My daughter's in STEM, along with a few other girls, though it seems that the class is mostly male. I would wager that, at least at the middle-school level my current daughter's in, STEM involvement has more to do with the parents and less to do with the child's natural inclinations.
That isn't to say that kids don't have free will, obviously, or that they can't effect their own preferences in their lives, but I'd wager that my daughter's inclination for math and science has more to do with both of her parents having that inclination, and hence, her more frequent exposure to it.
While I tend not to worry about these sorts of things, and/or how big a deal they are, I would wager that much of this is self-perpetuating. Mothers who aren't inclined towards technology aren't able to impart technical inclination to their daughters. I couldn't swear to whether my daughter's interest in tech comes from me or my wife, but if we assume that daughters often take after their mothers, and their mothers aren't technically inclined, it's easy to say that the problem is not self-healing.
That isn't to say that kids don't have free will, obviously, or that they can't effect their own preferences in their lives, but I'd wager that my daughter's inclination for math and science has more to do with both of her parents having that inclination, and hence, her more frequent exposure to it.
While I tend not to worry about these sorts of things, and/or how big a deal they are, I would wager that much of this is self-perpetuating. Mothers who aren't inclined towards technology aren't able to impart technical inclination to their daughters. I couldn't swear to whether my daughter's interest in tech comes from me or my wife, but if we assume that daughters often take after their mothers, and their mothers aren't technically inclined, it's easy to say that the problem is not self-healing.