Survey Of Doctorate Recipients Research Articles

Mapping scientists’ career trajectories in the survey of doctorate recipients using three statistical methods

This paper investigates to what extent there is a ‘traditional’ career among individuals with a Ph.D. in a science, technology, engineering, or math (STEM) discipline. We use longitudinal data that follows the first 7–9 years of post-conferral employment among scientists who attained their degree in the U.S. between 2000 and 2008. We use three methods to identify a traditional career. The first two emphasize those most commonly observed, with two notions of commonality; the third compares the observed careers with archetypes defined by the academic pipeline. Our analysis includes the use of machine-learning methods to find patterns in careers; this paper is the first to use such methods in this setting. We find that if there is a modal, or traditional, science career, it is in non-academic employment. However, given the diversity of pathways observed, we offer the observation that traditional is a poor descriptor of science careers.

A User-Driven Method for Using Research Products to Empirically Assess Item Importance in National Surveys

Abstract Large-scale, nationally representative surveys serve many vital functions, but these surveys can be long and burdensome for respondents. Cutting survey length can help to reduce respondent burden and may improve data quality but removing items from these surveys is not a trivial matter. We propose a method to empirically assess item importance and associated burden in national surveys and guide this decision-making process using different research products produced from such surveys. This method is demonstrated using the Survey of Doctorate Recipients (SDR), a biennial survey administered to individuals with a science, engineering, and health doctorate. We used three main sources of information on the SDR variables: a bibliography of documents using the SDR data as a measure of item use and importance, SDR data table download statistics from the Scientists and Engineers Statistical Data System as an additional measure of item use, and web timing paradata and break-off rates as a measure of burden. Putting this information together, we identified 35 unused items (17% of the survey) and found that the most burdensome items are highly important. We conclude with general recommendations for those hoping to employ similar methodologies in the future.

Assessing Measurement Error in Hypothetical Questions

The hazard of asking survey participants hypothetical questions is that most often, responses are only an inferential vehicle for understanding preference and may not reflect the truth. Often it is necessary to make a reasoned assumption about the alignment of an individual's attitudes and behaviors. In this paper, we discuss results from a Survey of Doctorate Recipients (SDR) pilot study experiment that found significant response bias to hypothetical questions even when the hypothetical context was unambiguous and included salient properties which were familiar to respondents from prior experience. The experiment asked Treatment group participants to report their reaction to slight alterations in the SDR instrument; meanwhile, those in the Control group were asked hypothetically how they *would react* to the protocol if they had experienced the same changes. We identify the presence of response bias across 10 respondent experience questions using both categorical and quantitative methods. Our results show that the Control group consistently exhibited less preference for the hypothetical protocol than the Treatment group. We believe these differences are representative of the measurement error resulting from the poor correspondence between the Control group's hypothetical attitudes and the Treatment group's reported experience. This work shows that hypothetical bias is a concern in opinion research even when hypothetical conditions may be clearly understood by respondents and similar to their previous experiences.

Man versus machine? Self-reports versus algorithmic measurement of publications.

This paper uses newly available data from Web of Science on publications matched to researchers in Survey of Doctorate Recipients to compare the quality of scientific publication data collected by surveys versus algorithmic approaches. We illustrate the different types of measurement errors in self-reported and machine-generated data by estimating how publication measures from the two approaches are related to career outcomes (e.g., salaries and faculty rankings). We find that the potential biases in the self-reports are smaller relative to the algorithmic data. Moreover, the errors in the two approaches are quite intuitive: the measurement errors in algorithmic data are mainly due to the accuracy of matching, which primarily depends on the frequency of names and the data that was available to make matches, while the noise in self reports increases over the career as researchers’ publication records become more complex, harder to recall, and less immediately relevant for career progress. At a methodological level, we show how the approaches can be evaluated using accepted statistical methods without gold standard data. We also provide guidance on how to use the new linked data.

