How human capital, universities of excellence, third party funding, mobility and gender explain productivity in German political science
Autor/in:
Habicht, Isabel M.; Lutter, Mark; Schröder, Martin
Quelle: Scientometrics (Scientometrics), (2021) , S 1–27
Inhalt: Using a unique panel dataset of virtually all German academic political scientists, we show that researchers become much more productive due to the accumulation of human capital and third party funding. We also show however, that while universities of excellence have more productive researchers, individuals who go there do not become more productive. Finally, we show how women publish only 9 percent less than men with the same level of prior publication experience, but are about 26 percent less productive over their entire career, as early productivity leads to later productivity, so that women increasingly fall behind. These results cannot be explained through the influence of childbearing. Rather, they support the ‘theory of limited differences’, which argues that small differences in early productivity accumulate to large differences over entire careers, as early success encourages later success. Apart from generally showing why political scientists publish more or less, we specifically identify accumulative advantage as the principal reason why women increasingly fall behind men over the course of their careers.
Hier zeigen wir, dass Wissenschaftlerinnen und Wissenschaftler an Exzellenzuniversitäten produktiver sind („Bestenauslese“). Doch dieselbe Wissenschaftlerin / Wissenschaftler wird nicht produktiver, weil man dort hin geht. Die wichtigsten Prädiktoren späterer Produktivität sind vorherige Produktivität und Drittmitteleinwerbungen. Dass Frauen weniger publizieren, können wir nicht darauf zurückführen, dass sie seltener auf höhere Karrierestufen kommen („leaky pipeline“), sondern vielmehr auf geringere Publikationserfahrung zu Beginn ihrer akademischen Laufbahn. Frauen publizieren also anfangs weniger, und da frühe Publikationserfahrung zu mehr Produktivität führt, wird der Abstand zu Männern im Verlaufe einer Karriere immer größer. Dies wiederum kann man nicht damit erklären, dass Kinder die Produktivität von Frauen stärker senken als von Männern.
Schlagwörter:academic career; Bestenauswahl; Drittmittel; Exzellenzinitiative; Forschungsförderung; funding; German higher education system; Geschlechterunterschied; human capital; Humankapital; political science; Produktivität; publication; Publikationsverhalten; wissenschaftliche Karriere
CEWS Kategorie:Berufsbiographie und Karriere, Wissenschaft als Beruf, Geschlechterverhältnis
Quelle: Journal of Further and Higher Education, (2021) , S 1–14
Inhalt: The transition of early career researchers into academic posts is understood to be a crucial career step and marks a point at which representation of women declines significantly. The research adopts a participatory qualitative research methodology through career narrative interviews and group discussions with women engineers recently appointed into academic posts. It was found that academic careers are ‘hoped for’, but not described as a straightforward option in terms of either securing tenure or future career development. The collective career paths outlined were rarely linear and featured key moments of crisis and self-doubt, culminating in ‘tentative’ career identity formation in the face of gendered career structures. There is evidence of a pre-emptive and continuing uncertainty about the feasibility of an academic career that begins years before embarking on a PhD. The distinctive contribution of the study is the consideration of gendered early processes of forming an academic identity and ongoing collective experiences of becoming an academic.
Schlagwörter:akademische Karriere; early career researchers; Gender; Ingenieurwissenschaft; soziale Konstruktion; transition; Übergangsphase; wissenschaftlicher Nachwuchs
CEWS Kategorie:Berufsbiographie und Karriere, Naturwissenschaft und Technik, Wissenschaft als Beruf, Geschlechterverhältnis
Do Women Shy Away from Public Speaking? : A Field Experiment
Autor/in:
Paola, Maria de; Lombardo, Rosetta; Pupo, Valeria; Scoppa, Vincenzo
Quelle: Labour Economics, 70 (2021)
Inhalt: “Public speaking is an important skill for career prospects and for leadership positions, but many people tend to avoid it. We run a field experiment to analyze whether in an incentivized setting men and women show differences in their willingness to speak in public. The experiment involved more than 500 undergraduates who could gain two points to add to the final grade of their exam by presenting solutions to a set problem orally. Students were randomly assigned to give a presentation to the instructor only or in front of a large audience (a class of 100 or more). We find that while women are more willing to do a face-to-face presentation, they are considerably less likely to give a public presentation. We show that female aversion to public speaking does not depend on differences in ability or other psychological attitudes. Such an aversion seems considerably less marked for daughters of working women. The aversion to public speaking cannot be interpreted as strategic avoidance deriving from women anticipating their poor performance in this specific task. From survey data we also show that neither increasing the gains deriving from public speaking nor allowing participants more time to prepare lessens the gender gap.”
