phd advisor abuse

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How to deal with a toxic academic supervisor?

I am a person who does not have an "invisible personality". I talk, help around and friendly with everyone. It took me a great deal of efforts to be finally able to open up, which let me make many connections at workplace and otherwise. This attitude helps me learn from their experiences too. Recently, I was slut shamed in my absence, in front of everyone (in a meeting) for being able to talk and hangout with the guys (majority of lab mates were guys). I was even accused of many things and the professor insulted me which stripped me of my dignity (again, in a meeting with the entire lab). I believe everything was blown out of proportion based on some baseless rumors. The PI even commented about my personal life. I could not stand being insulted and left the lab.

I would be soon starting my PhD and I do not want to face a similar situation again. What are the Do's and Don'ts that I should be taking into consideration while entering into a purely professional environment for smooth sailing of 4yrs of PhD? What if my superior at the new workplace is equally toxic? Is work environment at research labs generally so toxic? Since many people normalized this behavior?

• 1 Are you in an environment where you can meet (and perhaps take a course with) potential advisors? Or is it a blind process? Also, the frequency probably varies around the world and even by field. –  Buffy Commented Aug 23, 2021 at 14:04
• 6 Run, run for your life. First red flag, change your advisor –  looktook Commented Aug 23, 2021 at 14:17
• 2 Which country? I do think that today, in most western countries, you have a wide arsenal of recourse. If there are witnesses, you can bring a rain of fire and brimstone on the perpetrators. Such behaviour on the side of your superiors and colleagues is utterly unacceptable. –  Captain Emacs Commented Aug 23, 2021 at 14:38
• 2 @CaptainEmacs, and some "boys", whatever their age need to be taken to the woodshed. –  Buffy Commented Aug 23, 2021 at 15:06
• 2 @CaptainEmacs, how about if woodshed = dean? –  Buffy Commented Aug 23, 2021 at 15:25

I only have partial information, so can only offer general/partial solutions. The correct way to deal with a toxic advisor is to move elsewhere, even if it means changing universities. If you can do so safely (to yourself and your career) report them to university authorities. Whether it has any effect or not depends on how widespread are the poor attitudes.

These things happen and when they do, a sort of whipsaw effect seems to magnify them, so where they exist they can be very intense. But they don't exist everywhere. Oddly enough, all of my doctoral students were women, somewhat like yourself. The other women in our program mostly all seemed similar (outspoken, contributors, ...) and were taken for their skills and knowledge. So, the opposite thing can and does occur.

The way to avoid it is to first look closely at any environment you are jumping into, either for a degree or for a job later. Try to meet people before you make any commitments. Try to meet some of the students. Evaluate. If you sense creepiness or other poor attitudes keep looking. This is actually true for other issues as well as for sexism, but for this case, try to find other female students (or graduates) and get their advice on what it is like to work with a given professor on in a given lab.

If there are other women around, collective action may be possible, for protection, even if it won't change the environment.

Don't get chased out. Your "personality" is perfectly fine.

• +1 Make sure you get a chance to communicate with current and/or former students on their own, in a reasonably private venue, not in the presence of the supervisor (e-mail can be OK, although face-to-face is best for picking up on cues) –  Ben Bolker Commented Aug 23, 2021 at 18:27

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Bullying by supervisors is alive and well – now is the time to tackle it

The arrangements that trap PhD students in toxic relationships with abusive supervisors must be reformed – here’s how, says Timothy Ijoyemi

Timothy Ijoyemi

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In recent years, a chorus of former PhD students have broken their silence over abusive behaviour suffered at the hands of their supervisors. Their horrifying accounts variously relate being belittled and humiliated in front of colleagues, having supervisors explode with anger upon hearing of scientific setbacks, even supervisors sullying their students’ reputations in the eyes of prospective employers. The toll of this sustained torment on students’ mental health can be devastating, with reports of anxiety and depression, post-traumatic stress disorder and even suicide having emerged.

Supervisor bullying deters talented students from pursuing academic careers. It can also compromise academic integrity by pressuring students to falsify data to avoid provoking backlash. This is a lose-lose situation for all of academia.

To make matters worse, the unprecedented demands of the Covid-19 pandemic risk diverting attention from nascent efforts to address supervisor bullying precisely when many of the conditions that feed into it, such as work frustration and economic inequality, have worsened. More optimistically, the state of flux created by the pandemic also presents an opportunity to finally get to grips with this issue requiring bold and urgent action.

