The X Files’ Dana Scully inspired a generation of women in STEM

to be saved. There Are No Girls on the Internet as a production of I Heart Radio and Unbossed Creative. I'm Bridget Todd and this is There Are No Girls on the Internet. So I was obsessed with the TV show The X Files growing up, specifically because one doctor

Dana Scully. Now, I know that woman scientist is kind of a television genre now with shows like Phones and c Side, but back when I was growing up, Dana Scully was one of the only successful, capable women in stem on television that I had Before Scully, a scientist on TV was usually a loner, white dude in a lab code, and this critical lack of representation kept women and girls like me from being able to see ourselves

meaningly reflected in STEM fields. According to the Gina Davis Institute on Gender and Media YEP, spearheaded by that Gina Davis, this portrayal reinforces the belief that science is a male pursuit, one that is held by many children, adolescents, and adults. Children start implicitly pairing men and math as early as age seven, a bias that continues into adulthood. The Davis Institute researches gender representation and media and advocates for the

equal representation of women. Their researchers looked at the impact that Dana Scully had on women and girls in STEM and the importance of representation in media. I have the privilege of serving as the President and CEO of the Gina Davis Institute on Gender and Media. So how did an actor like Gina Davis, the woman behind iconic performances in films Like a League of their Own, come to start of institute dedicated to equity and media. Well, it actually came out of her experience as being a mom.

Like any mom, she was watching content with her actual daughter at the time, it was a toddler, and she was struck by the disparity and lack of female presence, fictional presence in the content that she was showing her daughter. And like any mom, you turned to your friends, You're like, hey, did you notice in such and such show or movie there just wasn't a lot of female characters? And her

friends would say, no, we didn't really notice that. And then she asked the same question when she meet with producers or other creators for potential acting work, and they would say, no, no, we had this character, we had that character, and they were naming wonderful female characters, but they were it was one. And she thought, my goodness, in the twenty one century, women and girls are fifty something per cent of the population and they're not being

reflected in popular content. And the concern came because of the messaging. What's the message that not only my daughter, but my two young sons are getting about where women and girls fit and their importance. Are we saying that they don't share the sandbox? Are we saying that they're not as important? And that's what gave her the uh, the drive to say, I need to at the research. I want to know if I'm correct, you know, am

I truly seeing this gap um and this disparity. And so if you hear Gina talk, she'll say, I didn't mean to start a whole institute. Once she got started, Uh, she tends to become very laser focused, like with her archery and many other things that she does. And that's how the institute came about. So it came about, you know, from her being a mom and concerned about you know, what kind of biases her daughter going to grow up with, you know, her sons, etcetera. Uh, And that's that's that's

how it got started. Yeah, I'm so glad that you talked about how it's important not just for young women and girls, but also for boys, for people of any gender to understand that you know, yes, women and girls are are self actual, self actualized. We have you know,

roles in society and we're in the workplace. Like it's not just important for women and girls, it is important for us, but also for everybody to see the ways that women and girls should be integrated in society and see a diverse you know, array of what that actually looks like. Yeah. So for example, if you grow up seeing say, a media landscape that is full of many

diverse people. I'm not just saying boys, girls, and give any type people with disabilities at p t q A. If that's normalized in what you see in the fictional world, then it transfers into your real life. When you're at school, maybe when you're playing sports, maybe your first job. You would expect to see that flavor, those colors of the rainbows reflected in an environment, because that's all you've ever seen, that's what you've known. Now we know that's not exactly

the real world, but it normalizes it. Media is playing as important of a role in influencing their societal beliefs as much as church, sports, sleeping, you know, all of those other activities. So you can't ignore it and say, oh, it's just to make believe. No, no, no no, Now, what plays out you know on screen can also transfer to real life and could be in a wonderful way, in

a really positive way. Now, representation is not the end all, be all, but we do know that it matters because everyone deserves to see themselves reflected in the stories that we consume. And to that end, the Davis Institute uses technology to put some data behind who gets treated like a full main character and who has to be satisfied with just seeing themselves reflected as a side character and

someone else's story. One of my on screen idols, Miss Dana Scully, put out of your organization to put out a report about the Skully Effect, which I definitely want to talk about, But I have to ask you. Know you mentioned how you know a diverse array of folks can have a diverse array of different kinds of jobs, you know, applying that to you personally, you have had this incredible career that has spanned over so many fields philanthropy.

