Gender Segregation in Medicine: The Impact of Stereotypes on Speciality Perceptions and Choices

This study examines the role of gender stereotypes in shaping the perceptions and specialisation choices of medical students in Italy. Although women are increasingly entering the medical profession, strong gender segregation persists across medical specialities, with surgical and technological fields remaining male-dominated and people-oriented specialities female-dominated. Using a survey of 502 senior medical students, the analysis explores whether students perceive certain specialities as more suitable for men or women, and how gendered dispositions influence these perceptions and career orientations. The results show that gendered patterns in both perceptions and intended specialisation choices cannot be fully accounted for by gender alone. Rather, they are mediated by communal and agentic traits, understood as socially produced dispositions aligned with the organisation of medical work. Students with stronger communal orientations are less likely to endorse gender-stereotypical views, whereas agentic traits are associated with perceiving certain fields—both male- and female-dominated—as more suitable for one gender. Family background also plays a role, with students from medical families more likely to perceive specialities as gendered. Overall, the findings suggest that implicit biases continue to shape medical career trajectories through indirect and less visible pathways, even in contexts of increasing gender parity in education.