Postdoctoral research training and the attainment of faculty careers in social science and STEM fields in the United States

PurposeWhile postdoctoral research (postdoc) training is a common step toward academic careers in science, technology, engineering and mathematics (STEM) fields, the role of postdoc training in social sciences is less clear. An increasing number of social science PhDs are pursuing postdocs. This paper aims to identify factors associated with participation in postdoc training and examines the relationship between postdoc training and subsequent career outcomes, including attainment of tenure-track faculty positions and early career salaries.Design/methodology/approachUsing data from the National Science Foundation Survey of Earned Doctorates and Survey of Doctorate Recipients, this study applies propensity score matching, regression and decomposition analyses to identify the role of postdoc training on the employment outcomes of PhDs in the social science and STEM fields.FindingsResults from the regression analyses indicate that participation in postdoc training is associated with greater PhD research experience, higher departmental research ranking and departmental job placement norms. When the postdocs and non-postdocs groups are balanced on observable characteristics, postdoc training is associated with a higher likelihood of attaining tenure-track faculty positions 7 to 9 years after PhD completion. The salaries of social science tenure-track faculty with postdoc experience eventually surpass the salaries of non-postdoc PhDs, primarily via placement at institutions that offer relatively higher salaries. This pattern, however, does not apply to STEM PhDs.Originality/valueThis study leverages comprehensive, nationally representative data to investigate the role of postdoc training in the career outcomes of social sciences PhDs, in comparison to STEM PhDs. Research findings suggest that for social sciences PhDs interested in academic careers, postdoc training can contribute to the attainment of tenure-track faculty positions and toward earning relatively higher salaries over time. Research findings provide prospective and current PhDs with information helpful in career planning and decision-making. Academic institutions, administrators, faculty and stakeholders can apply these research findings toward developing programs and interventions to provide doctoral students with career guidance and greater career transparency.

SEER: A Graphical Tool for Multidimensional and Categorical Data

This paper introduces a visualization technique, SEER, devel oped for policy makers and researchers to graphically analyze and explore massive amounts of categorical data collected in longitudinal surveys. This technique (a) produces panels of graphs for multiple group analysis, where the groups do not have to be mutually exclusive, (b) profiles change pat terns observed in longitudinal data, and (c) clusters data into groups to enable policy makers or researchers to observe the factors associated with the changing patterns. This paper also includes the hash function, of the SEER method, expressed in matrix notation for it to be implemented across computer packages. The SEER technique is illustrated by using a national survey, the Survey of Doctorate Recipients (SDR), administered by the Na tional Science Foundation (NSF). Occupational changes and career paths for a panel sample of 14,901 doctorate recipients are profiled and discussed. Results indicated that doctorate recipients in some science and engineering fields are roughly two times more likely to work in an occupation when it is the discipline in which they received their doctorates.

Understanding Career Mobility of Professors: Does Foreign-Born Status Matter?

The purpose of this study was to seek to understand the mobility patterns of faculty members, with particular attention to foreign-born faculty members who work at 4-year colleges and universities in the United States. Examining data from the Survey of Doctorate Recipients, we looked at the mobility patterns of faculty members who held tenure-track faculty positions in 2003 and who responded to the survey again in 2013 (a 10-year time period). After examining different types of mobility, we found that the only significant difference was that, all things being equal, foreign-born faculty members were less likely to move into administration than U.S.-born faculty members. Foreign-born faculty members were no different from their U.S.-born counterparts in their mobility to other universities or to business/industry.

Earnings of foreign-born doctoral engineers in the United States: intersectionality of citizenship status and gender

Foreign-born scientists and engineers in the United States make significant contributions to their fields. While some studies of their career outcomes investigate the internal differences among immigrant scientists and engineers, there is little scholarly attention to how immigration status and gender work together in shaping their career outcomes. This study employs the intersectionality framework and uses National Science Foundation’s Survey of Doctorate Recipients 2008, 2010, 2013, 2015, and 2017 to examine how citizenship status and the intersection of citizenship status and gender affect earnings among engineers with doctoral degrees. Findings show that naturalized U.S. citizens do not earn less than comparable native-born citizens, but permanent residents and temporary residents do. In terms of intersectional effects, U.S.-born women experience an earnings disadvantage due to their gender, naturalized U.S. citizen women and permanent resident women face earnings disadvantages because of both citizenship status and gender, and temporary resident women earn less because of their citizenship status. The preceding findings persisted in the period of study with one exception. These findings reveal the internal variations among foreign-born engineers, intersectional effects of citizenship status and gender, and the complexity and persistence of these effects, suggesting the intersectional and enduring nature of inequality.

Naturalization and the productivity of foreign-born doctorates

This paper estimates the effect of obtaining US citizenship on individual-level measures of productivity for foreign-born doctoral recipients from US universities. Becoming a US citizen results in the removal of barriers such as access to public sector occupations and to some sources of government-sponsored research funding which are hypothesized to increase the productivity of foreign-born scientists. We utilize panel data from the Survey of Doctoral Recipients from 1993 to 2013 and individual fixed effects models to control for selection bias in the naturalization decision. Our results indicate that becoming a naturalized citizen increases wages and several measures of academic productivity. In support of our argument, we find that foreign-born workers who naturalize are more likely to utilize research funding from a government agency, but not more likely to work for the government post-naturalization.

