Title: First Results of a Survey on the Diversity of the R Community

Authors: Stella Bollmann, Rudolf Debelak, Carolin Strobl

Affiliation: UZH Zurich

Abstract: 
Given the gender gap in both user and developer communities, the R Foundation
has established a Task Force to inquire how more women and members of other
marginalized groups can be encouraged to participate in the R community. In a
first step, the Task Force aimed at investigating the present situation by the
means of a survey that was sent to participants of the useR! conference 2016.
The survey not only addressed possible reasons for the gender gap but also aimed
at helping to better understand how to make the R community a more inclusive
environment in general. It therefore also contained questions on other diversity
aspects, such as ethnicity and sexual orientation. 458 of the 899 attendees of
the useR! conference answered to the survey, out of whom 33% identified as
women. The talk gives an overview of the main descriptive results of the
questionnaire, that was analyzed in a cooperation between the Task Force and our
team, and discusses possible implications for future work of the Task Force.