From space to social media: How female and male NASA astronauts promote women's participation in STEM on Facebook

Research paid increasing attention to women's participation in STEM. Despite several initiatives promoting women's participation in the aerospace industry, women still constitute a minority among astronauts. This exploratory paper investigates how astronauts - as STEM role models - discuss women's participation in STEM through their Facebook communication. We quantitatively and qualitatively examined a subset of 293 posts about women and STEM by a sample of 16 NASA astronauts between 2018 and 2022. Results highlight that while male and female astronauts acknowledge and support women in STEM, they do so in different ways and narratives. Both male and female astronauts perceive science as a universal good.