Social equity & data
Gender Data Gap
The systematic absence, under-collection, or bias of data about women and girls, causing research, design, and policy to be built on a default male picture of the world.
Definition
The gender data gap is the persistent imbalance in data collection, analysis, and interpretation whereby data is sourced primarily from men, so that the solutions, designs, and decisions built on that data reflect male bodies, preferences, and life patterns. Popularised by Caroline Criado Perez's "Invisible Women", it spans medical research, product design, workplace policy, and official statistics.
References
definition and causes
popularisation and examples
Overview
What it means
Where women are missing from the data — crash-test dummies modelled on male bodies, time-use surveys ignoring unpaid care, clinical trials under-recruiting women — systems fail women by design rather than by intent. The gap is both a measurement problem (sex-disaggregated data not collected) and an analytical one (data collected but not disaggregated or used).
How it is used
The concept drives sex-disaggregation requirements in SDG monitoring, gender-responsive budgeting, and standards such as UN Women's data programmes; organisations audit datasets and AI systems for gender bias.
Why it matters
What is not measured is not managed: closing gender gaps in health, safety, and economic opportunity starts with making women visible in the data.
Review
Public comments appear only after editor acceptance. Draft comments stay in the review queue.
Reviewers choose the definition or an overview paragraph, leave a comment or replacement, and attach evidence or a source link.
Editors compare reviewer cards side by side. AI may help find agreement, conflicts, unsupported claims and possible source issues.
Only an editor-accepted synthesis changes the public page. Reviewer identities are shown only with consent and an editorial decision to attribute them.
Submitted reviews stay private until an editor decides whether to accept and attribute them.
Contribute to this entry
Help improve this definition
Your contribution is private while it is checked. Nothing changes on this page unless an editor accepts it.
Loading verified endorsements… Endorsements are not votes and never determine publication.
Endorse this definition
Endorse the exact version shown here. This is not a vote, and publication remains an editorial decision.
Review board
Comment on a specific line. Each reviewer stays separate until an editor accepts a merged draft.
Each person comments on the definition or overview in their own draft card, with role, evidence and suggested wording kept together.
AI can compare comments against the current text, flag conflicting claims, surface missing evidence and identify where reviewers agree.
An editor merges compatible suggestions into a draft change, checks sources, records disagreements and decides what can be published.