You're an Emmy nominated enterhayment professional. You used to run the Hallmark Channel, which I have to tell you is where I get the bulk of my holiday programming, love the holiday movies. How did you personally get plugged into this work at the institute? I was on a journey, uh, like I think we all are. And I'm the first person to go to college in my media family. I come from, you know, generations of of immigrants like many other people, and so there wasn't a pathway or a

pipeline pre provided for me. And so going to college, which we could debate the value of that. That that's another podcast. You know, at that time, going to college was a really big deal and also trying to find your way. And this is a secret about me. Now you're really going to think I'm very strange, and I'm sure are your listeners are. But how do you get information about people? And this is like pre you know,

pre iOS universe. I would read the obituaries, and as much as I know, there's been a lot of argument about how the obituaries have not favored women, but I was constantly looking for unsung heroines. Were there people out there doing things that could help guide me or give me ideas? And I read about so many great women who invented things and people like you just would never hear about. Now, of course you would know who they are.

And I was a executive groupie, so I would just latch on and look at great men and women who were doing interesting things in their careers. And I would look at what was the path that they took. Because I didn't have anyone leading me, um, I didn't have anyone, you know, mentoring me um. So So with that, how do you get experience? And uh, A dear family friend love dating very high powered women. God bless him, he's

still alive, Thank you, Frank. And I wound up doing a lot of internships with a lot of his high powered girlfriends. That's how I got my gigs um and so I started interning from the time I was seventeen all the way until I graduated college at twenty one, where I wound up landing a full time job at at ABC because of all the internships that I've done,

That's kind of how it started for me. Wow, I'm sel lad to hear all the different places your professional journey took you, and I'm even more happy that you landed somewhere that is really changing. I think our understanding of the role that represent that media can play and how important representation is for the kind of world that we want to live in. You know, some of the tools that the David's Institute puts out are so incredible.

You know, things like the Inclusion Quotient that uses machine learning to analyze who speaks the most in different types of media, or spell Check for Bias that uses the Institute's human expert coding to determine the representation of six identities, gender, race, ethnicity, lgbt QUI A plus visibility, body type representation, age representation. I guess my question is how are First of all, I just want to shout out the depths to which the Institute is like really putting doing in this work

in a granular way. And then also, I guess my question is how are all of these tools and studies being used to create a more equitable media landscape. Well, first of all, I can't take credit at all for the depth of wanting to see not only how many female characters maybe on screen, but what is their sense

of agency? That came from Gina, So one of the things that she always wanted to know is okay, great, I can count on one hand how many female characters are, but are they being seen and heard with the same weight as their male counterparts? And that data point was

not humanly possible. And it wasn't until we received a lovely technology grant from Google dot org back in and we found true partners in USC Perturby School of Engineering led by Dr tre Naryan to come together and Jine said, I want to know the screen in speaking time, and and this is really funny and if you ever have a chance to Meetrie and his team of engineers. Gina and I sat with him and said, we want to think of the jiggy and now you've got the most

brainiac brilliant scientists engineers. And they looked at us like, what, UM, Yeah, we want to thinking. We want the thinking to extract screen and they built it right, They did it, UM. And what we found is, uh that even if it was a top of the call sheet, right, so you had a female lead, male lead, that the female characters were on screen and speaking a third of the time less even though they have the same weight, say, in

terms of of a call sheet. And that was not possible until we had the g d i Q, the inclusion quotation, which uses, as you mentioned, machine learning plus human expert coders to do the other things. Because as you mentioned, we look at intersectionality and for us it just ectionality, which Kimberly Crenshaw, Thank you, Kimberly beautifully coined at Columbia. But in our world we look at the intersection between gender, race, ethnicity, l g P, t q

I A disabilities, age fifty plus, and body type. So our intersectionality is a little bit different than the traditional full on definition. UM. But that's you know what we we look at. You know, that intersection. The tools that the Davis Institute builds and champions opens up the door for media makers to make their stories more inclusive and better represent a diversity of identities. It's been used as an auditing tool for people to measure where are we

where do we need to go? How are we doing It's it would be complicated, uh for us, and it can be used in a live production kind of way. So it's been used as an auditing to by many leading brands and entertainment entities. What we once we socialize that, we thought, well, what could really be an intervention? And that's where we turned back to our partners that us SEE who had had this patented text to IP, and

we said, we want a different thing, um. And essentially the combination of their text tool IP and our human expert coders were able to look at words and so think about it. You know, you're writing a script for something and for the people that are being charged with looking at cultural equity in content and then having to have a discussion about it with the people who are actually producing and making and crafting the content. Uh. This is a way for them to come together around a

