Letters on mental health and graduate school

From this week's letters to the editor in C&EN, a set of fascinating ones:

The article “Managing Grad School Stress” by Linda Wang was most welcome (C&EN, Sept. 14, page 59). In 45 years as a student, postdoc, and faculty member, I have seen almost all graduate students stressed at some point. 

The article omitted an important group of people who in many cases act as psychologists, counselors, and relief valves: support staff, especially secretaries and administrative assistants. Frequently going beyond their job descriptions, they provide perspective, sympathy, and a human touch that students sometimes feel is lacking from some faculty. I know of at least one Ph.D. chemist who spent so much time doing counseling instead of chemistry in a central lab facility that she changed careers to social work. 

While not always recognized for their contributions to graduate training, these supporting players are beloved by the students and essential in these increasingly stressful times. 

Alexander Scheeline
Urbana, Ill. 

Wang’s excellent article on managing grad school stress cut close to the bone for me. While I was a doctoral student at the University of California, Berkeley, in the late 1950s, one fellow student did, in fact, kill himself. I, too, might have gone that route, or at least dropped out of the program, had it not been for the intervention of two perceptive and sympathetic faculty members: my formal research director, professor Isadore Perlman, and my de facto research mentor, professor Robert Connick. 

Evan Appelman
State College, Pa. 

I read your article on managing graduate school stress with great interest as it provoked recollections of my own experiences in the early 1980s. One paragraph in particular suggested that advisers are not blameless, but why? Could this be a result of their own experiences that, in most cases, have not been punctuated by life in a nonacademic environment? 

When I started my first job at a pharmaceutical company, it took me several weeks, if not months, to become accustomed to the concept of a weekend, let alone an evening. Testimony of graduates whom I hired, years later, would sometimes include tales of adviser-originated phrases like, “If I’m here from 8 AM until 10 PM seven days a week, then you should be too,” “Don’t waste precious research seconds,” and “Why on Earth would you want to take a day off [to spend time with your spouse, partner, family, etc.]?” 

It was always far more impressive to see a person who achieved outcomes and managed their time efficiently, rather than one who prided himself or herself on sheer physical presence in the lab or office. Time management and life balance can be taught, but it is best taught by example lest those less experienced in both have nothing by which to measure their achievements in such skills. 

Young academics striving for tenure are in their own (sometimes self-made) pressure cookers, may have had no training themselves in a more realistic environment, and could benefit greatly from learning by some of the examples described in the article. Overall, moderation in all things (including moderation—sometimes, but not always, the extra effort is essential, just not continuously) would seem to be the best policy! 

James T. Palmer
Templestowe, Australia

Gotta say, I love Alexander Scheeline's perspective - so true. Staff can be great counselors, and I feel that they are not recognized as such by many departments. 

Reddit AMA this AM

I was part of a Reddit AMA this morning on graduate school and stress, if you're interested. 

Is graduate school in chemistry bad for your mental health? Part 5

This is the final post in the series on the question "Is graduate school in chemistry bad for your mental health?" by myself and Vinylogous Aldol. Don't miss Part 1, Part 2, Part 3 and Part 4. 

Dear Vinylogous Aldol:

This has really been quite a week of posts -- I'm almost exhausted just reading through all the other posts that have spun off. As you've said, if we had to name check all the folks who've contributed, it'd start looking like a J. Med. Chem. paper. I have a couple of comments and answers to some of the questions that you've posted in your excellent Thursday post (which, I feel, I need to somehow apologize for a lack of comments -- perhaps readers were actually beavering away in their hoods on Thursday. I got a large bit of work done myself.)

As to whether graduate school contained anything that improved my mental health, I'd have to think about it, and give a qualified "yes." I learned to exercise in grad school; while I seem to have lost the motivation to exercise a little since then, it's definitely something that I really enjoyed doing and gave me some amount of pleasure. I did gain a good bit of emotional resilience from graduate school (the ability to "take a lickin' and keep on tickin'), but I'm not sure that's something that made me happier.

