Overcoming a toxic lab environment
How to identify toxic labs and why it matters
Finding a team and laboratory that have research lines that align with your career prospects is fundamental when considering a doctoral program. Indeed, in times of overly competitive work cultures across society, prospecting a PhD opportunity is no small undertaking, but doing some reconnaissance before you embark on this journey may well save you a lot of frustration down the line.
Do perfect teams or labs exist? Probably not, but it all begins with identifying hostile work environments.
What is a hostile lab environment?
As a naive and inexperienced researcher, or prospective student, it’s easy to miss some of the red flags that are laid out before you. The saying “young and hopeful” has a strong meaning, until things take a wrong turn… Long story short, a hostile lab environment is a place that is detrimental to your growth as a scientist. Of course, the story is not always black and white, it comes in many shapes and forms, and different shades of grey.
Recognizing toxic lab environments
Just like predatory journals are flagged for being detrimental to a researcher’s career, working in a toxic lab can produce similar effects in the future. But how do you pinpoint abusive labs?
Patterns of poor research integrity. Fast science is often labeled as low-quality science, and rightfully so. Here are common patterns you should pay close attention to:
Does the team, or PI, seem to only target (or greatly favor) journals of a particular publisher, regardless of their impact factor and quartile? In itself, this is not a misconduct, but there’s likely more to the picture than meets the eye.
Does the team publish in said journals often? Of course, having a supportive PI who encourages you to publish your work is great, but encouragements to publish just about anything, or as often as possible, regularly subtly cloaked in “full waivers” and “APC discounts” in specific journals, should raise suspicion.
Are team members often listed on papers that stray from their immediate area of expertise? It’s normal, and healthy, for teams to collaborate on projects, but patterns of questionable co-authorship can be spotted as you dig through individual publication lists from team members; a quick search on ORCID can help.
Does the lab head pressure the team to generate fast (and low-quality) data, to submit to “easy-to-publish-in” journals? This is a common sign of misconduct that can potentially lead to paper retractions (if the data was fabricated) or having many papers on your track record disregarded by committees for permanent positions, because the journals you published in were removed from “green lists”…
Self-citation culture. Citing your own work is not questionable per se, so long as you do it when justified. Nevertheless, papers where the work of one’s self is overly cited is a major red flag.
High performance rewarding system and team performance comparison. Being highly productive is usually favored by lab heads, which normally translates into number of outputs. A toxic PI will reward those who produce more and constantly compare them to the rest of the team, which are signs of poor empathy and lack of understanding of each member’s unique qualities.
Hyper-competitive setting and asymmetric opportunities. Competition is stimulating and healthy to a certain extent, but pushing it too far can result in mental breakdown and burnout. Likewise, asymmetric opportunities, especially among PhD students, regardless of experience, can lead to frustration, loneliness and a lack of sense of belonging, further exacerbating an already hyper-competitive environment.
Micromanagement and lack of transparency. In short-term or high-risk situations, micromanagement can be advantageous to the team. However, as team members spend more time in the lab, especially in the case of PhD students, a supportive PI would give them the space they need to learn and grow, and do what a PI is expected to do: mentor and advise, and step in only when necessary. An abusive PI, however, will be excessively present in every task or project, and try to control everything, including your career prospects, without asking about your aspirations or engaging in meaningful conversations about your future plans.
Poor communication. Did you ever walk into the lab on a Monday morning and see an unfamiliar face? Someone probably just forgot to tell you that a new student is starting today and that you will have to share the microscope, and rearrange your entire schedule for the week…
Overstepping on work-life balance. A toxic PI will always find a reason to overstep on their students’ right to a downtime and work-life balance by contacting you, either by e-mail or text message, after hours, on weekends and even during vacation time, expecting you to reply within the hour.
Do your homework. Toxic labs are still shrouded in taboo, unfortunately, but asking around current and/or past lab members about their experience is always a good starting point, and LinkedIn and ResearchGate (under the ‘Lab’ tab in a researcher’s profile) are great places to look at for first impressions.
Naturally, having this all figured out right from the start is not always possible, if ever, and switching labs halfway through your PhD is not an option in most cases, but your institution likely has mechanisms or people you can rely on. Just know that you are not alone in this hurdle and surround yourself with a strong support system, and prioritize your mental health and well-being.
As sour as the experience may be, talking about it helps in the long run, but be mindful about leaving this bad lab culture behind as soon as possible. Jumping off a train running off the tracks is always better than waiting for the train wreck to happen, right?
For further information on this topic, I recommend:
“What’s a toxic environment for a PhD student?”, by Prof. Sophien Kamoun;
“Toxic labs: what are they and why you should avoid them” and “Toxic labs: what to do if you're in a toxic lab”, by Prof. Matthias Rillig;
“Work environment: When labs go bad”, by Chris Woolston.