Self-doubt, confusion and low self-esteem. Each of these are feelings you might experience when you believe you are not deserving of the position you are in today; you cannot rationalise your current reality and instead contribute your success to other factors, not your own hard work. This is more commonly known as imposter syndrome and is more prevalent in today’s society than ever before. Imposter syndrome can occur in any field, and at any level, but this article will refer to STEM careers and/or higher education.
As a young woman, embarking upon my career within Neuroscience, and as the first individual within my family to pursue a STEM career, the emotions that imposter syndrome caused greatly impacted my journey, from before I entered university up until now as a postgraduate student. Imposter syndrome not only affected the way I viewed myself, but also altered the prospects I had for myself within my neuroscience career. So, how can we recognise and combat the feeling that we don’t deserve certain achievements or careers? In this article, I will be sharing my top three tips that I have learnt throughout my neuroscience career that you too can take on board, hopefully allowing you to recognise these self-critical thoughts and shift them into more uplifting ones.
1. Recognising that your thoughts towards your current situation are self-critical
The initial step to defeating your imposter syndrome, particularly as a woman in STEM, is to recognise that the thoughts that are entering your head about your new job role or your position within a particular university or institution, for example, are self-deprecating and are not always healthy. Whilst this can be easier said than done, recognising these thoughts and feeling the consequent negative emotions, such as guilt or low mood, is an important first step in pinpointing that you are stuck in a certain perspective. Consider this scenario for example - you are taking part in a group discussion with your class at university and whilst waiting for your turn to speak, you are listening to your peers’ ideas upon the chosen topic. One of your peers shares an excellent answer that, at the time, you feel is much better than yours. Subsequently, you begin to develop feelings of self-doubt and low self-esteem through believing that you do not share the same academic ability as your peers. And so, in this scenario, noticing that you are feeling such emotions instead of putting them to the side is the first step to defeating imposter syndrome and developing your confidence as a student or academic.
2. Shifting your self-critical thoughts into positive, uplifting ones
One method that particularly worked for me to combat imposter syndrome throughout my neuroscience journey was taking small steps to help rewire my brain’s thought processes from self-critical thoughts to those that reinforce confidence and high self-esteem. Let’s take the previous scenario, for example, where thoughts of you not being clever enough or good enough to participate in this class flood your brain. To act upon this, we would first notice that these thoughts are caused by self-doubt. Instead of reinforcing negative beliefs and allowing this to become a natural thought pattern, we would actively combat these ideas with phrases such as ‘I am good enough’ or ‘I am clever enough’. Whilst this may seem like a silly thing to do initially, it follows the same principle as affirmations, whereby you consistently reinforce positive, confident thoughts about a specific situation to slowly encourage your brain to understand that you truly are each of these positive things.
3. Supporting your positive, uplifting thoughts with concrete facts
Following my two previous tips on how to combat imposter syndrome, there still may be some lingering doubts in your brain that require additional support to help get rid of them. And so, whilst the repetition of positive affirmations does help to rewire your thinking, sometimes the addition of factual information can help solidify these shifts in your mindset. Again, using the scenario we have discussed throughout, it initially began with self-critical thoughts about how ’you’ may not feel as though ‘you’ are good enough to be in that class and take part in such intellectual discussions. To prove that this is not true, we can reverse our thought processes by realising, ‘if I wasn’t clever enough to be in this class, I wouldn’t be here,’ or ‘if I wasn’t good enough to be in this university then, I wouldn’t have achieved the grades to be here or I wouldn’t have passed the interview stage.’ By reinforcing our positive affirmations with facts, we disassociate ourselves from these feelings of self-doubt and move onto those of self-belief and confidence to enable us to achieve whatever we set our minds on.
I am an avid self-help podcast listener, and I have come across some great episodes where imposter syndrome is further discussed and some additional tips and tricks are shared that really helped me when these thoughts began to filter into my head, as a university student.
The first I would like to share is an episode from the podcast, ‘A Millennial Mind’, hosted by digital creator and speaker Shivani Pau with the addition of Bridgerton’s favourite, Charithra Chandran. Whilst this episode explores imposter syndrome from an actress’s point of view, the take home messages on how to combat such feelings are very similar.
These 4 Words Will Silence Your Self-Doubt: A Life-Changing Conversation | The Mel Robbins Podcast (youtube.com)
The second podcast episode I would like to share is an episode from, ‘The Mel Robbins Podcast’, whereby author Mel Robbins shares the most valuable piece of information to help silence the feelings of self-doubt that imposter syndrome brings about.
Ultimately, imposter syndrome is a huge issue, particularly among women working within STEM careers, but with the help of organisations such as WiNUK, there is a community of like-minded individuals who are embarking on their scientific careers. In these communities, open-ended discussions about topics such as imposter syndrome can be had and personal advice or tips on how to manage struggles can be shared! In addition to this, support services such as ‘Student Space’ led by the UK’s student mental health charity, Student Minds, can provide additional support and tailored services to students who are experiencing a range of mental health concerns, because of things like imposter syndrome, through a 24-hour text support line, free online workshops and support groups. I hope the advice and resources I have shared within this article, alongside sharing my own personal experiences surrounding imposter syndrome, have helped you to realise that you are not alone and that together, as today’s generation of scientists, we can combat imposter syndrome within the science community.
Disclaimer: Gender is a self-described characteristic, whilst sex is biologically determined. The term ‘women’ can refer to either or both definitions, and this may vary according to the study cited. At Women in Neuroscience UK, we tackle both sexism and gender biases in neuroscience, by covering topics of sex/gender discrimination in neuroscience workplaces and sex differences in neurological conditions. Our current activities primarily support female-identifying neuroscientists, but we actively encourage people of all gender identities to our community. We believe everyone can benefit from learning and peer support towards more diverse and inclusive neuroscience.
This post was written by Riya Verma and edited by Lauren Wallis and Rebecca Pope, with graphics produced by Lilly Green. If you enjoyed this article, be the first to be notified about new posts by signing up to become a WiNUK member (top right of this page)! Interested in writing for WiNUK yourself? Contact us through the blog page and the editors will be in touch.
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