I do think that something might be given up when you work shorter hours; let's just posit that the difference between working 40-50 hours and week at 60-70 hours a week for 2 or 3 years is probably 1 Org. Lett. paper's worth of work (maybe more, maybe less.) Would that one more or less publication at the margin cost someone a job? Maybe -- I think it's possible. I think the return on the happiness is probably worth it, though. (Don't know -- that's all just a WAG.)

As to Lyle's question of "whether grad school causes these issues, or exacerbates the existing condition?", I agree with you, it's probably both. I really, deeply agree with the commenter (I can't find it now) who said that probably everyone has some level of predisposition with mental health issues and graduate school is a really good environment to bring them out.* The trio of high expectations, high failure rates of experiments and relatively low pay is probably corrosive to all but the most mentally tough psyches. What's worse, of course, is that when you haven't figured out your project well enough to really, deeply understand the principles behind the chemistry that you're doing, failure and success almost seem to happen randomly. It's that initial random aspect to experimentation that can drive people completely bonkers if they're not careful.

And of course, "project frustration" (I'm trying to come up with a phrase for the scientific version of "battle fatigue"**) is such a key part of graduate school. It is the one thing that teaches a chemist that they can solve the problem presented to them. I think it teaches them to challenge assumptions, to learn the usefulness (or lack thereof) of beating your head against the wall, to delve into the literature, to talk to your adviser and your friend. I think what is most key is that we have to acknowledge, at those key times (perhaps in our 3rd or 4th years?), that graduate students need to be watched especially carefully by their PIs to be sure that they're not doing poorly, from a mental health perspective.

Quick hits: 

Pressures on a PI: Whenever I think about this issue, I think about Professor Hardass Slavedriver, and his paragraph on the pressures that he has. It's real reality, and there's not a lot of humanity, just Hobbesian jungle.
Organic-versus-everything-else: Students are getting smarter about the job market, and they can read the writing on the wall about organic chemistry (perhaps scrawled by Professor Whitesides.) Chemistry is full of other interesting fields, and organic chemists aren't waving around their Big Pharma signing bonuses like they used to.
If the job market/funding picture continues to suck, what happens?: Not a clue. If the funding picture continues to suck, more 4th and 5th years will teach o-chem lab and the Wheel of Pain will turn slower, and they won't be in the lab as much. If the job market continues to suck, I dunno. Lots of cheap postdocs?
Are relaxed labs at a disadvantage at hiring?: I don't know -- are they less visibly productive? I don't think there's any really good evidence that they're at a disadvantage, but I'm not in the hallowed halls of Big Pharma, so I can't tell you. Readers?
What parts of grad school are necessary?: The truly high stress parts of the Ph.D. are really important, in my opinion: giving literature seminars, the original proposal, the candidacy exam, these all make a lot of sense to me. What I would potentially discard is some of the tried-and-true soul-grinding routine: namely group meeting. Is a 3 hour group meeting starting at 7 pm with lots of pop quizzes and berating necessary? Is departmental group meeting necessary? Were Woodward's all nighters really that important? (Probably, yes, but most PIs that pull that stuff (Saturday group meetings) aren't R.B. Woodward.)

Concrete things I would add to grad school: 

• A mercy rule, w/r/t length of doctoral degree. I don't know what is too long, but I think 9 years is probably too long. 
• A course on interpersonal professional interaction, with an emphasis on communicating needs. By this, I mean, "telling people how you really feel" and "asking people for stuff." Look -- you're going to be doing it in one form or another for the rest of your life, even if you're just asking people if they want fries with their burger. (I kid.) Asking a customer if they'll accept $400/kg instead of $300/kg, asking your boss for flex time or your friend if they'll hire you are all basically asking people for stuff. It's very important, and only covered in writing form in grad school (because, apparently, the government will only give you money after you've written a doorstop of a proposal in 8 point Times New Roman.) 
• The excellent and mysterious @jfreebo suggested a one-month sabbatical for grad students in the middle of the 3rd year of graduate school. I think that's an excellent idea, and I would put it at the end of the candidacy exam as a reward for finishing -- along with my offer of cold hard cash to quit. 

What have I learned from all of this talk of mental health and graduate school? 