But why focus on supervisor bullying of PhD students when bullying affects academics at all levels? While all forms of bullying must be eradicated, the power imbalance of the student-supervisor relationship makes students uniquely vulnerable to bullying from superiors who can destroy careers before they’ve even begun.

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Indeed, once a student has progressed to a certain point in their PhD, their supervisor is usually so intertwined with the project that they are virtually indispensable to its completion. Students jumping ship partway through their PhD are likely to lose access to essential resources bound to their existing supervisor, including research funding and access to crucial lab equipment, not to mention their supervisor’s expertise. Any student raising the ire of a malicious supervisor also risks forgoing the glowing reference and authorship credit on papers that could be pivotal to landing their first postdoc. It’s little wonder that so few PhD students report their experiences of bullying.

The arrangements that trap students in toxic relationships with abusive supervisors are something that universities and other stakeholders can and must work together to reform. A key focus must be making it easier for students to change supervisor partway through their projects. Here, funders could make provision for finance allocated to PhD students to be transferred to a new supervisor if bullying has occurred. Where this isn’t possible, universities should have a fund available to plug or mitigate funding shortfalls that accrue to students decoupling from abusive supervisors.

Furthermore, investigative committees should have the power to force offending supervisors to continue providing access to equipment or other resources needed by a targeted student to complete their project, with conditions around this carefully set to eliminate opportunities for reprisal – for example, mandating that the former supervisor be absent during specified access times.

Any effort to ease supervisor transition must be paired with a robust anti-bullying policy that sets out disciplinary action to be taken against supervisors found to have bullied. Consequences for repeat or particularly egregious offenders should be severe, ranging up to dismissal.

Research has found that reporting of academic bullying is low largely because targets doubt that it will lead to meaningful action. To inspire greater confidence, anti-bullying policies must be communicated to incoming PhD students as a prominent part of their induction, with clear definitions given of what constitutes bullying, how complaints will be investigated, what disciplinary actions may result and what measures can be taken to minimise negative impacts on reporting students. To increase confidence further, at least one example should be given of a previous case where a complaint was upheld with a resolution favourable to the targeted student.

Ensuring that investigations are conducted fairly is essential to earning supervisor and student support. As such, investigative committees should be made up of individuals external to an accused supervisor’s department. This would help avert conflicts of interest that could otherwise impel investigators to protect or sabotage an accused colleague.

Beyond the university itself, there’s much that can be done to tackle supervisor bullying. Funding bodies should follow the lead of the Wellcome Trust by attaching conditions to their grants that allow funding to be withdrawn from supervisors found to have bullied. Where this occurs, funding should be transferred to another principal investigator from the same department to reduce impacts on others funded by the same grant. Funders could also collaborate with universities to obtain records of academic bullying by grant applicants and factor these into funding decisions.

Gatekeepers for academic metrics, including those that publish institutional rankings, could also collaborate with universities to incorporate bullying records into their assessment criteria. This would benefit gatekeepers by driving up standards in the institutions on which their existence depends, while those institutions would benefit from outperforming competitors on a metric bound to influence student enrolment. Most important would be the benefit to students now belonging to institutions better incentivised to root out supervisor bullying.

The stories of supervisor bullying that have emerged in recent times are a terrible stain on higher education. It’s past time for the multi-pronged effort needed to reform a system in which bullying has been able to thrive. In the ruins of the pandemic, opportunity for drastic change abounds. It would be grossly unjust to the next generation of PhD students if inaction prevails.

Timothy Ijoyemi has more than 10 years’ experience in higher education. He has a passion for equity, diversity and inclusion, and at UCL School of Management he researches and supports on various projects to improve student and staff experience. 

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Abuse and Exploitation of Doctoral Students: A Conceptual Model for Traversing a Long and Winding Road to Academia

• Original Paper
• Published: 31 July 2021
• Volume 180 , pages 505–522, ( 2022 )

Cite this article

• Aaron Cohen   ORCID: orcid.org/0000-0001-8143-2769 1 &
• Yehuda Baruch   ORCID: orcid.org/0000-0002-0678-6273 2  

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This paper develops a conceptual model of PhD supervisors’ abuse and exploitation of their students and the outcomes of that abuse. Based on the literature about destructive leadership and the “dark side” of supervision, we theorize about why and how PhD student abuse and exploitation may occur. We offer a novel contribution to the literature by identifying the process through which PhD students experience supervisory abuse and exploitation, the various factors influencing this process, and its outcomes. The proposed model presents the Dark Triad, perceptions of goal blockage, and perceptions of ethical culture as potential characteristics of the PhD supervisor and implies the mediation of the perceptions of power and politics in the relationship between the Dark Triad and student abuse and exploitation. Institutional policies and practices concerning doctoral students and their characteristics are proposed as moderators in such a relationship. Finally, the model suggests that student abuse and exploitation may hinder or even end students’ academic careers. The manuscript discusses the theoretical and practical contributions and managerial implications of the proposed model and recommends further exploration of the dark sides of academia.

