Gender differences in higher education from a life course perspective : Transitions and social inequality between enrolment and first post-doc position
Autor/in:
Lörz, Markus; Mühleck, Kai
Quelle: High Educ (Higher Education), 77 (2019) 3, S 381–402
Inhalt: In the last decades, a vast number of post-industrialised economies have experienced a growing participation of women in higher education. However, men and women still differ with regard to their subsequent academic careers and labour market prospects. While several studies have disentangled the cumulative process of gender inequalities along the path to higher education, few studies cover two or more subsequent transitions in the academic career following graduation from upper-secondary education. We have investigated gender differences at five educational stages between graduation from upper-secondary education and the first post-doc position. To explain gender differences, we have integrated arguments of individual decision-making and educational, familial and work context conditions. This life course perspective leads us to propose several hypotheses on why the academic careers of men and women would differ in terms of transitions to the next education stage and graduation. We test our hypotheses using a longitudinal dataset which covers a large part of individual educational and academic careers of a cohort of students, beginning at the age of 20 years and extending up to the age of 40 years. Our results show that gender differences are more pronounced at the beginning of the academic career and tend to fade out at later stages. In particular, gender differences occur most strongly at transitions to the next educational stage rather than being caused by different graduation rates. These differences can be explained only to a very minor extent by performance. Separated analysis shows that men and women differ in their reasons to start or stop an academic career, with family circumstances in particular having different consequences.
The role of women scholars in the Chilean collaborative educational research : A social network analysis
Autor/in:
Queupil, Juan Pablo; Muñoz García, Ana Luisa
Quelle: High Educ (Higher Education), 78 (2019) 1, S 115–131
Inhalt: Collaboration is an indispensable tool to promote and increase research. However, little is known about the role of women in collaborative efforts among educational scholars, especially in developing countries, such as Chile. We apply social network analysis (SNA) to examine the relationships and patterns that emerge from a dataset retrieved from Web of Science (WoS) of coauthored scholarly publications. Using sociograms and networks’ centrality indicators (density, degree, betweenness, and closeness) and bibliometric results, this study focuses on detecting the role of women in the collaborative networks. Our results show that the presence of women in the research space is stable across time, but they tend to collaborate more than men, acting as important bridgers since 2000, and that their contribution is relevant in promoting networking. This paper invites a reflection about the policies of research and gender, as well as the positionality of women doing knowledge on education.
Quelle: High Educ (Higher Education), 77 (2019) 3, S 541–559
Inhalt: The article examines the mid-term occupational outcomes of two cohorts of PhDs graduated in 2004 and 2008 in Italy. This comparison allows the authors to explore changing PhD’s occupational prospects after recent academic reforms (e.g. cuts to public funding, introduction of fixed-term positions for assistant professors) and the economic crisis. Population data from the ‘Istat Survey on the Occupational Outcomes of PhD graduates’ is used to analyse PhD’s employability, international mobility, type of contract and occupation 5 years after obtaining a doctoral degree. Empirical results show that academic reforms and the economic crisis coincided with decreasing employment in academia and increasing chances of having a fixed-term contract, being employed abroad and working in research-related occupations outside academia. Moreover, PhD graduates from hard disciplines, such as engineering, are generally better off compared to PhD graduates in soft fields, such as sociology. Finally, the results suggest that the academic reforms reduced the chances to work in academia more in soft rather than in hard academic disciplines.
Selecting early-career researchers : The influence of discourses of internationalisation and excellence on formal and applied selection criteria in academia
Autor/in:
Herschberg, Channah; Benschop, Yvonne; van den Brink, Marieke
Quelle: High Educ (Higher Education), 4 (2018) 2, 61 S
Inhalt: This article examines how macro-discourses of internationalisation and excellence shape formal and applied selection criteria for early-career researcher positions at the meso-organisational and micro-individual levels, demonstrating how tensions between the various levels produce inequalities in staff evaluation. In this way, this article contributes to the literature on academic staff evaluation by showing that Selection Committee members do not operate in a vacuum, and that their actions are inextricably linked to the meso- and macro-context. This study draws on qualitative multi-level data that comprise institutional-level policies, recruitment and staff protocols, job postings and individual-level interviews and focus groups with Selection Committee members. Findings show that a majority of Selection Committee members consent to university policies and macro-discourses when evaluating early-career researchers, but a smaller group questions and resists these criteria. Furthermore, the analysis revealed four inequalities that emerge in the application of criteria and reflect on disciplinary differences between the Natural and Social Sciences. The article concludes that with only a few Committee members to critically question and resist formal selection criteria, they limit the pool of acceptable candidates to those who fit the narrow definition of the internationally mobile and excellent early-career researcher, which may exclude talented scholars.
