel really hopeless.
Amen!!
Just borrowed it from my e-library.
I can attest about medical issues; both my girls weren’t diagnosed with ADHD until adults because they didn’t fit the “criteria.” Which was based on boys. ADHD manifests differently in girls. Or the old jackass of a doctor who patted my hand and prescribed Valium for my “nerves.” I was experiencing a number of physical symptoms, turned out to be low thyroid, easily treated. I could go on.
Can you give some examples of how it manifests differently in girls?
Not the OP commenter, but generally speaking, boys tend to present with more external symptoms that are visible to others - fidgeting, difficulty sitting still, etc. Girls tend to have more internal symptoms like ‘spacing out’ that others can’t see. A diagnosis in kids is often based on observable symptoms and kids aren’t always asked about their invisible symptoms inside their heads, so boys get diagnosed more frequently. The example symptoms only scratch the surface of what ADHD entails, but’s that’s the gist of it.
In addition to the examples from other commenters, girls seem to be better at masking. When they’re alone, they might display more stereotypical behaviours, but they’re better at watching other people in public and mimicking them to fit in, even when they don’t understand the reasons for the actions.
As a teacher, one thing I’d say is that while boys often act out when they get distracted, what we see with girls is classic daydreamy behavior… so she’s paying attention, and then suddenly another student will do something disruptive, and instead of her attention snapping back to the lesson, we lose her looking out the window. Enough that it is having an impact on her grade/ability to relate to others. Then we start watching more closely (some kids just daydream! Just like some kids just get bored and mess around.)
Girls are underdiagnosed because their behavior (usually) isn’t disruptive; boys are massively overdiagnosed because parents sometimes are looking for a medical solution to their kids just being kids, as well as biases from within the system.
I’m still in the process of getting diagnosed as an adult, but I generally say that I have a bunch of anxiety keeping the ADHD in check.
Like, I’m not late for appointments… But only because I have 12 alarms and didn’t sleep the night before and any sleep I did get was populated by a fear that I was going to oversleep through my appointment and then I still left too late to make it on time so I ran.
My assignments aren’t late… Because when I realized I put it off too long, I stayed awake all night writing in a panic, and I only reread it 8 times instead of the 12 times I wanted to.
I don’t lose things… Because I put them in the same place, every day and if they aren’t there I get a little panicked and can’t find it, even if I walked by it multiple times.
Speaking of walking by, I need to try and do things the first time I see them, because if I let myself sit down, that chore vanishes.
I was diagnosed a year ago and I’m over 40.
I have somehow gotten by by masking (which can lead to a burnout), and various survival mechanisms I had developed in order to cope (such as writing everything down, and having a husband who is my executive function director).
I started it a while ago but it made me so angry I haven’t continued it yet
The last chapter is less angering. I had to skip to it, I couldn’t finish either
It took me a long time to read, as it infuriated me, but was well worth taking it slow. It really impacted me and I bring it up regularly. A really important data driven book. I am constantly telling people about the facts it reveals regarding car crash testing in particular, very shocking
Yes, I started it and her podcast but never finished the book or kept listening - her writing is good and content great but just kinda upsetting how fucked up the world is
It was an amazing amazing read. Made me switch to menstrual cups right then and there too :D was on my period reading that chapter and I was like oh sshhhhhiiiit
Yes! I’m a psychiatrist and learned loads from it - I recommend it all the time to my colleagues!
I agree with the points she made about the medical field (when I myself had heart problems, it was thought to be anxiety and not investigated/recognised as medical until I was admitted to the Coronary Care unit for a week and needed a pacemaker…), but I had already been broadly aware of these issues.
For me the more eye-opening chapter was about town/city planning and how development and transport issues disproportionately negatively affect women (e.g having a “flat rate” bus fare means women are more out of pocket as they often do lots of smaller trips (shopping, care, etc) rather than just to/from work!).
If anyone here is even slightly interested, I’d definitely say to them to pick it up! I “read” the audiobook first but then got a physical copy because I reference it so often! 🤓
I teach graduate psych students and often reference the same chapters. I just picked up a spare copy of the book for my office.
Yes! I recommend it to everyone - it covers so much and has so many statistics to back everything up. It is very infuriating to read as a woman seeing just how many things in life are stacked up against you that you would never even realise (e.g., crash dummies are modelled after the average male so women have higher incidences of injury in car crushes)
has so many statistics to back everything up
dont forget that statistics is the easiest way to lie, especially when the seeming conclusion is outrageous enough
it only works when someone questions it, and then the author or their colleagues answer - only then one can really tell who’s right and who’s wrong
Loved it, we read it in my company’s marginalized genders’ group book club. I agree that it’s a tough read and can make me angry, but it also was very validating of my experiences and why I often feel unsafe or doubt the advice of experts. That part was nice.
She also has a podcast and email newsletter.
Almost every time my seatbelt hits my neck I think of her book.
Yes! I recommend this book to everyone I can. The ones who read it always come back to tell me that it made them mad lol
Fantastic book I think anyone and everyone should read. I recommend it heavily to others. Sometimes people think it will be a very social justice style book, but it really isn’t. It’s presented with just facts and data that make you go “Wow I can’t believe that’s how things are made/designed/planned. That’s insanely stupid.” It doesn’t preach at you at all.
One of the most infuriating books I’ve ever read, and I couldn’t put it down. I recommend it to everyone.
I was able to reference this book once at work.
I was working as a triage nurse and a middle aged lady presents symptoms of upper stomach ache. She said she’d had this symptom before and it turned out to be a heart attack. The (male) doctor had told her that women’s symptoms of MI often present “atypically”.
I said something along the lines of “atypically, what a strange way to say it when we’re half the world’s population”.
She gave me the kindest sisterhood looks I’ve ever received from a stranger.