3 separate very senior chemists (with an H-index average of ~30 or so) have talked about moments of deep emotional distress in graduate school, with an added panic attack by a not-nearly-as-senior-but-still-awesome chemist. It happens, and it's normal. It is also wise and normal to seek professional help.

I think I've learned the breadth and depth of pain that people are willing to talk about in forums such as these, and how important it is that institutions and professors note how their words and actions  might be perceived (however incorrectly). I've also learned that this is something that we should be watching for in our friends and talking about, in public and online.

Hope you had a good week and that you managed to get something done in the lab. Thank you for participating in this and thanks for the sacrifice of your time. I think I've also learned that you're a pretty great writer and thinker, and I hope to hear more from you, Vinylogous.

Best wishes, Chemjobber

*@autolycos, a MD, writes in with his thoughts: "In my opinion, the reason chemistry grad school, med school, residency, and other similar hierarchical environments (the military, too) have such a mental health and suicide problem is twofold. First: there are few checks on admittance of people who are potentiated to have mental illnesses when they are deprived of meaningful feedback... But, once we've admitted these people, it's then generally the case that they are treated capriciously, carelessly, and generally considered second to the task at hand, whether it be teaching, research, taking care of patients, or storming that hill."
**Noting, of course, that PTSD is its own thing and separate from a hard year in the lab.

Is grad school in chemistry bad for your mental health, part 4: at Not the Lab

Vinylogous' latest installment on our series on chemistry grad school and mental health is up and he's asking some great questions:

A few questions remain: Do you think that a sustained poor job outlook might lead to a relaxation of grad school culture? Or will the harsher grant culture lead to increased pressure on students instead? There are apparently many labs that don’t suffer from a depression culture: but are students from these labs as competitive in the job market as the high-octane labs? (Of course, that’s a very complex question). What high-stress aspects of the system are maybe really just necessary in order to impart chemists with the skills and breadth/depth of knowledge to competently practice in the field?

Go over there and read, and comment!

Is graduate school in chemistry bad for your mental health? Part 3

This is the 3rd in a series of posts on the question "Is graduate school in chemistry bad for your mental health?" by myself and Vinylogous Aldol. Don't miss Parts 1 and 2. Tomorrow's post (part 4) will be at Not The Lab.

Dear Vinylogous Aldol:

That was a really great post with some really great questions. We've been particularly blessed this week to have as many great comments on our blogs and links from both Derek Lowe and See Arr Oh. Both of them describe dark moments in their Ph.D. programs; See Arr Oh's post on his panic attack is particularly courageous and a must read.*

I think we've agreed that grad school in chemistry can be (is sometimes? will always be?) bad for your mental health; as of yet, I'm not really aware of very many comments that have argued otherwise. At some point, I'd like to transition to "what to do about it?", but I think that the points you made and the questions that you have are worth commenting on.

You've asked what aspects of the graduate school experience negatively affects mental health -- you've pointed out poor work/life balance, the power dynamics of graduate advisers and students, the perfectionist mentality and our mature (sigh) field itself. I think you've covered all the bases. I really want to highlight your point about the "nebulosity" of graduate school -- that everyone knows what a "good" doctoral thesis looks like, but very few people are willing to posit what the minimum contribution to our broader chemical knowledge should be. (And rightly so, I think!) I am reminded of a favorite passage from "Cold Zero", the true story of a speechwriter who becomes an FBI agent and, ultimately, a member of the Hostage Rescue Team (the FBI's SWAT organization). Here is what a HRT operator says at the beginning of one of the evaluations:

"This is an individual event of indeterminate length," an operator read. "You are expected to give a maximum effort throughout the event. You will be evaluated on your performance." 

Naturally, to heighten the psychological stress of the process, the operators don't tell the entrants how they are doing. Another military organization (the US Army's Delta Force) says during their selection process (which involves lone land navigation marches in the wilderness): "The standard is the best you can do."

I can't think of a better way to both identify the very self-motivated and to induce panic among most students. We all want to know how we're doing, we all want some idea that we're headed in the right direction, and no one wants to wander the wilds of graduate school for 10 years.