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We refer to PhDs, but this applies to any doctorate, such as the Doctor of Business Administration (DBA) or Doctor of Science (DSc).

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Cohen, A., Baruch, Y. Abuse and Exploitation of Doctoral Students: A Conceptual Model for Traversing a Long and Winding Road to Academia. J Bus Ethics 180 , 505–522 (2022). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10551-021-04905-1

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‘You have to suffer for your PhD’: poor mental health among doctoral researchers – new research

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PhD students are the future of research, innovation and teaching at universities and beyond – but this future is at risk. There are already indications from previous research that there is a mental health crisis brewing among PhD researchers.

My colleagues and I studied the mental health of PhD researchers in the UK and discovered that, compared with working professionals, PhD students were more likely to meet the criteria for clinical levels of depression and anxiety. They were also more likely to have significantly more severe symptoms than the working-professional control group.

We surveyed 3,352 PhD students, as well as 1,256 working professionals who served as a matched comparison group . We used the questionnaires used by NHS mental health services to assess several mental health symptoms.

More than 40% of PhD students met the criteria for moderate to severe depression or anxiety. In contrast, 32% of working professionals met these criteria for depression, and 26% for anxiety.

The groups reported an equally high risk of suicide. Between 33% and 35% of both PhD students and working professionals met the criteria for “suicide risk”. The figures for suicide risk might be so high because of the high rates of depression found in our sample.

We also asked PhD students what they thought about their own and their peers’ mental health. More than 40% of PhD students believed that experiencing a mental health problem during your PhD is the norm. A similar number (41%) told us that most of their PhD colleagues had mental health problems.

Just over a third of PhD students had considered ending their studies altogether for mental health reasons.

There is clearly a high prevalence of mental health problems among PhD students, beyond those rates seen in the general public. Our results indicate a problem with the current system of PhD study – or perhaps with academic more widely. Academia notoriously encourages a culture of overwork and under-appreciation.

This mindset is present among PhD students. In our focus groups and surveys for other research , PhD students reported wearing their suffering as a badge of honour and a marker that they are working hard enough rather than too much. One student told us :

“There is a common belief … you have to suffer for the sake of your PhD, if you aren’t anxious or suffering from impostor syndrome, then you aren’t doing it "properly”.

We explored the potential risk factors that could lead to poor mental health among PhD students and the things that could protect their mental health.

Financial insecurity was one risk factor. Not all researchers receive funding to cover their course and personal expenses, and once their PhD is complete, there is no guarantee of a job. The number of people studying for a PhD is increasing without an equivalent increase in postdoctoral positions .

Another risk factor was conflict in their relationship with their academic supervisor . An analogy offered by one of our PhD student collaborators likened the academic supervisor to a “sword” that you can use to defeat the “PhD monster”. If your weapon is ineffective, then it makes tackling the monster a difficult – if not impossible – task. Supervisor difficulties can take many forms. These can include a supervisor being inaccessible, overly critical or lacking expertise.

A lack of interests or relationships outside PhD study, or the presence of stressors in students’ personal lives were also risk factors.

We have also found an association between poor mental health and high levels of perfectionism, impostor syndrome (feeling like you don’t belong or deserve to be studying for your PhD) and the sense of being isolated .

Better conversations

Doctoral research is not all doom and gloom. There are many students who find studying for a PhD to be both enjoyable and fulfilling , and there are many examples of cooperative and nurturing research environments across academia.

Studying for a PhD is an opportunity for researchers to spend several years learning and exploring a topic they are passionate about. It is a training programme intended to equip students with the skills and expertise to further the world’s knowledge. These examples of good practice provide opportunities for us to learn about what works well and disseminate them more widely.

The wellbeing and mental health of PhD students is a subject that we must continue to talk about and reflect on. However, these conversations need to happen in a way that considers the evidence, offers balance, and avoids perpetuating unhelpful myths.

