Tips for PhD Students & Postdocs

Beyond How Often and How Many Human beings have always been difficult to research. Unlike the natural sciences where we can use quantitative methods to capture how often things…

Even the longest stays in grad school go by in a flash and most of it seems to be filled with reading, research, and writing. I interviewed a group of recent PhDs and asked them,…

A Very Plural Bias Speaking in terms of a singular cognitive bias is an inaccurate but widely accepted practice. The term is used to describe inherent errors in thinking and…

“Branding is for Products, Not People!” Sound familiar? You have reached a point in your academic career where you have a solid body of work, a track record of well-received…

The Most Commonly Wasted Opportunity When the stressful interview comes to its inevitable end, it’s either gone really well and you think it’s in the bag, or you “ummed” and…

What Constitutes Basic Research? Basic research (also described as fundamental or pure research) categorizes any study with the objective of deeper understanding of the…

Writing can be boring, hard, and stressful by itself. This coupled with deadlines, peer review, grading, etc., can become a truly daunting process. Writer’s block is not a state…

What Is the Purpose of Science? Answering this question in full would probably take up several volumes of a large textbook, but in laymen’s terms, scientists conduct research to…

The Declining Art of Good Research We seem to be compromising our commitment to good research in favor of publishable research, and there are a combination of trends that are…

Let’s face it, researching and writing a dissertation or a book means you’re going to spend a long time thinking about one, very narrow topic. Because of this, it’s common for…

The term multitasking refers to moving quickly between different areas of work without losing focus. Some people are really good at it, while others find it terribly stressful and…

Although every library has outreach and support programs tailored to the needs of its primary users, some types of formal initiative are common to all. One of these is the…