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  • CAREER COLUMN

Why comparing yourself to other graduate students is counter-productive

Julia Nolte realized that the only fair comparison to make during a PhD is with your past self.
  1. Julia Nolte

    1. Julia Nolte is a developmental psychology PhD student in the Department of Human Development at Cornell University in Ithaca, New York.

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Midway through my psychology PhD programme at Cornell University in Ithaca, New York, I felt that I lacked whatever magical ability is required to finish and publish a project. It seemed as though other graduate students were authoring several papers in the time it took me to complete a single experiment. I worked as hard as I could, but my progress seemed to be incremental compared with theirs.

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Nature 587, 319-320 (2020)

doi: https://doi.org/10.1038/d41586-020-03040-7

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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