Men have dominated the STEM fields — science, technology, engineering and mathematics.

According to the most recent data available, although women earn the majority of bachelor’s degrees in the U.S., they make up a tiny proportion of computer science, engineering, physical science and mathematics degrees. Ladies are snubbed in Silicon Valley. They’re belittled as researchers, engineers, physicists and mathematicians.

There’s a thousand different theories on why this might be. One novel hypothesis has begun garnering scientific attention, though — that men master physics at an younger age because they learn “projection” while peeing.

According to research published in the Times Educational Supplement, boys gain an early advantage over girls in physics because they pee standing up, cultivating a natural insight into projectile motion.

“[We] have observed the great delight young males take in urination, a process by which they produce and direct a visible projectile arc,” the researchers claim.

They cite as examples — pee games, in which boys aim to hit floating targets with their streams; YouTube tutorials about how to write your name in the snow with your pee; literal pissing contests in which the furthest, highest and most precisely aimed stream wins; and the post-game celebration pee antics of sports players.

“All this is experienced up to five times a day, so by 14, boys have had the opportunity to play with projectile motion around 10,000 times,” the researchers estimate.

The article’s analysis first found that women generally perform worse than men on physics tests. Women fell especially short on topics like projectile motion, in which objects are thrown, kicked or fired. In the study, only one-third of girls could correctly answer projectile motion questions, compared with two-thirds of boys.

The researchers see this as problematic. In standard physics curricula, projectile motion builds a basis for more complex mechanics concepts, such as force, energy and momentum. If women can’t play with a fleshy pee-pole, their understanding of these scientific dynamics could be doomed.

“This self-directed, hands-on, intrinsically (and sometimes extrinsically, and socially) rewarding activity must have a huge potential contribution to learning, resulting in a deep, embodied, material knowledge of projectile motion that’s simply not accessible to girls,” the researchers say. “There is no simple way to provide girls with the same opportunities for exploring projectile motion that boys have in playing with pee.“

However, their analysis concludes, it’s possible to take a step in the right direction. Structuring the school physics syllabus differently, beginning with subjects other than projectile motion, can keep girls from immediately becoming discouraged.

After all, you shouldn’t have to piss standing up to become a science whiz.