Indeed, in our own study, we found that the percentage of PhD students who believed their peers had mental health problems and that poor mental health was the norm, exceeded the rates of students who actually met diagnostic criteria for a common mental health problem . That is, PhD students may be overestimating the already high number of their peers who experienced mental health problems.

We therefore need to be careful about the messages we put out on this topic, as we may inadvertently make the situation worse. If messages are too negative, we may add to the myth that all PhD students experience mental health problems and help maintain the toxicity of academic culture.

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4 Signs Your PhD Advisor Is Mistreating You and What to Do About It

PhD students rely on their supervisors for support, help and mentorship. But what happens when your supervisor treats you unfairly? In this article, we will tell about the top 4 signs your PhD advisor is mistreating you.

Why Do PhD Supervisors Turn on Students?

A PhD supervisor can make or break your post-graduate experience. An academic staff has a huge impact on how students feel about their experience. So, it’s hard when your supervisor starts treating you unfairly. Some students end up being micromanaged, bullied, and even abandoned by their advisors.

A conflict in working styles is one of the most common reasons why supervisor relationships turn sour. Many PhD advisors expect their students to be perfectly in sync with their work style. They don’t take it kindly when students can’t keep up.

Other times, it happens because of poor communication. Simply clarifying your expectations early can help you set things straight with your supervisor. Sometimes, even relationships that begin well, go on to become intolerable later. It’s all part of the ups and downs of the post-graduate experience.

With that said, there are times when students have advisors who are mistreating them without a clear reason. Let’s see how you can identify a PhD supervisor who mistreats you.

They Manipulate You through Praise

Mistreatment takes many forms. But you least expect it from someone who excessively praises you. Funnily enough, that is how some PhD advisors mistreat students. This type of behavior is called love bombing.

First, they will shower potential candidates with praises, telling them they are unlike other students they’ve worked with. They will lure you with promises of publications and prestigious institutions. However, it all ends after you join their research group.

As soon as you face problems like failed experiments, the same person could behave very differently. Instead of helping you modify your approach and reevaluate methods, they may belittle you.

The best way to pick up on such habits is to ask senior students in the program about their experience. Likewise, you can also ask the advisors how they relate to other students and how students relate to them.

In other words, if you sense your advisor is overpraising you or making fantastic claims about your acumen and credentials, pay attention to how they talk about other graduate students. Therefore, if an advisor tells you (a new graduate student) not to listen to senior graduate students because you are better than them, it’s likely they will discuss you similarly down the road.

They Want to Control Your Actions

Going to conferences and networking with people is crucial for the graduate journey. While it isn’t necessary to attend every meeting, you should definitely visit the ones relevant to your field and research topic.

A good supervisor will help you learn new skills and accelerate your professional and academic goals. Even if they disagree, they will let you decide what’s best for you. However, abusive advisors will stop you from attending conferences unless you have their permission. They will belittle you for going against their will and their position of power against you.

They Try to Isolate You

Abusers thrive in an environment where victims are isolated and can’t share their experiences. Unfortunately, graduate school is pretty isolating. Students must leave their established support circle, become financially dependent on an institution, and do their best to keep the advisor’s favor.

In such circumstances, it’s easier for abusive supervisors to force students into isolation. They may refuse to include other faculty as a part of your committee, so they have complete control over you.

There have been cases where abusive advisors refuse anyone on the committee who isn’t a part of their cult of personality. In such instances, a student’s success depends heavily on keeping their advisor happy. And since the rest of the committee is filled with people close to the supervisor, voicing your concerns can result in a group backlash or gaslighting.

This is why students need to maintain a strong support network. People around you can help you figure out different ways to avoid these situations.

They Want to Become Gatekeepers for Everything

Abusive supervisors have no qualms about telling you to do things and then get mad if you don’t follow through, even if it’s not directly related to the project. They will force you to ask them for permission for the simplest of things.

Impolite advisors may make it mandatory for students to ask for permission before approaching or talking to anyone at a conference. Other times, they might stop you from publishing your article in a journal until they have approved it.

Regardless, it’s likely that they won’t permit you and eventually force you to act on your own, only to then lash out at you for not listening.

In summary, the main purpose of mistreating supervisors is to misuse their power over you and exert their control over you. If you think your PhD advisor is mistreating you or stopping you from publishing an article, don’t worry; we have you covered.

