Professional Socialization of Doctoral Students

There are studies that focus on doctoral students or junior university teachers which might discuss the target group directly, mapping their characteristics, needs, and issues, but those studies might also be included that, instead of strictly focusing on doctoral students, study how the role of teaching is formed along with the various steps of becoming a teacher. Research on the professional socialization of doctoral students goes back to the

179 1980s and the first conceptual models, which described the stages of development for teaching assistants, were published at the beginning of the 1990s. The early studies focus on the process which describes how a doctoral student prepares for the above mentioned roles concluding that professional socialization should happen more thoroughly and at a deeper level.

The starting point of our study is that the professional socialization of doctoral students depends on various elements. Firstly, they need to learn the socialization traditions, roles and rules of at least two different roles – that of teachers and researchers¹ (Mundy et al, 2012). Our questions are: what are the possible ways of preparing doctoral students, and how can they carry out continuous development in connection with their roles?. McDaniels (2010) points out that apart from “classic roles” such as teaching and researching, doctoral students have community tasks and activities resulting from being active citizens. Their socialization is significantly defined by the organizational culture, the climate and system of expectations typical of teaching and researching, and the demographic-socio-economic processes that have a marked effect on the field as well (such as info-communication technologies, the change in the labour market of education, and the experiences of underrepresented social groups) (Austin – McDaniels, 2006).

The initial approaches to professional socialization worked with stage-models which understood the socialization process as a series of stages that follow one another and through which junior researchers could eventually be socialized into the given academic culture. In later studies it was suggested that the process of socialization should be approached in a more complex manner, understood as a dialectical and culturally defined phenomenon in which culture is debatable and individuals bring their experiences, ideas and views with them which come into contact with the expectations of the given organization. In other words, the post-modern approach to the socialization process highlights the fact that the organization supports the beginners in understanding and accepting the organizational expectations while encouraging them to reinterpret the organizational culture rather than merely to reproduce it. To sum it up, while learning about the organization, the new members also change it to some extent.

1 We are aware that there are more than two roles; however, in the case of teaching, the international literature argues that while researching tasks and the perfection of these skills is clearly a part of being a university teacher, this discourse is not characteristic regarding the teaching aspect. It is due to this that the role of teaching is often secondary compared to researching. This does not mean that there are no other roles, as for example the interpretation of different roles is different for a young junior university teacher, for a doctoral student or for a university teacher.

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Austin and McDaniels (2006) and Pyhältö et al. (2009) both point out that the learning environment created by the academic community has the most significant effect on the quality of the doctoral programs and the experiences of the doctoral students. In other words, the learning environment either supports well-being and satisfaction or fosters dysfunctional emotions which can lead to dropping out early. Ideal learning environments are characterised by student-centred methods and the division of control, enabling the doctoral students to build and maintain meaningful relationships with each other and with their supervisors, through which they integrate into the academic community. Vermont and Verloop created the category of constructive friction which supposes a dynamic interaction between the student and the learning environment, in which students are supported in developing their academic knowledge and competences. As opposed to this, in the case of destructive friction, which is characterised by a teacher-centred attitude, there is no shared control and support. The way in which doctoral students experience their learning environment influences their professional identities and the development of their expertise (Pyhältö et al, 2009, 2012).

There are various factors that have an effect on the experiences of doctoral students during their studies such as their relationship with their supervisor, the academic community, the views and ideas of doctoral students and supervisors about supervising and researching.

The multi-element process is partially due to the fact that doctoral students, during their training and professional socialization, face a number of difficulties which can be looked at from a number of different perspectives. In their research focusing on Finnish doctoral students, Pyhältö et al. (2009, 2012) sought to answer the questions of what problems do doctoral students have to face, and how these problems are connected to well-being and study engagement. They studied the relationship between opinions on the learning environment, well-being and perseverance in continuing one’s studies. They concluded that the academic community and the supervision they received had a definitive role in how doctoral students experienced their doctoral education. Those who felt that they were a part of the academic community had positive experiences about their learning environment and were more satisfied with their studies compared to the outsiders who did not feel integrated into the academic community. One third of the students who participated in the study reported that they did not feel that they were a part of the academic community or at least felt that their relationship to the academic community was problematic. Those doctoral students who studied behavioural science (pedagogy, psychology, teacher training) were the ones to mention their problems with supervision and the academic community most frequently, for which the primary reason might be that, since they are experts in the fields of learning, teaching and pedagogy, they are more sensitive to pedagogical practices and communicational problems. As a solution they suggested that cooperation (such as doing research together, writing joint articles and giving constructive feedback) with more intensively supported doctoral students might help the integration of less supported

181 students into the academic community. One of the most important conclusions of the study was that there is a clear connection between the well-being of students and their plans pertaining to giving up or interrupting their doctoral studies.

In their study Golde and Dore (2001) concluded that teaching is the primary reason why one wishes to pursue a university career (McDaniels, 2010). According to them, doctoral students are deeply committed to teaching, because of which it is increasingly more important to maintain and find ways of supporting this commitment. Positive confirmation has the most effect on the decisions of talented young researchers on whether they choose an academic career or not. In addition to these, it is also crucial that doctoral students should learn key competences which will enable them to become successful university teachers. McDaniels (2009) defines four components that doctoral students must learn in order to operate successfully:

- conceptual interpretations: includes interpretations that reflect on professional identity, field of study, the diverse institutional culture and the target system of tertiary education

- knowledge and competence in the main areas of teaching: the interpretation of the teaching-learning process: how do students learn, teaching strategies, differences between fields of study, and obstacles which doctoral students might have to face - interpersonal competences: oral and written communication, cooperation, ability to

cooperate with a variety of students and colleagues

- professional attitudes and habits: attitudes and habits that make the work-family balance and participation in life-long learning possible