Schlagwörter:female; gender difference; leadership; public speaking; soft skill
Drehtür-Effekt im deutschen Hochschulsystem? : Bildungswege nach dem Abbruch geschlechtsatypischer Studiengänge
Autor/in:
Meyer, Jasmin; Mantinger, Mara
Quelle: Soziale Welt, 72 (2021) 1, S 27–54
Inhalt: Die bisherige Forschung zeigt, dass Studierende in geschlechtsatypischen Studiengängen ihr Studium häufiger vorzeitig beenden als Studierende in geschlechtstypischen oder -neutralen Studiengängen. Ungeklärt ist bisher, ob sie nach dem Verlassen dieser Studiengänge auch das geschlechtsatypische Bildungsumfeld an sich verlassen und welche Mechanismen diese Entscheidung erklären. Die empirische Analyse dieser Frage erfolgt auf Grundlage der Exmatrikuliertenbefragung des Deutschen Zentrums für Hochschul- und Wissenschaftsforschung (DZHW) der Jahre 2014 und 2017. Dabei zeigt sich, dass die Mehrheit der Studierenden nach dem Abbruch eines geschlechtsatypischen Studiengangs das geschlechtsatypische Bildungsumfeld verlässt. Bei Frauen bewirken insbesondere Zweifel an ihrer Eignung für das jeweilige Studienfach, dass sie einen geschlechtstypischen oder -neutralen Bildungsweg einem geschlechtsatypischen vorziehen. Jene Frauen, denen das gesellschaftliche Ansehen wichtig ist, verbleiben hingegen eher im geschlechtsatypischen Umfeld. Bei Männern können die untersuchten Faktoren nicht erklären, warum auch sie nach dem Abbruch eines geschlechtsatypischen Studiengangs mehrheitlich den geschlechtsatypischen Bildungsweg verlassen.
International Mobility and Social Capital in the Academic Field
Autor/in:
Bauder, Harald
Quelle: Minerva, 58 (2020) 3, S 367–387
Inhalt: The relationship between the international mobility of academic researchers and social capital is complex. On the one hand, the literature suggests that social capital facilitates the international mobility of academics which, in turn, promotes the accumulation of international social capital, enhances research productivity, and advances careers. On the other hand, international mobility can isolate researchers from the national social capital in their origin countries. In this paper, I present the results of 42 interviews in Canada and Germany to examine how academics in both countries have experienced the connection between international mobility and social capital. In addition to revealing the complexity of this connection, the results show that social capital facilitates international mobility and that mobility sometimes creates social capital. However, mobility can also lead to the loss of national social capital that negatively affects early-career researchers in particular.
Schlagwörter:academic career; Canada; Deutschland; early career researcher; Feldtheorie; international academic mobility; Interview; Kanada; Mobilität; scientific career; social capital; soziales Kapital; wissenschaftlicher Nachwuchs
CEWS Kategorie:Berufsbiographie und Karriere, Europa und Internationales, Wissenschaft als Beruf
Quelle: Gender and Education, 32 (2020) 1, S 11–26
Inhalt: Drawing on data collected in a cross-disciplinary survey of early-career academics (ECAs) in New Zealand, this article explores the factors influencing ECA conference attendance. Our conceptual framework uses conference attendance as the dependent variable and measures gender, ethnicity, family responsibilities and workload. Three key features affect conference attendance: "demographic characteristics" (background features and prior experiences that affect an academic's willingness and ability to attend), "accessibility" (constraints to attending, such as financing, family responsibilities, institutional support or teaching commitments) and "purpose" (the value placed on attending conferences by the individual, the institution, or the discipline). In particular, we identify differences for women, Indigenous people, and those born overseas with respect to their ability to navigate and their inclination to attend national and international conferences.
