From children of the Great Depression to baby boomers, age and the common experiences that define a generation are deeply important. The shared events that form a scientific generation, such as the one that developed the atomic bomb, could equally well set the trajectory of a research career. The fact that some career elements are beyond any individual's control may be hard for self-motivated research types to accept, but is important for our profession to know.
These thoughts came as I read Striking the Mother Lode in Science: The Importance of Age, Place, and Time (New York, Oxford University Press, 1992) a new book by Paula Stephan, a labor economist at Georgia State University, and Sharon Levin, an applied microeconomist at the University of Missouri, St. Louis. The book pulls together data about scientists, the science they make, and when in their careers they make it. It analyzes the influence ...
