Last week I posted about the apparent decrease in my fellow grad students’ happiness. There were so many good comments, I thought it was only fitting to continue the discussion. (In the style of scientiae carnival, for your reading ease….and to point you to some great blogs!)
I was (and am) not sure of the reason(s) for this increased misery. Crazy Daisy echoed my thoughts.
Mad Hatter wasn’t quite sure, either, but she hypothesized that students that can see grad school for what it is—a means to an end (and a defined one, at that)—are happier. This should be put in the prospectives’ packets: “It’s one thing to slog through a 5-6 year PhD knowing it’s the path to what you’ve always wanted to do and quite another to spend it wondering why the hell you’re torturing yourself.”
DancingFish agreed (although thinks good beer would help, too), and added that some go to grad school to avoid the “real world” (oh….oops!).
And speaking of the real world, Anonymous1 actually tried a “real job” prior to grad school “but it was so empty and meaningless and after year 1 I stopped learning anything new and my brain completely atrophied.” By comparison, grad school is heaven!
Jody thinks that many grad students are at a point where they are questioning if they are “doing the right thing.” (I know I’ve occasionally wondered that very thing…)
Some of you can cite specific grad school events that suck the life out of you.
For example, Jennie was doing just fine until she got to the revision stage of writing…ugh!
EcoGeoFemme is happiest when funding is good because “feeling you have to compete with other students for lab resources doesn’t create a happy environment.”
Ms. PhD had problems with the mismatched expectations of grad school. She always puts it best: “We expected to be treated like responsible adults, and we expected our advisors to be responsible adults. We weren’t and they weren’t.”
Anonymous1 had a bad few months with a postdoc (who came to the lab from hell, incidentally).
Others think that the misery is a self-propagating problem.
DancingFish thinks that part of the problem is the atmosphere of grad school itself, that there are some who think that grad students cannot both be happy AND be productive. “So students make themselves miserable because that is what is expected of them, regardless of their actual productivity.”
Rebecca gives some support towards this theory by reporting on the relative happiness in her program, which she attributes to free booze Fridays and the fact that most of their labs “are also not 24/7…we have many options to lead non-science lives if we so choose.”
Anonymous2 thinks that a good attitude and good people (namely, ones that are “at least cautiously or cynically optimistic people…who know enough about what you’re doing to understand but are far enough to let you rant when necessary”) go a long way. (soooooo true!!!)
Ms. PhD agrees that good friends are key to being (even somewhat) happy in grad school, and that they were “the only thing that got me through grad school with any sanity intact….” (although I feel like mine is rapidly slipping away….)
…and ScienceGirl is very grateful for her “wonderful” husband. (if only the rest of us could be so lucky!!)
EcoGeoFemme wondered if the so-called happiest country in the world, Denmark, a place where there is “trust in the government, lack of social hieararchy, lots of social time, and setting of low expectations” could also be applied to the science laboratory. (Hmm….wouldn’t THAT be nice??)
Meanwhile, That Guy observed that foreign students complain about grad school less than Americans, likely because of the fear of deportation, should they lose their assistantship.
SwissGuy weighed in on the European side of things and commented on the increasing expectations of academics. In his field, “you’re supposed to be in another country every three or four years, publish x papers every year, teach and do all sorts of bureaucratic stuff as well.” This is in stark contrast to 10 or 20 years ago, when people stayed at one school and didn’t have pressure to publish. SwissGuy says that this change has resulted in “nobody hav[ing] a normal life with functioning relationships.” (yikes! Then again, I’ve JUST learned how to have a functioning relationship….)
….but silk stocking is having a rough go of the data….so stop by Have Coffee, Will Travel and leave an encouraging note, okay?
