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Academic career intentions in the life sciences: Can research self-efficacy beliefs explain low numbers of aspiring physician and female scientists?

ABSTRACT: A lack of physician scientists as well as a high female dropout rate from academic medicine and basic life sciences is a concern in many countries. The current study analyzes academic career intentions within a sample of recent doctoral graduates from medicine and basic life sciences (N = 1109), focusing on research self-efficacy beliefs as explanatory variable of gender and disciplinary differences. To ensure that differences in research self-efficacy could not be attributed solely to objective scientific performance, we controlled for number of publications and dissertation grade. The results of multivariate analyses pointed to a strong and significant association between research self-efficacy and academic career intentions (ß = 0.49, p<0.001). The lower academic career intentions of medical doctoral graduates were no longer significant when controlling for research self-efficacy. Within the field of medicine, female doctoral graduates expressed lower research self-efficacy beliefs and academic career intentions. When controlling for research self-efficacy, the correlation between gender and academic career intention was no longer significant. In contrast, no gender differences were found within the basic life sciences with respect to neither academic career intentions nor research self-efficacy.

SUBMITTER: Epstein N

PROVIDER: S-EPMC5598975 | biostudies-literature | 2017

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature

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Academic career intentions in the life sciences: Can research self-efficacy beliefs explain low numbers of aspiring physician and female scientists?

Epstein Nurith N Fischer Martin R MR

PloS one 20170914 9

A lack of physician scientists as well as a high female dropout rate from academic medicine and basic life sciences is a concern in many countries. The current study analyzes academic career intentions within a sample of recent doctoral graduates from medicine and basic life sciences (N = 1109), focusing on research self-efficacy beliefs as explanatory variable of gender and disciplinary differences. To ensure that differences in research self-efficacy could not be attributed solely to objective ...[more]

PMID: 28910334

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Project description:Early research on the impact of COVID-19 on academic scientists suggests that disruptions to research, teaching, and daily work life are not experienced equally. However, this work has overwhelmingly focused on experiences of women and parents, with limited attention to the disproportionate impact on academic work by race, disability status, sexual identity, first-generation status, and academic career stage. Using a stratified random survey sample of early-career academics in four science disciplines (N = 3,277), we investigated socio-demographic and career stage differences in the effect of the COVID-19 pandemic along seven work outcomes: changes in four work areas (research progress, workload, concern about career advancement, support from mentors) and work disruptions due to three COVID-19 related life challenges (physical health, mental health, and caretaking). Our analyses examined patterns across career stages as well as separately for doctoral students and for postdocs/assistant professors. Overall, our results indicate that scientists from marginalized (i.e., devalued) and minoritized (i.e., underrepresented) groups across early career stages reported more negative work outcomes as a result of COVID-19. However, there were notable patterns of differences depending on the socio-demographic identities examined. Those with a physical or mental disability were negatively impacted on all seven work outcomes. Women, primary caregivers, underrepresented racial minorities, sexual minorities, and first-generation scholars reported more negative experiences across several outcomes such as increased disruptions due to physical health symptoms and additional caretaking compared to more privileged counterparts. Doctoral students reported more work disruptions from life challenges than other early-career scholars, especially those related to health problems, while assistant professors reported more negative changes in areas such as decreased research progress and increased workload. These findings suggest that the COVID-19 pandemic has disproportionately harmed work outcomes for minoritized and marginalized early-career scholars. Institutional interventions are required to address these inequalities in an effort to retain diverse cohorts in academic science.

Dataset Information

Academic career intentions in the life sciences: Can research self-efficacy beliefs explain low numbers of aspiring physician and female scientists?

Publications

Academic career intentions in the life sciences: Can research self-efficacy beliefs explain low numbers of aspiring physician and female scientists?

Similar Datasets

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