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• CAREER COLUMN
• 10 December 2021

Managing up: how to communicate effectively with your PhD adviser

• Lluís Saló-Salgado 0 ,
• Angi Acocella 1 ,
• Ignacio Arzuaga García 2 ,
• Souha El Mousadik 3 &
• Augustine Zvinavashe 4

Lluís Saló-Salgado is a PhD candidate in the Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Cambridge. Twitter: @lluis_salo.

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Angi Acocella is a PhD candidate in the Center for Transportation & Logistics at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in Cambridge. LinkedIn: @angi-acocella.

Ignacio Arzuaga García is a PhD student in the Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Cambridge. LinkedIn: @ignacioarzuaga.

Souha El Mousadik is a PhD student in the Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Cambridge.

Augustine Zvinavashe is a PhD candidate in the Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Cambridge.

When you start a PhD, you also begin a professional relationship with your PhD adviser. This is an exciting moment: interacting with someone for whom you might well have great respect and admiration, but who might also slightly intimidate you.

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doi: https://doi.org/10.1038/d41586-021-03703-z

This is an article from the Nature Careers Community, a place for Nature readers to share their professional experiences and advice. Guest posts are encouraged .

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Dealing With Abuse in Grad School

By  GradHacker

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One sees signs across many campuses encouraging people to “say something” if they “see something,” but what does that mean for graduate students?  Many graduate students experience some form of abuse, but we often feel helpless to do anything about it.  We sense that something is wrong with  us  rather than the institutionalized patterns of derision, infantilization, neglect, and exploitation.  To make matters worse, a blanket of silence shrouds this abuse.  Those who are brave enough to address the issue are often suppressed or dismissed.  Until we can bring about structural change as the next generation of scholars, we need to focus on supporting each other, finding individual solutions, and pushing our universities to provide greater protection.

In my own case, after many months of fruitless and unnecessary work, constant denigration of my mental competence and even my character, I was forced to give up my research fellowship and find a different advisor who would oversee my last comprehensive exam and direct my dissertation. Through the university Ombudsman, I contacted the associate dean of the Graduate School, who was incredibly helpful and was willing to back me in my department, and I am fortunate to have a supportive guidance committee, colleagues, friends, family, and husband who helped me navigate months of paperwork and uncertainty. Finally, I found a new advisor who has made the transition as smooth as possible, and I have been able to move forward in my degree.

However, I know that is not the case for everyone.  In doing some research for the post, I ran across numerous accounts of graduate students who were forced out of their programs because they had no way to redress the attacks and could not find any alternatives that would allow them to continue.  The problem is even greater for women, who are all too often harassed sexually by male professors and peers.  To shed light on such abuse often means sacrificing one’s career.  The long-term solution lies with us; we can begin to change the culture of academia one department and class at a time by holding each other to higher standards, but we will need administrative and professorial allies to confront current injustice.

If you are dealing with abuse of any kind, please know that it is  not  your fault.  If someone you know is going through a similar experience, please let them know that they are not alone.  My colleagues provided the support and encouragement I needed to get through a very difficult situation.

Some Suggestions:

• Form graduate student support groups. Contact your counseling center for materials that will maintain a positive focus for the group and address the issues that come up.
• Contact a counselor to help you deal with the negative mindset, lack of self-confidence, and shame that often result from abuse.
• Share what is happening with trusted friends and family who can provide some balance to your perspective and remind you of your many strengths.
• Contact your Ombudsman, Graduate School, graduate director and/or department chair, and trusted professors who will maintain confidentiality.  These people will help you determine the best course of action and provide the support you need to see it through.
• Save emails, record conversations, and document instances of abuse to protect yourself and provide evidence if requested or necessary.

Some Resources Online:

• Spotting the Signs of Emotional Abuse
• How to humanize higher education and reduce human suffering
• Surviving a Bad Advisor
• Grad Students’ Live Journal
•   “My grief lies all within” — PhD students, depression & attrition
•   PhD education and mental health: A follow-up

Also be sure to check out your counseling center’s website for other helpful information and support groups that might already be available.

“No one, ever, under any circumstances, deserves to be humiliated, undermined, insulted, shunned, marginalized, ganged up on, or even spoken to harshly. If it has happened to you, you did not cause it to happen. And you are not alone.”  [1]

"Nothing strengthens authority as much as silence." Leonardo da Vinci

"All that is necessary for evil to succeed is that good men [or good women] do nothing." Winston Churchill.

