John Tierney writes in the Times article that Roger linked yesterday that by 1991, there were four men to one woman getting 700 on the SATs, a huge improvement over the 1980s, when the ratio was 13 to one. He suggests that the improvement might be due to “sociocultural factors like encouragement and instruction in math offered to girls.” But weren’t the SATs renormed through the years? That might explain some of the change. Still, I have wondered why there seemed to be so many female mathematicians in the Soviet Union. It does seem that women can do better at math if encouraged or pushed.