How to protect your emotional wellbeing

In 2017, a paper in European Physical Journal C gained attention because of its acknowledgments. There, author Oliver Rosten had written a heartfelt note about deceased colleague, Francis Dolan. Rosten noted the high-pressure postdoc environment was one of the reasons behind Dolan’s suicide in 2011. The paper put a spotlight on the stress all researchers – including PhD students and professors – face daily in laboratories.

‘Faculty are expected to do more and more with less and less support,’ says Jeff Hester, a former astrophysics professor at Arizona State University, US, who is now an executive coach. In a typical institution, a scientist is expected to not only conduct cutting-edge research, but also mentor postdocs, hire staff, write grant applications, deliver talks at conferences and serve on national committees. ‘They don’t have the background or experience for most of that,’ says Hester. ‘How do faculty respond? Typically by sacrificing themselves in a never-ending effort to do a job that it is impossible to do to their own exacting standards.’

This lifestyle can take a toll on emotional health and wellbeing, particularly when combined with conscious and unconscious biases, contributing to anxiety and depression. It may even force some to quit academia altogether. And while it can be difficult to address many institutional problems directly, there are ways to address vulnerabilities at work.