[Image by Flickr User  TheJudge310  used under Creative Commons License]

Listen: How Colleges Are Making Career Development an Undercurrent of Education

The latest Voices of Student Success episode explores how career integration can boost students’ outcomes, addr

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5 Strategies to Support Academic Advisors

All who advise students should be empowered with the knowledge to help them succeed..

Posted June 27, 2024 | Reviewed by Michelle Quirk

• Why Education Is Important
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• Advisors need robust professional development and clear career paths to maintain consistency.
• Policies, processes, and technologies should be simplified to give advisors more time to advise students.
• Messaging around advising should emphasize its value to students beyond choosing classes.

Earlier this month, I had the honor to serve on a panel about advising best practices at a gathering of the Detroit Drives Degrees Community College Collaborative (D3C3) at Schoolcraft College. Jamie Storey, director of higher education innovation at the Michigan College Access Network (MCAN), opened by asking each panelist why academic advising is core to a college’s mission. We each expressed how students will never have a transformative educational experience or gain invaluable career training without the skilled work of college advisors to help students navigate our institutions.

Insights from my fellow panelists, along with the ensuing conversations with community college advisors from across southeast Michigan, unearthed five key recommendations for supporting and strengthening advising.

• Everyone is an advisor. Leticia Wilson, director of advising initiatives at Del Mar College in Corpus Christi, TX, spoke about how anyone and everyone on campus who helps a student is an advisor. Advising can be as great as mapping a student’s graduation plan or as small as pointing that student to the library, but all advising is pivotal to that student’s success. All staff and faculty must feel ownership over advising and empowered with the knowledge (or, at least, know who has the knowledge) to help students succeed.
• Simplify policy. Erica Orians, vice president and executive director for the Michigan Center for Student Success, discussed the importance of simplifying policies and processes. For example, she advocated for abolishing graduation applications, instead placing the onus on colleges (and, more importantly, their student information systems) to inform students when they’re eligible to graduate. Removing hassle factors will allow students and advisors to have more meaningful conversations unburdened by having to check boxes. New policies should also be reviewed by advisors who will be responsible for implementation and best understand how those policies may inadvertently harm students and threaten equity .
• Support advisors. Darryl Gardner, vice provost for student success, support, and engagement at Wayne State, shared the robust professional development they provide for their advisors’ continual growth. Likewise, both Gardner and Wilson highlighted the need for defined career trajectories for advisors, so they see future opportunities at their institution. Room for advancement will bolster employee retention, which benefits students by providing continuity to their advising relationships.
• Proactively connect students to advising. I discussed how behavioral science strategies can reshape students’ mindsets around advising. First, colleges need to make clear the value of advising beyond choosing classes; most students don’t realize how awesome their advisors are! Messages that connect advising to a student’s values and prosocial goals , not just the proximal task of registering for the next term, may resonate. Moreover, many colleges only require advising at intake, but changing norms to (at least) biannual advising could make such behavior a habit.
• Keep technology student- and advisor-friendly. Finally, many advisors voiced concerns that too much advising time is spent either troubleshooting student-facing technology or navigating clunky advising tools. CRMs, LMSs, SISs, and so forth are meant to increase efficiency, but before adopting any tool, first understand what advisors and students need, and whether technology will help or hinder their goals . Advisors also expressed the need for proactive training and robust support when new technology is introduced.

Many of these insights resonated with my own work. For several years, I’ve led professional development workshops for advisors (as well as faculty and other staff) to teach behavioral science strategies for student success. Advisors are always so engaged with learning best practices for better supporting their students. And I’ve written extensively on how to connect students to resources, like advising, including in a recent partnership with Lumina Foundation.

It was a pleasure to share my expertise with these community college advisors, but even better to learn from them. If you’re reading this and you’re an advisor, my humble appreciation goes to you for your challenging and important work. And if you’re in another role in academia, thank an advisor for all that they do for students!

Ross E. O'Hara, Ph.D. , is a behavioral researcher and he applies his expertise in behavioral science to develop scalable interventions that improve college student retention.

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Advisor-advisee relationships between PhD students and faculty are vital to research, but advising dynamics can be challenging for both student and advisor. Though advising can involve egregious problems such as sexual harassment, we focus on what might ...

Technology-facilitated abuse in relationships: Victimisation patterns and impact in young people

Research into technology-facilitated abuse in relationships (TAR) focuses predominantly on TAR prevalence and correlates. This study examines TAR impact (fear/distress), and multi-dimensional patterns of youth TAR victimisation. Using ...

