Hello everyone,
Once again, I struggled to think about what I wanted to write about. At first, I wanted to talk about the connection between learning a second language and whether it increases your ability to learn, retain information, and in general, become a smarter individual. However, after thinking about it while in a car yesterday, I realized that I don't have enough experience or knowledge about a second language to write about this. Instead, my mind changed focus to a topic I have been thinking about ever since I started looking for post-doctorate openings for late 2021. Should a PhD student be critically judged if they have not published any papers before graduation? This question brought me to a phrase I found while searching for answers online, "Publish or Perish". I found this phrase interesting because it appeared in blog posts, journals, news articles, and grad student forums. All talked about the same thing, should grad students have a mandate to publish papers in order to secure academic jobs after graduation?
Publication Mandate
In academia, credibility is built through the hard work you put into your research, the methods you use, develop or improve to obtain data, and how you present yourself to the community through conference abstracts and journal publications. In our undergraduate, we were taught that the more publications you had on your CV the more likely you were to find an academic position after your PhD. In general this is true, but it should not happen in cost of ignoring other skill sets that might be more beneficial and your mental health. "Publish or Perish". A phrase that does not go over lightly with graduate students who attend an institution where you strongly encouraged to publish before graduation or else risk not getting a job in academia. I am fortunate to not attend one of those institutions, and I can see the arguments on both sides for and against mandate publishing. The side for mandate publications is to show that the students are capable of seeing a project to the end and communicating their findings to the research community they are associated with. Administrators see the publication mandate as a way to encourage early-career scholars to conduct cutting-edge research and attract the attention of professors who have large research grants and reputations. In the sciences, publishing has become the norm for PhD students, and majority of journals accept graduate students as lead authors. Something I found surprising is that some philosophy journals have gate-keeping policies that prevent graduate students from being the lead-author on work. In 2017, J. David Velleman, a professor of philosophy at New York University, proposed two major policy changes: philosophy journals should refuse to publish work by graduate students and philosophy departments should discount graduate student work in tenure and promotion reviews. I was a little bit shocked when I read this quote. I mean, why should graduate student work be considered less credible or inferior to a tenure-professors work? Because they are younger? Their ideology might not be refined enough for their taste? I can understand tenure-professors saying graduate students do not have the experience we do in the field, but that does not mean they will not present work that is credible or even ground breaking. A favourite quote of mine from the same article is from Karen Kelsky, the academic career consultant and former tenured professor behind the blog The Professor Is In. She said, and I quote, "What the everlasting fuck is this nonsense?" She argues if the work is good it should be published. Why should journals say no to work that is good because it was researched and written by a graduate student?
I went on this tangent because I wanted to show an issue that would directly affect graduate students. If they run into these journal limitations and restrictions, how will they be able to publish in time? Will the university understand? Probably not. Their view is the students are not trying enough or are finding easy ways to make excuses.
If a student struggles to finish a project, how will they be able to take on a new one with a new supervisor, or head a project in the private sector. The problem with this is sometimes it is not so simple to finish your research and publish the results before graduation. What happens if there are funding issues? What if your supervisor puts you on numerous side-projects to encourage multiple publications but no end to finishing your thesis? What if the pressure of publishing forces you to degrade data quality and presentation to meet a deadline? I think the biggest question of all that the against publication mandate side argue is what happened to quality over quantity? Administrations, Deans, and some professors have become mind oriented to take someone who is able to publish research at a fast pace, instead of someone who can refine their research and make sure it is credible work and something worth publishing.
This brings me to another question, how fast should research be published during or after PhDs? You probably know someone that has plans to publish a paper every year. You probably feel intimidated, envious, and slight impostor syndrome when you talk to this person because maybe you haven't planned on publishing that frequently. Academia and research is a field that should not be thought of as a race. In school we always wanted to complete tests quickly because it made us appear very clever and knew all of the answers. This trait followed to research publications, because we think if we are quick then we must be a great scientist. This is a misconception. Rushing to publish results will not always lead to great science. People become so focused on getting their work out they don't stop to think if it is credible, accurate, reproducible, or even relevant to the field! Treating science publications as a race in the end leads to low-quality science. Now treating academia and publishing as a marathon will lead to more well-structured papers, thought out topics, and thoroughly analyzed data. It is not how fast you get to the finish line, it is how you finish. Some students want to publish every year of their PhD to prove they have earned their position. Others hold off their publications until near the end, or perhaps they wait until after graduation. In addition, what you should never do is compare yourself to others in your research group or program. If someone you know has published let us say three papers before their PhD defense, congratulate them. Do not think just because they published more than you before your defense that makes them a better scientist. Perhaps your one paper that requires more time to refine will have a bigger impact than their three.
What are your thoughts on this? Should publish or perish be a phrase that should be put to rest?
My Final Thoughts
I honestly do not believe publishing should hold a PhD student back and prevent them from finishing their thesis. I am not saying they should not be encouraged to publish their research, but I think they should not be punished and be denied graduation because of reasons they have no control over. Most graduate students, especially MSc students (at least ones I have known), write up their results into a manuscript and submit it to a peer-review journal after graduation. They no longer have the stress of courses and thesis completion so they can focus on writing about their work and presenting it in a simplified manner. Perhaps graduate students should be told during their time that there is no shame in publishing after graduation. That way the students feel less stress and anxiety if they are struggling to publish before graduation.
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