Apostdoctoral position is often considered the first stepping stone to a career in academia. According to recent surveys, many postdoctoral scholars feel disenchanted and stressed, eventually leaving academia.1,2 But the situation is not universal.
Some postdoctoral scholars go on to become successful academic researchers. Such widely opposite career trajectories led researchers to wonder what sets the two groups apart. Some studies indicate that graduate training shapes future career paths, with people holding PhDs from prestigious institutions having greater chances of being hired as faculty.3,4 However, the postdoctoral fellowship period’s impact in the academic job market remains underexplored.
Now, a team led by Bedoor AlShebli at New York University Abu Dhabi, and Petter Holme at Aalto University analyzed publication trends and found that the number and impact of publications during the postdoctoral period influence future academic success.5 The results, reported today in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, indicate that postdoctoral training plays a more important role in the academic job market than initially thought.
To investigate how postdoctoral periods shape researchers’ careers, AlShebli, Holme, and their colleagues gathered information from a publication database and an online professional network. The assembled dataset contained information from more than 45,000 careers spanning 25 years, from all academic disciplines worldwide. Their analysis of the dataset revealed that 41 percent of postdoctoral fellows left academia.
Equipped with this data, the team compared the number and citation counts of publications of researchers during their graduate and postdoctoral positions and tracked their career paths. They found that those who published fewer papers during their postdoctoral training than as graduate students were more likely to leave academia. They also noted that those who achieved a hit—highly cited—paper during their postdoctoral period were more likely to stay in academia. This trend was observed irrespective of whether researchers had a hit paper during their PhD, showing that success during postdoctoral period mattered more than PhD success.
Once the researchers had established who was more likely to stay in academia, they investigated who was more likely to succeed in this career path. They looked at citation patterns of new faculty members and used their h-index to estimate their success. Having a hit paper during either PhD or postdoctoral training significantly boosted the likelihood of academic success. Publishing a hit paper during both PhD and postdoctoral period improved the chances of success even further.
Academics believe that the postdoctoral period is an opportunity for newly minted PhD holders to broaden their experience, in terms of exploring newer research topics and changing institutions.6 Comparing young faculty members’ performances based on this revealed that a moderate change of topic and moving abroad for postdoctoral opportunity was linked with future success.
The authors noted that while a strong PhD is important to get a good postdoctoral position, academic career paths are shaped by complex factors. According to them, those in the academic job market must give postdoctoral training its due and not just treat it as a waiting period for securing tenure track positions.
- Woolston C. Postdoc survey reveals disenchantment with working life. Nature. 2020;587(7834):505-508.
- Arnold C. The stressed-out postdoc. Science. 2014;345(6196):594.
- Wapman KH, et al. Quantifying hierarchy and dynamics in US faculty hiring and retention. Nature. 2022;610(7930):120-127.
- Clauset A, et al. Systematic inequality and hierarchy in faculty hiring networks. Sci Adv. 2015;1(1):e1400005.
- Duan Y, et al. Postdoc publications and citations link to academic retention and faculty success. Proc Nat Acad Sci USA.
- Singer M. The evolution of postdocs. Science. 2004;306(5694):232.