• The Multi-dimensional Humiliation Pattern of TAR was experienced by men more than women and had the highest impact.

Image-based sexual abuse: The extent, nature, and predictors of perpetration in a community sample of Australian residents

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Stories from The University of Texas Health Science Center at Houston (UTHealth Houston)

Graduate School hosts 2024 Graduate Student Research Day

Written by: Elizabeth Murphy/MD Anderson UTHealth Graduate School | Updated: June 26, 2024

MD Anderson Cancer Center UTHealth Houston Graduate School of Biomedical Sciences held its annual Graduate Student Research Day at the Cooley Life Center on Thursday, June 13. More than 233 alumni, students, and faculty attended the event. Students were given the opportunity to present their research during a full day of competition, featuring oral and poster presentations as well as elevator pitches.

The keynote speech, “Using Multi-omics to Understand Human Skin Evolution Out-of-Africa and Skin Health Disparities”, was presented by Cristina deGuzman Strong, PhD, associate scientist in the Department of Dermatology at the Henry Ford Cancer Institute Center for Cutaneous Biology and Immunology and associate professor in the Department of Medicine at Michigan State University’s College of Human Medicine.

The event concluded with an awards ceremony.

See photos from GSRD here.

The Graduate School is proud to present the winners from the 2024 GSRD competitions:

Oral Presentation Skills – Pre-Candidacy PhD, MS & SMS, 1 st year

1 st : Mariana Najjar (Advisor: Hui-Wen Lo, PhD)

2 nd : Xing-Han Zhang (Advisor: Georgios Karras, PhD)

1 st year student award: Marina Najjar (Advisor: Hui-Wen Lo, PhD)

Oral Presentation Skills – Post-Candidacy PhD

1 st : Takese McKenzie (Advisor: Jian Hu, PhD)

2 nd : Emily Caggiano (Advisor: Emil Schueler, PhD)

Poster Competitions

Top 4 Poster Competition – Pre-Candidacy PhD, MS & SMS, 1 st year:

Vicky Chuong (Advisor: Fabricio Do Monte, DVM, PhD)

Peyton High (Advisor: Kendra Carmon, PhD)

Sophia Huang (Advisor: Vihang Narkar, PhD)

Julia Zickus (Advisor: Pratip Bhattacharya, PhD)

1 st year student award: Sophia Huang (Advisor: Vihang Narkar, PhD)

Top 4 Poster Competition – Post-Candidacy PhD

Bridgette Palacios (Advisor: Jian Hu, PhD)

Guillaume Trusz (Advisor: Michael Curran, PhD)

Llaran Turner (Advisor: George Eisenhoffer, PhD)

Amanda Warner (Advisor: Don Gibbons, PhD)

Elevator Speech Contest – Pre-Candidacy PhD, MS & SMS, 1 st year

1 st : Madison Shyer (Advisor: Valentin Dragoi, PhD)

2 nd : Zeph Kaffey (Advisor: C. David Fuller, PhD)

People’s Choice Award: Spring Hwang (Advisor: Jian Hu, PhD)

Elevator Speech Contest – Post-Candidacy PhD

1 st : Richa Nayak (Advisor: Yejing Ge, PhD)

2 nd : Yuejiang Lu (Advisor: Humam Kadana, PhD)

People's Choice Award: Barbara Marquez (Advisor: Laurence Court, PhD)

GSRD Scavenger Hunt Winners:

Michael Vouffo

Beatriz Rios

Esther Lujan

Andrea Ramirez

Hannah Wani

2023 Dissertation Awardees:

Alfred G. Knudson, Jr., Outstanding Dissertation Award: Vidhi Chandra, PhD (Advisor: Florencia McAllister, PhD)

Michael R. Blackburn Outstanding Dissertation Award: Melissa Franch (Advisor: Valentin Dragoi, PhD)

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• SDSU lands six winners of the competitive Fulbright U.S. Student Program awards

Research on an infectious pathogen and teaching English are among the plans for visits to countries ranging from Ecuador to South Korea.

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With destinations ranging from South America to Polynesia, at least six San Diego State University students and recent alumni have won Fulbright U.S. Student Program grants for international study for the upcoming 2024-25 academic year.

Four SDSU Fulbright recipients will conduct research abroad, while two will work in Fulbright’s English Teaching Assistant Program. Recipients will travel to Tonga, Spain, South Korea, Turkey, Ecuador and Argentina. Approval for a potential seventh grant is pending.