data driven conversation versus a theory or opinion. And essentially it's very pragmatic in that we look at who is speaking, who is contributing dialogue, and it's just who is showing up? How are they showing up? Are they being described? And for many of your listeners who may have gone to film school or you know, screenwriting one on one, you don't describe all your characters, which is could which could be great? So the banker, you know, the coach, the

et cetera, they have dialogue, but they may not be described. Well, that could be an opportunity to have a discussion to say, okay, it's the twenty one century, what could who could the coach be? Who could the banker be? And how could that be an opportunity to infuse more UH diversity, equity inclusion in a piece of content that doesn't disrupt the story. It's not changing the authentic truth of of what the

storyteller a story they were telling. And so that's where spell Chuck for bias is being used to help foster that conversation and also kind of flag some things, you know, especially sensitivities around sexism and racism, and there's some things that we can flag. We're all we're all looking to be better allies. We're all paying very close attention to how things land when you say something right, and this is a way to help do them. Let's say a

quick break out her back. The X Files first premier on September, introducing the world to Dr Dana Scully, a medical doctor working as a special agent for the FBI, alongside her partner Box Molder. I also had pretty big crushes on both of them growing up, but that's a podcast for another day. Together, they investigate the X files unsolved FBI cases caused by unexplained phenomena, whereas Molder is the wild card, open to the possibility of the paranormal.

Fully is capable, efficient, and deeply skeptical, but you also get to see a lot of who she is and what makes her her. She's a really complex character. For instance, her Catholic faith presents an interesting departure from her usual skeptical nature. Now, I watched Dana Scully on X Files every week growing up, and she was one of the first women that I saw and stam regularly, and she gave me a way to imagine myself one day working in technology too, and it turns out I was not alone.

The Davis Institute published a report on what they're calling the Scully Effect, the idea that Dana Scully inspired a generation of women and girls to go into STEM field because they finally saw themselves represented. That it has long been assumed that Scully had this big and packed on women and girls, but before the Davis Institute, there had been no formal study confirming it. So here's what they found.

Women who are medium and heavy watchers of the X files hold more positive views of STEM than non or light watchers, and that nearly two thirds or of women who are familiar with Dana Scully say that she increased their beliefs in the importance of STEM, and that among women who are familiar with Scully's character, half of them

report that Scully increase their interest in STEM. So while Dana Scully was getting to the bottom of all that paranormal activity, she was also inspiring a generation of women and girls to be interested in the sciences. And thanks to the Davis Institute, well that truth is out there. I love how you really highlight that you're able to get some data around it. Because I think, like, you don't know what you don't know, and so you can't even start to understand or tackle the problem if you

really don't have the information of the scope. And I guess that's such a good segue into, uh, the study on the Skully effect, because I think for a long time it had been just sort of assumed that Dana Scully this amazing character on the X Files. It was a huge part of my upbringing and development as a

young person, and I guess still is today. Uh. But there was this assumption that certainly a generation of women and girls saw this dynamic, successful, capable woman um in stem and that she probably had an impact on encouraging women and girls to see themselves in these fields and then actually go into these fields, but people didn't know.

I think it was really based on this this assumption one can reasonably assume, And so I guess my my question would be, why was it important for the Institute to really put some research into confirming that, yes, this Scully effect did actually make an impact. What was wonderful for us is that Fox approached us because the X Files was on the air in I think it was going off. Then it went off the air. Then it was coming back and I think it was um going

to go off on the air. So it was on for what over a decade or so, on and off, and they said, you know, we know anecdotally that there's this hashtag Scully effect and we want to prove it out. Would your partner with us and help us prove that theory out? And so what we did is we surveyed thousands of women and girls that would have been able to watch the show, and we asked them a series of questions. And what we found out from that is so among the women who said they were familiar with

the show, said that she was a role model. And the other one, which gets up what you were saying, six of them said that they work in stem because Dannis Scully served as their role model. And when we asked them why, it was because she us uh in control of her destiny, she didn't have to be saved.