Intergenerational Mobility at the Top of the Educational Distribution

Research has shown that intergenerational mobility is higher among individuals with a college degree than those with lower levels of schooling. However, mobility declines among graduate degree holders. This finding questions the meritocratic power of higher education. Prior research has been hampered, however, by the small samples of advanced degree holders in representative surveys. Drawing on a large longitudinal data set of PhD holders—the Survey of Doctorate Recipients—this study examines intergenerational mobility among the American educational elite, separately for men and women and different racial/ethnic groups. Results show substantial mobility among PhD holders. The association between parents’ education and adult children’s earnings is moderate among men and nonexistent among women with doctoral degrees. However, women’s earnings converge to an average level that is much lower than men’s, signaling ‘‘perverse openness’’ for women even at the top of the educational distribution. Among men, there is variation in mobility by race and ethnicity. The intergenerational socioeconomic association is null for Asian men, small for white and black men, and more pronounced for Hispanics. Educational and occupational mediators account for intergenerational association among blacks and whites but not Hispanic men. A doctoral degree largely detaches individuals from their social origins in the United States, but it does not eliminate all sources of inequality.

Professional societies and African American engineering leaders: Paving pathways and empowering legacies

Diversity and inclusion in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) fields is a global issue. The challenging issues facing the world relating to STEM diversity cross national borders and require leveraging the talents of diverse constituents.1Active international efforts at inclusive talent development are being undertaken to empower persons from groups historically underrepresented in STEM communities.2,3The US National Action Council for Minorities in Engineering (NACME) reports that in the United States, African Americans are one of the most underrepresented minority groups in engineering relative to their population. This is in spite of a great deal of progress in “growing African American scientists, engineers, and technologists since the Howard University School of Engineering opened in 1910.”4The number of African Americans in engineering at all degree levels is not representative of their percentage in the US population. Table I shows a sampling of 2016 data from a National Science Foundation (NSF) survey of doctoral recipients in engineering.5Figure 1 illustrates a snapshot of African American representation in US colleges of engineering. These statistics show that African Americans remain underrepresented relative to US demographics.6–8

Earnings of Academic Scientists and Engineers: Intersectionality of Gender and Race/Ethnicity Effects

While research increasingly examines the intersection of gender and race/ethnicity in science and engineering, not much is known regarding how they work together to affect career outcomes. This article examines gender earnings gaps among academic scientists and engineers by race/ethnicity. Using data from National Science Foundation’s Survey of Doctorate Recipients (2003, 2006, 2008, 2010, and 2013), I find that White women earned less than their male counterparts in 2003 and 2006, but the earnings gap closed over time. African American women did not earn less than their male counterparts in any year. Asian American women earned less only in 2013 (due to the high income of Asian American men), and Hispanic women earned less only in 2010 (due to their low income relative to other groups). The findings of relative improvement in gender earnings equality are analyzed in the context of disadvantages women face in other aspects of their careers.

The trade-offs of teamwork among STEM doctoral graduates.

Teamwork has increasingly become prevalent in professional fields such as academic science, perhaps partly because research shows that teams tend to produce superior work. Although research on teamwork has typically focused on its impact on work products, we complement that work by examining the degree to which teamwork influences salary, hours worked, and overall job satisfaction. Drawing on microdata collected through the National Science Foundation's Survey of Doctorate Recipients as well as the Survey of Earned Doctorates, we find that doctoral degree holders in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) fields tend to earn substantially higher salaries and work more hours when they engage in teamwork. We also find no comparable difference in overall job satisfaction as a function of whether individuals work within teams. Additionally, we find evidence that age interacts significantly with teamwork, whereby older teamworkers tend to earn relatively more when participating in teams without appearing to work more hours; and we show that employment sector is important, whereby teamwork is relevant for salaries and hours worked in education and industry but not in government. Although our study is based on market outcomes and behavioral measures, our findings provide grounds for future research that examines the psychological mechanisms that are relevant to understanding why people join teams as well as the psychological consequences that people encounter through teamwork. More generally, this study provides a model for considering individual-level antecedents and outcomes associated with teamwork when degrees of discretion exist with respect to teaming. (PsycINFO Database Record

