TY - JOUR
T1 - Phdepression
T2 - Examining how graduate research and teaching affect depression in life sciences phd students
AU - Gin, Logan E.
AU - Wiesenthal, Nicholas J.
AU - Ferreira, Isabella
AU - Cooper, Katelyn M.
N1 - Funding Information:
We are incredibly grateful to the 50 graduate students who were willing to share their personal experiences with us. We thank Sara Brownell, Tasneem Mohammed, Carly Busch, Mad-die Ostwald, Lauren Neel, and Rachel Scott for their helpful feedback on earlier drafts of this work. L.E.G. was supported by an NSF Graduate Fellowship (DGE-1311230). Any opinions, findings, conclusions, or recommendations expressed in this material are those of the authors and do not necessarily reflect the views of the NSF.
Publisher Copyright:
© 2021 L. E. Gin, N. J. Wiesenthal, et al. CBE—Life Sciences Education.
PY - 2021/9/1
Y1 - 2021/9/1
N2 - Graduate students are more than six times as likely to experience depression compared with the general population. However, few studies have examined how graduate school specifically affects depression. In this qualitative interview study of 50 life sciences PhD students from 28 institutions, we examined how research and teaching affect depression in PhD students and how depression in turn affects students’ experiences teaching and researching. Using inductive coding, we identified factors that either positively or negatively affected student depression. Graduate students more commonly mentioned factors related to research that negatively affected their depression and factors related to teaching that positively affected their depression. We identified four overarching aspects of graduate school that influenced student depression: the amount of structure in teaching and research, positive and negative reinforcement, success and failure, and social support and isolation. Graduate students reported that depression had an exclusively negative effect on their research, primarily hindering their motivation and self-confidence, but that it helped them to be more compassionate teachers. This work pinpoints specific aspects of graduate school that PhD programs can target to improve mental health among life sciences graduate students.
AB - Graduate students are more than six times as likely to experience depression compared with the general population. However, few studies have examined how graduate school specifically affects depression. In this qualitative interview study of 50 life sciences PhD students from 28 institutions, we examined how research and teaching affect depression in PhD students and how depression in turn affects students’ experiences teaching and researching. Using inductive coding, we identified factors that either positively or negatively affected student depression. Graduate students more commonly mentioned factors related to research that negatively affected their depression and factors related to teaching that positively affected their depression. We identified four overarching aspects of graduate school that influenced student depression: the amount of structure in teaching and research, positive and negative reinforcement, success and failure, and social support and isolation. Graduate students reported that depression had an exclusively negative effect on their research, primarily hindering their motivation and self-confidence, but that it helped them to be more compassionate teachers. This work pinpoints specific aspects of graduate school that PhD programs can target to improve mental health among life sciences graduate students.
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U2 - 10.1187/cbe.21-03-0077
DO - 10.1187/cbe.21-03-0077
M3 - Article
C2 - 34309412
AN - SCOPUS:85111933207
SN - 1931-7913
VL - 20
JO - CBE life sciences education
JF - CBE life sciences education
IS - 3
M1 - ar41
ER -