Echoes of the past: gender differences in perceiving past temporal focus in innovation funding

Evaluators, tasked with making funding decisions under conditions of incomplete information and uncertainty, are particularly susceptible to the influence of temporality and gender expectations. Drawing on the literature on signaling theory and gender expectations, this research examines the importance of past temporal focus in determining innovation funding decisions. Our empirical evidence suggests that innovation projects that focus on past events are more likely to receive favorable evaluations as past temporal focus signals better learning capacity among innovators. Moreover, we build on the signal credibility and visibility literature to support the notion that female-dominated presenting teams that emphasize past actions receive higher evaluations because the learning capacity signal is deemed more credible for women and female evaluators are more reactive to past-related signals, leading to higher evaluations for innovations with a past-focused narrative. Our study contributes to the literature on temporal focus and signal effectiveness and provides implications for mitigating the gender gap in accessing funding through temporal rhetoric.