The transcript appears to support Summers' contention that he was discussing how, in the general population, men are more likely to have science and math test scores in the highest and lowest ranges, while women's scores are more clustered in the middle.
But in explaining why fewer women scientists rise to the top, Summers said he was inclined to favor family pressure and biology as explanations over discrimination and social factors.
In his January 14 remarks, Summers repeatedly emphasized that he was "guessing," attempting to provoke and hoped to be proved wrong.
"So my best guess, to provoke you, of what's behind all this is that the largest phenomenon, by far, is the general clash between people's legitimate family desires and employers' current desire for high power and high intensity," Summers said at a National Bureau of Economic Research conference in Cambridge.
"In the special case of science and engineering, there are issues of intrinsic aptitude, and particularly of the variability of aptitude, and that those considerations are reinforced by what are in fact lesser factors involving socialization and continuing discrimination," he said.
