Young girls are less likely to think they’re “really, really smart” compared to their male counterparts as early as the age of 6, according to a new study released Thursday. The paper, published in the journal Science, sheds new light on girls’ ability to defy stereotypes about fields traditionally dominated by men, particularly careers in math and the sciences, researchers say. Lin Bian, a doctoral student at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign and a lead researcher behind the project, said the results show an urgent need to intervene in children’s education “as early as possible” before gendered notions about what girls and boys can accomplish set in.

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