Funded primarily through the U.S. State Department, Fulbright grants provide students with the opportunity to expand their perspectives and improve understanding of different cultures. About 2,000 students nationwide receive one-year Fulbright grants annually.

“We are very proud of these impressive and newly minted Fulbright Scholars who have earned this highly competitive and prestigious honor,” said Cristina Alfaro , SDSU associate vice president of International Affairs.

Among them is Gabriela Contreras , who graduated with a bachelor’s degree in chemistry last fall and initially had low expectations about her Fulbright chances.

“I was thinking there are probably students from the Ivy leagues and top universities in the U.S. applying,” she said. 

In January, her hopes picked up when she was named a semi-finalist. Then this spring, she received an electronic notice that her Fulbright application had been updated. “I opened the portal, and I actually got it.” 

An alum of SDSU Professor Tom Huxford ’s Structural Biochemistry Lab, Contreras will focus her Fulbright research on combatting Staphylococcus aureus, an antibiotic-resistant pathogen found in hospitals that is the leading bacterial cause of death worldwide. 

She will travel to South Korea and work in the lab of Kim Kyeong Kyu , a structural biologist and professor in the Department of Precision Medicine at Sungkyunkwan University, supported by the Samsung Biomedical Research Institute. After the trip, she plans to enroll in graduate school in the Bay Area.

“I am looking forward to seeing how people from different cultures conduct science,” said Contreras. “Dr. Kim Kyeong Kyu’s laboratory is diverse. There are people from Bangladesh, Vietnam. There have been a few Americans in the past. I am excited to be working in an international laboratory.”

SDSU’s success rate for Fulbright applications was a highlight of this past cycle, said Yoshiko Higurashi , SDSU professor emerita of Japanese and Fulbright Student Advisor for the university.

Of the 20 students who applied, 10 were named semi-finalists, with six receiving the honor to date. An additional student awaits authorization from the host country’s government, and another was named a Fulbright alternate. 

“All of them are ladies, by the way, brilliant ladies,” said Higurashi.

Last year, two SDSU students became Fulbright scholars. Since 2005-06, 108 SDSU students have been awarded Fulbright grants. The top year for SDSU came in 2013, with 11 student Fulbright recipients out of 45 applicants, said Higurashi.

Higurashi credited her predecessor, Provost Emerita Nancy Marlin , for much of the success. Marlin continued to advise SDSU Fulbright Student Program applicants through August 2023. 

The application window is open for the next round of Fulbright U.S. Student Awards for the 2025-26 cycle, with submission deadlines beginning in August. Higurashi hopes more SDSU students will apply for Fulbright awards given this year’s strong performance. 

Contreras agrees.

“Honestly, just apply,” she said. “Let them tell you no. Who knows, they might say yes like they did for me.”

Here is a look at the other SDSU student Fulbright recipients in the 2024-25 cycle:

As a child visiting relatives in Turkey, Gulce Ozturk loved snorkeling. These underwater adventures ignited her interest in environmental sciences. After earning her bachelor’s degree and working in the field, she joined SDSU’s Marine Conservation and Ecology Lab, also known as the Hovel Lab, as a graduate student. Her Fulbright research in Turkey focuses on the impact of invasive species on native urchin populations in the Mediterranean and Aegean Seas.

The daughter of immigrant parents from Tonga, Mele’ana K. Akolo witnessed the pain that substance abuse can bring to hard-to-reach and under-represented communities. Now advancing toward her Ph.D. in Interdisciplinary Research, Akolo will travel to the island nation of Tonga to probe gender differences in drug services and how the needs of women can be better addressed in treatments for substance use disorders.

As first-generation immigrants, Arianna Spata ’s family struggled with access to consistent and affordable health care. That led her to study biology on a pre-med track and join SDSU’s Maternal and Infant Health Among Refugee and Asylum-Seeking Woman Project. Now a Public Health Epidemiology and Latin American Studies graduate student, she will travel to Argentina to research the postpartum impacts of insufficient prenatal care among migrant women in Buenos Aires.

At 16, Madison Fitzpatrick joined an organization that provided English as a Second Language classes to Latinx adults. The experience taught her not only effective teaching techniques but also how small steps, such as helping individuals gain dual language skills, can be life changing. A SDSU International Security and Conflict Resolution graduate, Fitzpatrick received a Fulbright English Teaching Assistant Award in Ecuador.

• SDSU makes list of Money’s ‘Best Colleges in America’

San Diego State earns high marks for value and graduation rates

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