Heeding the call of science: What leads PhD graduates to pursue an academic career?

Abstract

The academic workplace has undergone substantial changes over the past decades. However, the implications of these developments for the career choices of junior scientists, i.e., PhD graduates, are largely unexplored. In this study, we build on the basic premises of social cognitive career theory (SCCT) to investigate the personality-related, behavioral, and environmental factors that lead individuals to pursue an academic career. Using panel data from a cohort of PhD students who graduated in the 2014 academic year in Germany, we find that factors from these three categories influence PhD graduates’ career decisions, although some factors do not (or do not only) have a direct influence, but interact with the other factors. Our results show that PhD graduates’ involvement in research collaborations and their level of intrinsic motivation are the most important factors influencing their decisions to stay in academia, and that the former strengthens the influence of the latter. Our findings may encourage researchers to further investigate the applicability of SCCT to PhD graduates’ decisions to choose an academic career.