Women Scientists are Calling Bullshit on a Study Claiming Women Make Bad STEM Mentors
upstart writes in with an IRC submission for Runaway1956:
Women Scientists Are Calling Bullshit On a Study Claiming That Women Make Bad STEM Mentors:
Last week, the scientific journal Nature Communications, an offshoot of the internationally respected journal Nature, enraged scientists, women, and anyone who has ever been near a graduate program by publishing a study that concluded maybe women mentors are actually hurting the career prospects of their mentees. As the study's authors wrote, the research "suggests that female proteges who remain in academia reap more benefits when mentored by males rather than equally-impactful females."
Thousands of scientists from all over the world identified issues with the methods used in the study, titled, "The association between early career informal mentorship in academic collaborations and junior author performance." Its methods and conclusions were even criticized by scientists who had peer-reviewed the paper, whose concerns were published alongside the study but were not addressed within the text. In response, the journal quickly promised an investigation of those methods and conclusions (the kind of thing that usually happens before publication, during peer review).
Journal Reference:
Bedoor AlShebli, Kinga Makovi, Talal Rahwan. The association between early career informal mentorship in academic collaborations and junior author performance [open], Nature Communications (DOI: 10.1038/s41467-020-19723-8)
Also at Retraction Watch
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