She used logic, you know, and science to make decisions, and she countered a lot of stereotypes for female characters you know, at that time, and so it was a almost a direct correlation, um and and it was exciting, you know for us because normally we wouldn't conduct a study on somebody else's I p um and make that a case history unless it was something they wanted to partner, you know, with us. So we were thrilled to have a chance to work with them on that and to

use that as as evidence. You know, it's definitely evidence. Yeah, it's and and it really goes back to this idea of if you can see it, you can be it. In the importance of that representation. And I know it might it might be harder for younger folks to really understand, but I was watching The X Files when it when it first premiered, I was a big fan. I had a poster in my locker that said the truth is out there. So I was hugely, hugely involved, like heavily,

heavily a fan. And you know, the show premiered in nine. Yeah, and my my producer and I right before you and I started talking, we were trying to name another show that was on or a movie that was on the air that that involved a woman who was a scientist or involved in stem and the only thing I could think was the Sandra Bolock movie Um Love Postion number nine. She plays a biochemist, but it's kind of it's kind

of like a romantic comedy. It's not. It's certainly her job as a biochemist is not the big part of the movie. And you know, today we have so many different women, like if you watch Bones or like s Vu, women who are in technical fields and in stem. But back then they're just really like, like, we struggled to come up with another woman scientists on on a film or in a television show other than Dana Scully. Back

in the nineties, I really could not. I could not think of any It's so it was a new thing, right, Well, maybe we could make a case for the amazing groundbreaking Mischelle Nichols. She was on star track, so yes, you can assume that she was flying out there in the universe. She had to have some kind of STEM degree, right, Yes, that's a that's a good that's a good cause. And and God bless her and and we're so thrilled with

everything that she contributed to breaking stereotized. But we couldn't say that she was maybe the you know, the first scientist because she was in space. That's true. Shout out

to shout out to her. We love her. Um, I guess you know, were you surprised to see how big of an impact the Skully effect actually had for a generation of women and girls to see themselves reflected instead, Like, I find the results to be not surprising, but just really kind of affirming that she did have this this great role in people being able to see themselves in her, not at all, because we've seen other examples of that.

So another example of that totally different is when Gina got to play the first ever president female president on TV. I think her show was on nineteen times and the Linda Linda Saylor Kaplan Group did a study on uh audiences views on the potential of a female president and what they found is, I think fifty eight per cent of the adults that we're familiar with the show would consider a female UM candidate. And this is going back

to like two thousand four, et cetera. And you think about the show was only on you know, nineteen something times to have that kind of you know, imprint. And and then another great example is UH. You know, Gina Uh went out for the Olympics and Archeries. She was in the trials and qualified for the trials, and a few years ago her coach said, hey, girls, participation of

archery has just gone crazy. And so we did a survey and we worked with the National Association of Archery in America, and we found that there were two movies in what were those two movies? Hunger Games and what's the other one, Rover Brave. Of course, of course those two movies came out and girls participation archery went up a hundred and four. They they went out and got a book. It was instantaneous. Wow. More after a quick break,

let's get right back into it. One of the questions I had, which is a complete like Devil's adig question, because you don't need to convince me. But you know, when you when you see these people who were like, it's just entertainment. You know, it's just movies, it's just TV. Doesn't really make a difference. What do you say? What do you say to that? Like, what's your response to that?

Because I have to imagine there has to be people out there who think, isn't there something else that you should spend your time studying or analyzing or working on. Who cares about the television that we consume, with the media that we watched, What did you say to that? Well, let me give you another example, and let me tell you another story. UM, we had the privilege of working

with UM it was J Walter Thompson at the time. UH, And we did a survey of women in nine countries and we asked them how they were positively influenced by a make believe fictional character, and UH as high as one in four said that seeing a positive female role model gave them the courage to leave an abusive relationship. Wow, that's real. Wow. Yes, I mean that's like saving someone's life,

Like media has the power to do that exactly. So, yes, it's make believe, but what happens in the Maple League world can play out hopefully positively in the real world and change lives. Oh, I absolutely mean. I don't know that I would be hosting a tech podcast if not for Dana Scully. You know, I think that there was no we just didn't have stories like that where you know, her partner was the one who was the the out

there person. She was the one who was like cool, calm, collected, didn't need to be saved, was very capable, and I really liked that she was you know, still she still you knew that she had a light outside of work, and you you you've got to understand her as a whole dimensional woman who did this work. I think you know if you were you know in the study you talked about how like the perception of a scientist was an awkward man and a white lab coat. Dana Scully

wasn't awkward. She did wear a lab coat, but she certainly was not awkward. She really they really depicted her in loving way and you really got to understand her as a a full person. And I think, yeah, I just I still remember the first time I watched the show and what an impression that made on me, and thinking like, oh, maybe this could be a career for me one day, maybe I could do something involved in