Gender differences in higher education from a life course perspective : Transitions and social inequality between enrolment and first post-doc position
Autor/in:
Lörz, Markus; Mühleck, Kai
Quelle: High Educ (Higher Education), 62 (2018) 3, 151 S
Inhalt: In the last decades, a vast number of post-industrialised economies have experienced a growing participation of women in higher education. However, men and women still differ with regard to their subsequent academic careers and labour market prospects. While several studies have disentangled the cumulative process of gender inequalities along the path to higher education, few studies cover two or more subsequent transitions in the academic career following graduation from upper-secondary education. We have investigated gender differences at five educational stages between graduation from upper-secondary education and the first post-doc position. To explain gender differences, we have integrated arguments of individual decision-making and educational, familial and work context conditions. This life course perspective leads us to propose several hypotheses on why the academic careers of men and women would differ in terms of transitions to the next education stage and graduation. We test our hypotheses using a longitudinal dataset which covers a large part of individual educational and academic careers of a cohort of students, beginning at the age of 20 years and extending up to the age of 40 years. Our results show that gender differences are more pronounced at the beginning of the academic career and tend to fade out at later stages. In particular, gender differences occur most strongly at transitions to the next educational stage rather than being caused by different graduation rates. These differences can be explained only to a very minor extent by performance. Separated analysis shows that men and women differ in their reasons to start or stop an academic career, with family circumstances in particular having different consequences.
What makes them leave? : A path model of postdocs’ intentions to leave academia
Autor/in:
Dorenkamp, Isabelle; Weiß, Eva-Ellen
Quelle: High Educ (Higher Education), 44 (2017) 3, 634 S
Inhalt: A growing number of postdoctoral academics cite stressful working conditions for considering abandoning their studies and leaving the academic profession entirely before they obtain a tenured position. This paper identifies the mechanisms by which work stress influences postdocs’ intentions to leave academia. Based on Schaubroeck et al.’s (1989) stress-turnover-intention model, we propose a professional turnover-intention model that includes both the effort-reward imbalance model as a comprehensive measure of work stress and affective professional commitment. The research model is tested using structural equation modeling (SEM) and data from 421 postdocs. The results show significant support for the hypothesized effects. In particular, a three-path-mediated effect is found from work stress to the intention to leave academia via strain and job satisfaction. Additional analyses reveal significant gender differences: The relationship between overcommitment and strain is stronger for female postdocs than it is for male postdocs, and the direct link between work stress and the intention to leave academia applies only to female postdocs. Further, job satisfaction fully mediates the relationship between affective professional commitment and the intention to leave academia. Thus, we provide a model on an academics’ professional turnover intention that goes beyond previous research by incorporating two important mediators, strain and job satisfaction. We also confirm the relevance of affective professional commitment to professional turnover intentions in the realm of academia. Specific policy recommendations for retaining more postdocs in academia are given.
Academic careers and the valuation of academics. A discursive perspective on status categories and academic salaries in France as compared to the U.S., Germany and Great Britain
Autor/in:
Angermuller, Johannes
Quelle: High Educ (Higher Education), 73 (2017) 6, S 963–980
Inhalt: Academic careers are social processes which involve many members of large populations over long periods of time. This paper outlines a discursive perspective which looks into how academics are categorized in academic systems. From a discursive view, academic careers are organized by categories which can define who academics are (subjectivation) and what they are worth (valuation). The question of this paper is what institutional categorizations such as status and salaries can tell us about academic subject positions and their valuation. By comparing formal status systems and salary scales in France with those in the U.S., Great Britain and Germany, this paper reveals the constraints of institutional categorization systems on academic careers. Special attention is given to the French system of status categories which is relatively homogeneous and restricts the competitive valuation of academics between institutions. The comparison shows that academic systems such as the U.S. which are characterized by a high level of heterogeneity typically present more negotiation opportunities for the valuation of academics. From a discursive perspective, institutional categories, therefore, can reflect the ways in which academics are valuated in the inter-institutional job market, by national bureaucracies or in professional oligarchies.