Welcome to Labmosphere, a social experiment and resource in the making. We are currently a small team of graduate students in the academic sciences\u00a0who also have a wide array of interests in psychology, mindfulness, organizational behavior, and human wellbeing and happiness. We care about our fellow man (one of the many reasons we joined scientific exploration) and dislike seeing some of our best and brightest going through difficult and stressful times.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
We’ve unfortunately\u00a0observed plenty of disappointment, cynicism, and sadness in the field of academic science, as well as many of the smartest scientists in their respective fields leaving for alternative careers (which isn’t a bad thing necessarily!) because they felt like they had no other choice.\u00a0This is not specific to one lab or one institute, but spans the entire enterprise, at all levels. That’s not to say it’s all bad, and in fact, we\u00a0find most people we\u00a0talk to (even those who are at their lowest), cling to those distant memories when everything about their work excited them and life in the lab seemed like a dream come true.<\/p>\n
A few, if not all, of the issues we’ve talked about with friends, mentors, PIs, and counselors, have solutions at the individual or population level. They require shifts in culture however, and because that is based on perception and language, we hope to promote discussions on here that we’re sure are already occurring in universities around the world. We\u00a0also hope that these discussions will lead to real-life, practical solutions to the issues we face on a daily basis as well as those of a more chronic nature. We believe in community, and the power of dialogue and discussion. So we have created this website for you, and welcome any suggestions and participation in its development\u00a0phase.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n Like the good scientists that we are, we have done our reading and discussing and noticed common threads of thoughts and ideas in those we interact with daily. We believe the time is right for many of the cultural and paradigm shifts that the scientific enterprise must go through for it to become sustainable through and beyond the twenty-first century.<\/p>\n But we are neither web designers nor social scientists\u00a0and\u00a0are also working on our own grad theses at the moment. So while we get our bearings around the world of website design and blogging, we ask for your patience and suggestions to make this site as good as it can get. Most of the original blogs will be shared with and seen by people close to us\u00a0in the scientific community. If you’re going through the archives at some point in the distant future and happen to stumble upon this, we can only hope the website you’re interacting with has improved\u00a0significantly from its humble beginnings.<\/p>\n We already have a few ideas for the general layout of the website and the way we’ll allow people to interact with each other on here. The idea is to build an e-community that begins accumulating momentum and force to give us leverage\u00a0for promoting change at the higher levels. We also have a few posts in the making and are discussing new ones with every new article we read or conversation we have.\u00a0But at the end of the day, this is your website, and\u00a0we want you to get involved, either through suggestions and discussions or by joining our team, whether you’re a department head, undergrad, or anyone in between.<\/p>\n So welcome to Labmosphere, where we explore ways to bring about healthier and happier lab atmospheres.<\/p>\n Yours in exploration,<\/p>\n The Labmosphere Team<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Welcome to Labmosphere, a social experiment and resource in the making. We are currently a small team of graduate students in the academic sciences who also have a wide array of interests in psychology, mindfulness, organizational behavior, and human wellbeing and happiness. We care about our fellow man (one of the many reasons we joined scientific exploration) and dislike seeing some of our best and brightest going through difficult and stressful times.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"sfsi_plus_gutenberg_text_before_share":"","sfsi_plus_gutenberg_show_text_before_share":"","sfsi_plus_gutenberg_icon_type":"","sfsi_plus_gutenberg_icon_alignemt":"","sfsi_plus_gutenburg_max_per_row":"","spay_email":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_is_tweetstorm":false,"jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true},"categories":[4],"tags":[13,19,20],"coauthors":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p7z5Ki-t","jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":540,"url":"https:\/\/labmosphere.com\/index.php\/2016\/06\/08\/open-call-for-scientists-zine-art-project\/","url_meta":{"origin":29,"position":0},"title":"Open Call for Scientists – Zine Art Project","date":"June 8, 2016","format":"link","excerpt":"Our friends over at Two Photon Art\u00a0are working on an amazing initiative that combines art, scientists, and the type of story-telling we at Labmosphere absolutely love. But don't take it from us. Here's what they have to say: \"Are you a scientist part of a group that is underrepresented in\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "News and Announcements"","img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i2.wp.com\/labmosphere.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/06\/Zine.jpeg?fit=1000%2C320&ssl=1&resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":850,"url":"https:\/\/labmosphere.com\/index.php\/2017\/11\/19\/choosing-the-right-mentor-for-career-success\/","url_meta":{"origin":29,"position":1},"title":"Choosing the Right Mentor for Career Success","date":"November 19, 2017","format":"link","excerpt":"An excellent article has just been published on the American Society for Cell Biology (ASCB) blog, by Pinar Gurel and Adriana Bankston, summarizing recent efforts by the Future of Research and collaborating organizations on mentoring. In the article, they provide great advice for graduate students and postdocs seeking to expand\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Exceptional Mentors"","img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":526,"url":"https:\/\/labmosphere.com\/index.php\/2016\/06\/07\/mental-health-issues-in-academia-a-documentary\/","url_meta":{"origin":29,"position":2},"title":"Mental Health Issues in Academia – a Documentary","date":"June 7, 2016","format":"image","excerpt":"We have become aware of an amazing initiative taking place that aims to bring light to the struggles of PhD students suffering from mental health issues during their\u00a0studies through\u00a0a documentary. If you or anyone you know might be interested in this, please see the advertisement below for more information. We\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "General"","img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i1.wp.com\/labmosphere.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/06\/thumbnail_Mental-Health-Pic-300x217.jpg?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":710,"url":"https:\/\/labmosphere.com\/index.php\/2016\/11\/05\/redefining-success-stories-introduction\/","url_meta":{"origin":29,"position":3},"title":"Redefining Success Stories – Introduction","date":"November 5, 2016","format":false,"excerpt":"As scientists and academics, we are all familiar with the talks given by respected group heads, both men and women, about balancing work and life, and what paths they took to get to their successful careers. And while these talks do open our perspectives as to what is and isn't\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Redefining Scientific Success"","img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":655,"url":"https:\/\/labmosphere.com\/index.php\/2016\/08\/27\/sexual-harassment-of-students-by-university-staff-hidden-by-non-disclosure-agreements\/","url_meta":{"origin":29,"position":4},"title":"Sexual Harassment of Students by University Staff Hidden by Non-Disclosure Agreements","date":"August 27, 2016","format":"link","excerpt":"In our continued fight against lab bullying and harassment, it is a welcome sight to see that others are pointing out the discrepancy between the incidence, reporting, and effective dealing with instances of harassment (sexual or not) and bullying in academia. We can only hope that through our combined efforts\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Interesting Articles"","img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":520,"url":"https:\/\/labmosphere.com\/index.php\/2016\/06\/07\/postdoc-mysteries\/","url_meta":{"origin":29,"position":5},"title":"Postdoc Mysteries","date":"June 7, 2016","format":"link","excerpt":"An interesting article came out in Science recently detailing the \"mysteries,\" and uncertainties of the Postdoc career track. The comments section of the article is also generating an interesting discussion as to how Postdocs view themselves and their future careers. \u00a0 \u00a0","rel":"","context":"In "Interesting Articles"","img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]}],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/labmosphere.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/29"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/labmosphere.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/labmosphere.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/labmosphere.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/labmosphere.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=29"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/labmosphere.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/29\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/labmosphere.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=29"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/labmosphere.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=29"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/labmosphere.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=29"},{"taxonomy":"author","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/labmosphere.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/coauthors?post=29"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}