United States National Postdoc Survey results and the interaction of gender, career choice and mentor impact

Abstract

The postdoctoral community is an essential component of the academic and scientific workforce, but a lack of data about this community has made it difficult to develop policies to address concerns about salaries, working conditions, diversity and career development, and to evaluate the impact of existing policies. Here we present comprehensive survey results from 7,603 postdocs based at 351 US academic and non-academic (e.g. hospital, industry and government lab) institutions in 2016. In addition to demographic and salary information, we present multivariate analyses on factors influencing postdoc career plans and satisfaction with mentorship. We further analyze gender dynamics and expose wage disparities. Academic research positions remain the predominant career choice, although women and US citizens are less likely than their male and non-US citizen counterparts to choose academic research positions. Receiving mentorship training has a significant positive effect on postdoc satisfaction with mentorship. Quality of and satisfaction with postdoc mentorship also appear to heavily influence career choice.

Keywords: career development; institutional policy; mentorship; postdoctoral researcher; research workforce.

Figure 1.. Demographics of the postdoc population surveyed.

(A) Postdoc gender; (B) Mentor gender; (C) Residency status; (D) Partnered/Married; (E) Has children; (F) Age; (G) Race/Ethnicity/Underrepresented status (which may include things other than race and ethnicity, such as LGBTQ or disability status); (H) Year of graduation; (I) Adjusted income, by year of graduation; (J) Postdoc satisfaction with mentor; (K) Primary long-term career plans; and (L) Primary field/discipline. White bars indicate female, black bars indicate male.

Figure 2.. Postdoc cost of living adjusted income and field of study by region.

(A) A map of the United States with the range of reported postdoc gross income adjusted by cost of living (key on the left). The adjusted income data are provided at the state (and when data sufficient to support, county) level. (B) The respondents’ field of study (key on the right) in each of the four major regions: West, Midwest, South, and Northeast (designated by bold lines on the map in A).

Figure 3.. Postdoc career choice.

Illustration of the independent effects of 10 of the 14 significant factors (out of 26) in the nominal logistic regression model of best fit for postdoc primary career choice (See Table 1 for effect statistics). A–C illustrate the effect of postdoc mentor and postdoc confidence on postdoc career choice; D–F illustrate the effect of postdoc productivity on postdoc career choice, and G–J illustrate the effect of demographics on postdoc career choice. In these mosaic plots, the panels show the listed factor and corresponding effect size, and the right-hand color key corresponds to primary career choice. Factors are paraphrased survey questions; please see Source Data 1 and Source Data 2 for specific wording of questions.

Figure 3—figure supplement 1.. Additional significant factors influencing career choice, but not depicted in Figure 3.

(A) Mentor rank; (B) whether the postdoctoral respondent was currently looking for a permanent position; (C) number of publications respondent had while a postdoc; (D) whether the postdoc respondent had received training in pedagogy. In these mosaic plots, the panels show the listed factor and corresponding effect size, and the right-hand color key corresponds to primary career choice. Factors are paraphrased survey questions; see Source Data 1 and Source Data 2 for specific wording of questions.

Figure 4.. Postdoc satisfaction with mentor.

Illustration of the independent effects of the eight significant factors (out of 26) in the nominal logistic regression model of best fit for satisfaction with postdoc mentor (see Table 2 for effect statistics). In these mosaic plots, the panels show the listed factor and corresponding effect size, and the right-hand color key corresponds to the degree of satisfaction with mentor. Factors are paraphrased survey questions; see Source Data 1 and Source Data 2 for specific wording of questions.