Peer group mentoring for racially underrepresented early career biomedical researchers: Identifying the unique influence of psychosocial support on personal gains and objective career outcomes

摘要 美国人口中的很大一部分，特别是某些种族和民族群体，仍然代表不足(UR) 在生物医学研究(BMR)劳动力中。尽管美国国立卫生研究院采用了多样性- 集中努力增加基础研究中UR科学家的比例，这些努力主要集中在 本科生和博士后水平。种族/族裔代表性不足在每个阶段都很明显。 BMR的职业轨迹，尽管从博士后研究员(博士后)过渡到学院和助理 副教授代表BMR最大的减员风险点。辅导不足，人数较少 与榜样的接触和孤立与学术界中种族/族裔代表性不足有关。这个 UR小组的二元指导模式是有限的，因为UR高级教员很少，而且可能不存在 解决UR科学家在BMR中经历的孤立问题。同龄人小组辅导是一种建立起一种 指导社区和几个(由资深教师推动的)UR的同行小组指导模式 博士后和初级教师已经显示出令人振奋的结果。然而，这项研究是不受控制的 不允许将心理社会支持的贡献与以技能为基础的贡献分开 辅导。 这项建议的主要目标是确定心理社会组成部分对 同龄人小组辅导不仅是基于技能的辅导，而且还能带来个人收获和 UR早期生物医学研究人员采用促进型同伴团体辅导的客观职业结果 接近。北卡罗来纳大学和杜克大学将共同随机挑选160名UR男性 BMR中的女性博士后或助理教授到两个9个月的同龄人小组中的一个，分层指导 按性别和级别，并由UR BMR高级学院(有6-8名同事/小组)协助：1)仅以技能为基础 促进手稿和资助写作技能和其他学术产品；或2)基于技能+心理社会 包括关于微侵略性、冒名顶替者综合症等主题的半结构化讨论，以及 文化资本。将对参与者进行短期评估(自我效能、归属感、对刻板印象的脆弱性 威胁和职业认同)、中期(职业满意度和职业承诺)和较长期 结果(美国国立卫生研究院拨款分数、资金、出版物、引文、留任、晋升) 并在同伴指导干预后至少2年。50%的参与者将提供 定性数据(访谈、焦点小组和书面叙述)，以阐明 干预措施会影响结果。这项研究有望为可扩展的、 对于早期职业生涯的有效指导方法，UR在其他机构的生物医学研究人员。

Abstract Large sectors of the US population, especially certain racial and ethnic groups, remain underrepresented (UR) in the biomedical research (BMR) workforce. Although the National Institutes of Health has employed diversity- focused efforts to increase the proportion of UR scientists in BMR, these efforts have been largely focused at the undergraduate and predoctoral level. Racial/ethnic underrepresentation is evident at each stage of the BMR career trajectory, though the transitions from Postdoctoral Fellow (Postdoc) to Faculty and from Assistant to Associate Professor represent points of greatest risk for attrition from BMR. Inadequate mentoring, less access to role models, and isolation are implicated in racial/ethnic underrepresentation in academia. The dyadic mentoring model for UR groups is limited because few senior UR faculty exist and because it may not address the isolation experienced by UR scientists in BMR. Peer group mentoring is a strategy that builds a mentoring community and several facilitated (by a senior faculty) peer group mentoring models for UR Postdocs and Junior Faculty have shown promising outcomes. However, that research is uncontrolled and does not permit the disentanglement of the contributions of psychosocial support from those of skills-based mentoring. The primary objective of this proposal is to determine the unique contribution that psychosocial components of peer group mentoring make, above and beyond that of skills-based mentoring, to both personal gains and objective career outcomes for UR early career biomedical researchers using a facilitated peer group mentoring approach. The University of North Carolina and Duke University together will randomize 160 UR men and women Postdocs or Assistant Professors in BMR to one of two, 9-month, peer group mentoring arms, stratified by gender and rank, and facilitated by a senior UR BMR Faculty (with 6-8 peers/group),: 1) Skills-based only to facilitate manuscript and grant writing skills and other academic products; or 2) Skills-based + Psychosocial to include semi-structured discussions on topics such as microaggressions, the imposter syndrome, and cultural capital. Participants will be assessed for short-term (self-efficacy, belonging, vulnerability to stereotype threat, and professional identity), medium-term (career satisfaction and career commitment) and longer-term outcomes (NIH grant scores, funding, publications, citations, retention, promotion) at interim time points during and for a minimum of 2 years following the peer mentoring intervention. 50% of participants will provide qualitative data (interviews, focus groups, and written narratives) to elucidate the mechanisms by which the interventions influence outcomes. This research is expected to provide the evidence base for a scalable, effective approach to mentoring early career, UR biomedical researchers at other institutions.