technology or science or a stem field. Because she allowed me to release see it and I've never seen anything like that before. So certainly stories and media have been important to me hugely. Absolutely, So we talked about Gina Davis. I am just now learning that she is an Olympian level archer? Is she as cool as she seems in the movie A League of their Own? Like that's the benchmark Gina Davis for me, It's like she'll never be

cooler than that. Movie. Is she just the best? Well, what's what's amazing is this summer will be the thirtieth anniversary of the League of their Own, Oh my god, and you know we're looking to celebrate that plans to be shared. And you know, she is sincere, she is dedicated, She rolls up her sleeves. There's a lot of celebrities that have charities and nonprofits and whatnot, but she really

digs in. The institute was born out of her vision. Um, her desire to change, you know the world and make it more equitable, particularly for you know, women and girls. I love the world. And um, she's she's a really big thinker. She's very creative. Um, but she's very thoughtful, you know, and and kind and and as you can tell, like on the mouth kind of thing. Um. So yeah, she she's that cool and then some I love it, Madeline. Is there anything that I did not ask but you

want to make sure it gets included? Well, yes, So we we welcome your audience to become members of the Institute. We do year round programming. We have all kinds of great events where we launch our studies UM networking. Follow us on social media at Gina Davis org and we welcome uh for anyone who's listening to get get more involved so there are no girls on the Internet. Launched a new newsletter called Dear Internet, where I am taking

your Internet questions and conundrums. You can subscribe for free. It can go be dot com slash newsletter to be my full advice and submit your own questions. You might even hear yours on the show. So I wanted to read one of the letters that we got from a listener that we're calling Joe Dear Internet. I have dealt with depression on and off for most of my life, and since the pandemic, my issues have only gotten more pronounced.

I experienced a particularly low period where if I was able to get out of bed and dressed, it was a good day. When I feel like this, my default is to cut off almost everyone and everything from the outside world. Thanks to a good therapist and new medication, that period of my life is thankfully behind me for now. But now that I'm reconnecting with the world, I'm struggling to deal with email inbox that is full of unanswered emails, some of which are or at least word time sensitive.

The idea of tackling this inbox fills me with dread. It feels really embarrassing and almost rude to reply to an email after several months. These feelings of shame and guilt make it difficult to move forward. I'm cleaning on my inbox? What's the cutoff for responding to an email late? Are there instances where a reply can come so late that it's better to not reply at all? And I need to exibling that people want My response is so overdue. So if you want to read my full response, subscribe

to our newsletter. But yeah, I really wanted to start with this letter because oh boy, can I relate? And I feel like a lot of us, especially since the pandemic, can probably relate to this feeling of dread and a keyness that comes with having to dig out an inbox. There's actually a recent episode of one of my favorite ever podcasts, You're Wrong About, about how email got to

be so awful and annoying? Uh spoiler alert. It has a lot to do with the rise of Gmail as our email platform, and tech companies like Google kind of thinking that everyone wants to enjoy the pressures and expectations to respond to emails right away no matter what time it is that people who are hit tech companies have to deal with. So that ikey feeling that comes with your email inbox is actually kind of by design, So thank you Google. Uh you know, I also deal with

mental health issues. In my case, I have generalized anxiety disordered, and my anxiety can really manifest itself into feeling panicky around email in my inbox, and at least to things like me ignoring emails and really letting them pile up, or spending an hour overthinking an email response that just says sounds good, thanks, you know, I'll spend an hour writing that and thinking about all the ways they can go wrong, most of which are just kind of in

my head. But you know, I'm also a busy creative professional. I make a podcast and I do other things, and so I can't let my email get two out of control, and so I actually take really clear steps to handle this in my own life. I have someone who handles my inbox because I know that I just cannot be trusted and really should not be trusted with my own email. And I'm really curious, what is your personal relationship with email? What does it look like, what does it feel like.

Are you someone who feels the need to get to inbox zero? Are you somebody like me who when other people look at your inbox they kind of cower and disgust at how many unread emails you have? What does it look like? I really want to know, So subscribe to our newsletter at tangodi dot com slash newsletter and let me know. I can't wait to hear from you. Got a story about an interesting thing in tech, or just want to say hi? You can be just at Hello at tangodi dot com. You can also find transcripts

today's episode at tangodi dot com. There Are No Girls on the Internet was created by me H Todd. It's a production of iHeart Radio and Unboss creative Jonathan Strickland as our executive producer. Terry Harrison is our producer and sound engineer. Michael Amato is our contributing producer. I'm your host, Bridget Todd. If you want to help us grow, rate

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