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The Struggle is Real: Mental Health in Academia with Özgün Ünver
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Perhaps more than any other industry, mental health struggles seem rampant in academia.
The stress, isolation, common lack of work-life balance, and anxiety can have serious implications for grad students and established researchers alike, when combined with the nebulous work and deliverable structure that is common in the sciences.
To dive further into this phenomenon, I spoke with Özgün Ünver -- a social scientist who recovered from a debilitating burnout at the tail-end of her PhD.
Seeing this as an opportunity to raise awareness and help other academics avoid the same fate, she has become a "burnout coach" (and podcast host!) for academics, helping them to navigate their current situations and proactively manage their mental health, and to help them recover from burnouts in a healthy, measured way.
This episode is important to me as I (like many others) had some pretty big problems with my own mental health in grad school.
We touch on SO many points (we'll definitely need a second chat), including:
- Why mental health struggles are over-represented in academia
- Why "setting boundaries" isn't always possible or the best advice
- How the work and deliverable structure of academia makes it difficult to maintain work-life balance
- The rise of unpaid labour and increasing expectations placed on academics
- The difficulties in speaking out against PIs who have been less-than-kind
I had a blast chatting with Özgün! There is so much ground to cover with this issue -- we only scratched the surface. If you enjoyed it and want us to continue this conversation, get in touch and let us know!
Reach out via:
Email - biosplainingpodcast@gmail.com
Özgün's podcast - https://www.mindyourownrevisions.com/podcast
Twitter - @IraSherr @ozgununver
Credits:
Audio everything - Fred Brenton
Visual identity - Gio Petrucci/GIOGRAFIK
Dr. Andrew Huberman's Podcast - https://hubermanlab.com/
--- Send in a voice message: https://podcasters.spotify.com/pod/show/biosplaining/message
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