The Postdoc Queue: A Labour Force in Waiting

Postdoctoral fellows (postdocs) comprise a large sector of the US scientific workforce. A substantial majority of postdocs are in a holding pattern, seeking tenure‐track assistant professorships. We model the postdoc population as a labour force in waiting—in queue. Postdocs enter the queue as they start their first postdoctoral appointment, and they leave in one of two ways: (i) obtaining the ‘queue service’ desired by the majority of postdocs, that is, an assistant professorship, or (2) reneging from the queue and seeking other positions. Using recent data from the US Survey of Doctorate Recipients, we show that the postdoc queue is one of those rare queueing systems where most of the queuers eventually renege rather than receive service. We find that only about 17% of postdocs ultimately land tenure‐track positions. The mean time in queue (postdoc career length) is 2.9 years, with significant variations across disciplines. We discuss policy implications. © 2018 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.

Survey of checkpoints along the pathway to diverse biomedical research faculty.

There is a persistent shortage of underrepresented minority (URM) faculty who are involved in basic biomedical research at medical schools. We examined the entire training pathway of potential candidates to identify the points of greatest loss. Using a range of recent national data sources, including the National Science Foundation’s Survey of Earned Doctorates and Survey of Doctoral Recipients, we analyzed the demographics of the population of interest, specifically those from URM backgrounds with an interest in biomedical sciences. We examined the URM population from high school graduates through undergraduate, graduate, and postdoctoral training as well as the URM population in basic science tenure track faculty positions at medical schools. We find that URM and non-URM trainees are equally likely to transition into doctoral programs, to receive their doctoral degree, and to secure a postdoctoral position. However, the analysis reveals that the diversions from developing a faculty career are found primarily at two clearly identifiable places, specifically during undergraduate education and in transition from postdoctoral fellowship to tenure track faculty in the basic sciences at medical schools. We suggest focusing additional interventions on these two stages along the educational pathway.

Careers in ecology: a fine‐scale investigation of national data from the U.S. Survey of Doctorate Recipients

AbstractFor several decades, economists have been warning the academic community that graduate training has been too tightly focused on careers in higher education, using the apprenticeship model in which students are trained to become tenure‐track faculty at research‐focused institutions. These jobs are simply not growing at the same rate as graduate admissions. In biomedical research, the mismatch in supply and demand has now been widely recognized. Other disciplines have begun these discussions, but for smaller fields, employment trends are more difficult to identify because they are subsumed in aggregated national statistics. For non‐biomedical biological fields in particular, such as ecology, using biology statistics may be inappropriate since trends within the field may be obscured by the strong signal from biomedical disciplines. Here, we use the 2013 Survey of Doctorate Recipients (SDR) to investigate career paths for ecology Ph.D. recipients in the United States, and present the first fine‐scale national profile of careers in ecology. Our results demonstrate that while involuntary unemployment is low for ecology Ph.D. recipients (3.3%) and job satisfaction is high, the assumptions of the prevailing apprenticeship model are inappropriate: Less than 20% of employed recent ecology Ph.D. graduates are in tenure‐track positions at a Ph.D.‐granting university. Accordingly, proactive steps could be taken to create more realistic expectations about graduate training and preparation for diverse careers. Further, the SDR data provide demographic profiles for ecology. Ethnic diversity has remained low in ecology (7.5% non‐Caucasian for Ph.D. recipients since 2000). Gender balance in career‐track positions appears to have improved by multiple metrics. However, women are overrepresented in non‐tenure‐track academic positions, where access to resources that support professional advancement may be limited relative to tenure‐track jobs, and salary disparities appear for women in private academic institutions. Thus, while there is much good news in these data, we suggest that ecology as a field would benefit from (1) a broad analysis of the training required to make Ph.D.s best prepared for jobs outside of the research‐oriented tenure track and (2) continued attention to increasing diversity and equity.

Wait time for permanent residency and the retention of immigrant doctoral recipients in the U.S.

More than 65% of foreign doctoral recipients remain and work in the U.S. after graduation. Using data from the Survey of Earned Doctorates, the Survey of Doctoral Recipients, and the U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS), this paper estimates the impact of wait time for permanent residency (Green Card status) on the migration decisions of foreign doctoral recipients graduating from U.S. universities. Results indicate that for a recent immigrant doctoral recipient, an additional year of wait time decreases the probability that he or she will remain in the U.S. by 5.5 percentage points. I also find that the negative impact of wait time on immigrant retention in the U.S. is temporary: Five years after graduation, there is no difference in retention between foreign doctoral recipients who faced long Green Card wait times and those who faced none.