Schlagwörter:conference culture; early career researcher; ethnic minority; gender inequality; Konferenz; Neuseeland; wissenschaftlicher Nachwuchs
CEWS Kategorie:Berufsbiographie und Karriere, Diversity, Wissenschaft als Beruf, Geschlechterverhältnis
Autor/in:
Dworkin, Jordan D.; Zurn, Perry; Bassett, Danielle S.
Quelle: Neuron, 106 (2020) 6, S 890–894
Inhalt: Reference lists of neuroscience articles show marked gender imbalances. To mitigate this disparity, we discuss relevant ethical considerations and offer practical recommendations to scientists of all ages. We envision an equitable future by all scientists for all scientists.
Schlagwörter:citation; citation gap; gender bias; publication pattern; science career
CEWS Kategorie:Berufsbiographie und Karriere, Wissenschaftspolitik, Geschlechterverhältnis
Inhalt: Women's underrepresentation in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) impedes progress in solving Africa's complex development problems. As in other regions, women's participation in STEM drops progressively moving up the education and career ladder, with women currently constituting 30% of Africa's STEM researchers. This study elucidates gender-based differences in PhD performance using new survey data from 227 alumni of STEM PhD programs in 17 African countries. We find that, compared to their male counterparts, sampled women had about one less paper accepted for publication during their doctoral studies and took about half a year longer to finish their PhD training. Negative binomial regression models provide insights on the observed differences in women's and men's PhD performance. Results indicate that the correlates of publication productivity and time to PhD completion are very similar for women and men, but some gender-based differences are observed. For publication output, we find that good supervision had a stronger impact for men than women; and getting married during the PhD reduced women's publication productivity but increased that of men. Becoming a parent during the PhD training was a key reason that women took longer to complete the PhD, according to our results. Findings suggest that having a female supervisor, attending an institution with gender policies in place, and pursuing the PhD in a department where sexual harassment by faculty was perceived as uncommon were enabling factors for women's timely completion of their doctoral studies. Two priority interventions emerge from this study: (1) family-friendly policies and facilities that are supportive of women's roles as wives and mothers and (2) fostering broader linkages and networks for women in STEM, including ensuring mentoring and supervisory support that is tailored to their specific needs and circumstances.
The Covid-19 crisis as a career shock: Implications for careers and vocational behavior
Autor/in:
Akkermans, Jos; Richardson, Julia; Kraimer, Maria L.
Quelle: Journal of Vocational Behavior, 119 (2020) , 103434 S
Inhalt: The covid-19 pandemic is a career shock for many people across the globe. In this article, we reflect on how insights from the literature on career shocks can help us understand the career consequences of the pandemic and offer suggestions for future research in this area. In particular, we offer three "key lessons". The first lesson is that the implications of Covid-19 reflect the dynamic interplay between individual and contextual factors. Here, we argue that although the pandemic was difficult to predict and control, research shows that certain psychological resources - such as career competencies and resilience - could make this career shock more manageable. The second lesson is that the pandemic may have differential implications over time, as suggested by research that has shown the consequences of career shocks to differ between short-term vs. long-term time horizons, and across life- and career stages. The third lesson is that, even though the pandemic is clearly a negatively valenced shock for most people, further into the future it may allow for more positive outcomes. This lesson builds on research showing how negative career shocks have long-term positive consequences for some people. We hope that these insights will inspire both scholars and practitioners to study and understand the work and career implications of Covid-19 as a career shock, as well as to support people in dealing with its consequences.
Everyday sexism and racism in the ivory tower: The experiences of early career researchers on the intersection of gender and ethnicity in the academic workplace
Autor/in:
Bourabain, Dounia
Quelle: Gend Work Organ (Gender, Work and Organization), (2020)
Inhalt: The academic workplace is often described as a place of merit and equal opportunities. However, research shows a leaky pipeline where the share of women and people of color decreases in the higher echelons of academia. Explanations are often structural, referring to the access barriers women are confronted with, such as hiring and recruitment. This research investigates what goes wrong in the early phases of a female academic's career. From an intersectional perspective, I study the experiences with everyday sexism and racism of PhD and postdoctoral researchers across disciplines. After conducting 50 in‐depth interviews, four processes are discovered: smokescreen of equality, everyday cloning, patronization, and paternalism.