Regarding work-life balance, I wanted to mention that Richard Rhodes' great book "The Making of the Atomic Bomb" (you'll have to pardon my jump into sudden militarism) has a wonderful section about the off-hours activities of the scientists that worked at Los Alamos on the design and production of Fat Man and Little Boy. These scientists, who were incredibly bright and talented and facing an incredibly difficult task [and herded into the middle of nowhere, New Mexico], were given to skiing, partying, square dancing, putting on plays, fishing and mountain climbing. Perhaps we are not all as productive (there's that word!) as a Fermi or as brilliant as an Oppenheimer, but it is an indication that even in the most pressing of circumstances, scientific giants were willing to step out of the laboratory and have some fun. I think we could all learn from that.

I want to take a moment and reiterate my comment about the isolating nature of science. The Ph.D. is a collaboration (in the best times) between PI and student. However, it is the student that must perform the research alone, it is the student that must grapple with the literature by themselves and it is the student alone who must face their adviser and their committees when it is time to defend their dissertation. To a great extent, I think this is a great benefit of getting a doctorate as a degree -- it should mean that a graduate is independent, and capable of learning a field, its techniques and contributing to it on their own (employers and supervisors -- take note!) But it might train us to cut ourselves off from social support when we need it.

When you asked what I thought about how chemistry compares to other fields (veterinary medicine, medicine or an MBA program), certainly the economics of those programs are relevant to the discussion.** But what I think really distinguishes those professional fields from science is the relative lack of isolation. Young physicians don't work alone; group decision-making is (I think) the norm, even if one particular resident is responsible for patients and their outcomes. It is my understanding that MBA programs are very, very group project-oriented.

This isolating nature means that both inside and outside the laboratory, I believe a graduate researcher in chemistry should seek out other scientists, early and often. I know that lots of us are introverts, and many of us would much rather read a book than go to a party. But you might try talking to another chemist about your problems, scientific and otherwise -- at the very least, you'd be gaining a different perspective. (Also, talking to another chemist gets us practicing the very important skill of communicating chemistry and our chemistry problems to each other -- you're going to be doing it in your defense, at the very least, and likely many other times.)

Moreover, if there is one thing that I've been reading again and again in the comments (over 100, between your blog, my blog and Derek's), it is the importance of a human support system, be it a spouse, significant other, friends, family or even a therapist. I will note that during a particularly crippling bout of procrastination and non-motivation in the laboratory, I went to my university's counseling center to talk about my issues. I won't say that it changed things overnight (because it did not), but it at least got those issues out front, where I could confront them.

As for "is it worth it?", man, that is a hard, hard question. I don't rightly know, to be honest. It might be an unanswerable question, because it depends on time and place. If you asked me that question 2 years ago, I would have given you a much less positive answer. At the moment, I can mostly say, "Yeah, it was worth it. It was hard, but worth it." I think that question can only be asked maybe 10 years after graduation -- right now, it's still up in the air for me. I am proud of my degree, but I'm not going to pretend that it didn't come with a cost.

Some questions for you (man, this is a long post!): Which comments have struck you the most? As the chemblogosphere's resident naif, I think I'm a little surprised (even though I shouldn't be) about how many people admit to self-medicating with alcohol. I ain't a medical doctor, but I'm pretty sure that's a bad idea. What do you think your PI would say about mental health in graduate school, and how best to achieve it? Do you think grad school could be good for your mental health? (#slatepitches)

Hope you have a good Wednesday. Cheers, Chemjobber

*Reading SAO's post reminded me of a medical mystery that struck right around the time that I was interviewing for my postdoc in my final year of graduate school. The physician pretty much shrugged and said "It definitely could be stress-related." After I got my postdoc offer, the problem went away. Post hoc, ergo propter hoc? The human body is a mystery.

**Licensing, professional societies and practical constraints (a medical school requires a teaching hospital) all limit the number of students that can enter the field and compete for employment. Also, we as a society tend to care a lot of about our doctors and how they are trained (which can be quite brutal as well.) The famed limiting of hours for medical residents, I suspect, was a big moment for physicians-in-training and how they were treated. But chemicals don't care when they're dropped on the concrete floor due to fatigue -- I can't say the same for people.

