Among U.S. postdoc applicants, researchers of color often fare worst

Credit: Abscent84/istockphoto, adapted by N. Jessup/ Science Many researchers of color are at a disadvantage when applying for postdoctoral positions. That’s one of the main findings of a new study of 22,098 applications for 769 scientific postdoc positions at nine U.S. universities. The results could inform long-standing efforts to diversify science faculty, as postdoc appointments are a key stage in the academic career pipeline—but notoriously difficult to track or study because they are generally managed at the level of individual principal investigators (PIs) rather than departments or institutions. The study, published last month in Social Science Research , is “very important” and “very needed,” says Damani White-Lewis, an assistant professor of higher education at the University of Pennsylvania who has researched inequity in faculty careers but wasn’t involved in the new work. “The data are just unparalleled,” agrees Mary Blair-Loy, a professor at the University of California (UC), San Diego, and co-director of the Center for Research on Gender in Science, Technology, Engineering, Mathematics, and Medicine (STEMM) who also wasn’t involved in the study. Lead author Kimberlee Shauman, a professor of sociology at UC Davis, and her colleague analyzed the hiring process for postdoc positions advertised in STEMM fields from 2013 to 2021, dividing it into three stages: being considered for the position, bein...
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