The unhappy postdoc: a survey based study.

The emerging public discourse about the "broken" postdoc system is mostly conceptual (with several recent exceptions). The current work offers an attempt to quantify postdocs' perceptions, goals, and well-being. A survey of 190 postdocs in North America. This article first reveals a surprisingly unhappy postdoc community with low life satisfaction. Second, it demonstrates how over the course of the fellowship many postdocs lose interest in the goal of pursuing a tenure track academic position (20%) or in recommending the postdoc track to others (30%). Finally, we find that among a large number of factors that can enhance life satisfaction for postdocs (e.g., publication productivity, resources available to them) only one factor stood out as significant: the degree to which atmosphere in the lab is pleasant and collegial. Our findings can stimulate policy, managerial, and career development improvements in the context of the postdoc system.