Impact of research collaboration cosmopolitanism on job satisfaction

The concept of collaboration cosmopolitanism has referred to the institutional and geographic distance characteristics of academic researchers' collaboration patterns. We study the effect of collaboration cosmopolitanism on doctoral level research personnel working in different sectors–government, industry, and academia. The study examines the impact of collaboration cosmopolitanism on an important aspect of career success: job satisfaction. We employ the 2006 and 2010 Survey of Doctorate Recipients (SDR) collected by the US National Science Foundation to evaluate the cross-sectional and longitudinal effect of collaboration cosmopolitanism on job satisfaction. We are particularly interested in doctoral level researchers’ job satisfaction related to sector of employment while controlling for demographic and work characteristics such as gender, minority status, salary, and work hours. Findings suggest that scientists working at a higher level of collaboration cosmopolitanism tend to report a higher level of job satisfaction. Furthermore, we find that academic scientists are more satisfied than those working in industry. This finding holds in the longitudinal model—industry scientists are less satisfied—but we find that over time, government scientists are more satisfied than academic scientists, and much more satisfied than industry scientists.

Reasons for Becoming a Postdoc: Differences by Race and Foreign-Born Status

Background/ContextThe postdoctorate has become an important component of research careers in a growing number of science and engineering (S&E) fields. However, a tight academic job market, the growing number of postdocs, and the heightened internationalization of the position in the United States call the traditional definition of the position into question.Purpose/Objective/Research Question/Focus of StudyDoctorate recipients who aspire to research careers may be forced to remain postdocs while waiting for their desired permanent position to become available. We hypothesize that foreign-born doctoral recipients, particularly those who are female and/or non-White, are more likely than their U.S.-born, male, or White counterparts to become a postdoc for reasons not related to professional training and development.Research DesignTo explore these hypotheses, we have analyzed individual-level data from the 2006 administration of the U.S. National Science Foundation's Survey of Doctorate Recipients using multinomial logistic regression.Findings/ResultsWe find that the reasons for working as a postdoc differ by race, foreign-born status, and the interaction of these two factors. In particular, foreign-born Asians are much more likely than their White U.S. counterparts to accept a postdoc job because no other options are available.

Do Babies Matter?: Gender and Family in the Ivory TowerMaryAnn Mason, Nicholas H.Wolfinger, and MarcGoulden. New Brunswick, NJ: Rutgers University Press, 2013.

Do Babies Matter?: Gender and Family in the Ivory Tower Mary Ann Mason, Nicholas H. Wolfinger, and Marc Goulden. New Brunswick, NJ: Rutgers University Press, 2013.While debates over whether women can it all rage through the popular media, Mary Ann Mason, Nicholas H. Wolfinger, and Marc Goulden offer a thorough analysis of this issue in a very specific context: the American university. Do Babies Matter? opens with the important observation that while more women than men gain doctorates today, far fewer women reach the top of the academic ladder, and these women are less likely to be married parents than their male counterparts. Relying on empirical data gathered over a decade, the authors find-albeit unsurprisingly -that babies do indeed matter and suggest policy reforms to increase gender equity in the academic workplace.Conveniently devoting one chapter to each stage in the academic career, Mason, Wolfinger, and Goulden identify factors that influence women's reproductive decisions and their effects on career developments. As graduate students, many women are discouraged from having children by the lack of positive role models, access to quality childcare, and health insurance as well as a fear of being perceived as uncommitted. The logistics of job interviews and campus visits pose extreme challenges for nursing mothers applying for tenure-track positions. If married, women are also less likely to get hired when their husbands are presumed unwilling to relocate (31).While women with young children struggle early in their academic careers, marriage and parenthood are found to be beneficial to both male and female scholars when they are up for tenure, especially when the children are six years or older. Uncritically assuming that marriage makes people happier, healthier, and more productive, the authors argue that married tenuretrack faculty tend to have longer publication lists to support their tenure cases than single colleagues. Later in the career, marriage and children seem to have less of an effect on professional development, even though gender still plays a role. For instance, women tend to be assigned more service work, preventing them from producing the research necessary for promotion. Finally, the authors find no statistically significant difference in retirement age.As the authors explain in the appendix, their findings derive from two primary sources: one is the Survey of Doctorate Recipients, conducted by the National Science Foundation, the other is a set of surveys the authors administered themselves on nine University of California campuses. …