On Thu, 2 Sep 1999, Martin J. Bourgeois wrote:
> My experience on grad committees has been that most people prefer
> students who want to work specifically with them, in their area. I think I'm
> in the minority, but I would rather work with the bright, motivated student
> who doesn't know exactly what they want to do yet. I don't think it's
> particularly healthy to have a fixed idea about your career goals by the age
> of 21,22, 23 or whatever (geez, that sounds Eriksonian).
An anecdotal data point about my own research career: at 23, ALL I was
interested in was social relations among adolescents with diabetes and
their non-diabetic peers. Not surprising, given that I was a
post-adolescent with diabetes and a lot of peer issues :). I did both my
MA thesis and my dissertation on this topic, and when I moved to Boston,
had an opportunity to access a data set collected by a leading person in
this field. It's now 3 years later, and I have basically left that
dataset untouched. Why? I've outgrown my interest in the topic. In
fact, even just writing 2 or 3 articles off my diss is proving to be a
tremendous chore.
My research interests tend to follow what is going on in my life. When I
moved here, I fell in with a group of high-level computer programmers,
ex-hackers, and techno-hippies. I've spent a lot of time listening to
them talk about management, and am now working on a mostly qualitative
project about the culture divide between "geeks" and managers. I also
started teaching, and have found it really challenging, and am interested
in how the Web can be used to facilitate teaching. Several projects have
emerged from this, including one about social loafing in student virtual
work teams.
I still have my rats [pets], and if I had the facilities, would probably
be doing research on social learning in rats. Ditto quilting [another
interest of mine] -- I find observing the on-line quilting community
really fascinating.
just a data point...
------------------
Ann Muir Thomas, Ph.D. http://erebus.bentley.edu/empl/t/athomas
"The Accidental Jewess"
Bentley College, Waltham, MA
"You aren't belittled by being little. Only by acting small." --- Red