Is grad school in chemistry bad for your mental health? Part 2 at Not The Lab

In part 2 of our dialogue, Vinylogous speculates as to what might contribute to poor mental health in graduate school. A wonderful sample snippet:

I think it’s fairly obvious that advisors are in a power to be abusive, and though many aren’t, a large number are. And oblivious advisors can be as hurtful as malicious advisors. If a student has undiagnosed depression, it may show in their recommendation letters in the form of descriptions of laziness or lack of enthusiasm. Advisors have huge career-altering power. A set of nasty letters from a former boss can sink your chances at good jobs, and there’s really no system to avoid this if you happen to accidentally piss someone off.  

On the other hand, some professors are very keen on their students' happiness and treat them with respect. I've seen professors who go by their first name and invite their lab to gatherings at their house as well as professors who want formalities (including scheduling appointments with a secretary to even have a ten minute talk) and aren't interested in their students beyond a working capacity.

Go over there and read -- it's really good.

Is graduate school in chemistry bad for your mental health? Part 1

Dear Vinylogous Aldol:

Thanks for agreeing to do this little dialogue with me! It will be fun, educational and will hopefully raise some issues that aren't talked about very much in the chemblogosphere (not because of any particular taboo, it just hasn't really come up (that I recall.))

I'll start with a vignette (for which the details are hazy -- my subconcious defending itself?):

After weeks and weeks of long hours and frustration in the lab in either my 2nd or 3rd year of graduate school, I remember walking into my apartment bathroom, smashing the mirror with my fist and sitting on the edge of the bathtub. I seem to recall yelling at the top of my lungs "What am I going to do!?!?" about whatever reaction sequence of my total synthesis that simply was not going anywhere.

I can easily say that was one of the darkest periods of my time in graduate school. I am not sure if I was depressed -- I'm a synthetic chemist, not a clinical psychologist. Close to ten years later, it's mostly an unpleasant memory, with little recall of the details that set me off. But I can remember sitting on that bathtub edge, the deep despair of a project that wasn't going well and the feeling that my entire life was an utter failure. Now, of course, I don't feel that way at all. I can leave my work at work (mostly, anyway), and my self-worth is not entirely reliant on the yield of my last reaction. But there was a lot of pain in between then and now.

So the topic question for our discussion is "Is graduate school in chemistry bad for your mental health?" My answer? Yes, graduate school in chemistry can be bad for your mental health. Science can lend itself to isolating workers from healthy habits, from friends and from family. For people who see themselves as competent and at least as good as their colleagues, bench research in chemistry can rub failure in their faces and deliver fierce blows to self-confidence. You can see yourself as falling behind, not pulling your own weight, never giving a good group meeting and just simply not up to snuff.

It doesn't have to be that way, of course. If you're someone who already has a strong support system, if steely discipline got you through your undergraduate career, if you already have healthy habits and life skills, graduate school will probably not affect your psyche too negatively. But if you don't, grad school can be brutal on your self-image.

There are famous examples of the negative effects of mental health in graduate school; Jason Altom's suicide at Harvard is prominent, and a reminder that mental health crises can happen at august institutions and with the most impressive CVs. It's an extreme example, but its components (a tough project, coworkers who were concerned but somewhat unaware, a seemingly implacable adviser) are known to us all.

We can take this discussion lots of places. Most of it will be driven by you, commenters and (hopefully) other bloggers. Personally, I'd like to talk about project frustration (and how it is necessary, and both the thing that can both kill us and teach us), depression (how to spot it, how to address it in ourselves and others) and how much professors and the university's resources might be able to help graduate students and postdocs. I'd like to talk about what good mental health looks like, and how we might be able to get there or maintain it.

So what do you think, Vinylogous? Is graduate school in chemistry (which you're participating in right now) making you crazy? You seem pretty rational (for a blogger, anyway), so I'm guessing not. What do you think -- do I have it all wrong? I'm looking forward to what you have to say on Tuesday.

So I think I'm done talking -- I hope your week is going to go well. Apart from the potential bout of stomach flu I might be having (and if so, I'm staying home, like I might not have done in grad school), I'm looking forward to a week in the lab and in the plant and talking to you.

Cheers, Chemjobber