Learners on the Doctoral Journey: Understanding and Managing Fear
by Lori Schroeder | January 4, 2010
While engaged in learning, individuals experience a wide range of emotions: joy, delight, interest, wonder, disappointment, frustration and fear. While all emotions need to be managed, fear may be the most significant barrier to adults realizing their full learning potential. In a series of blog posts, Lori shares information—and asks you to offer insights and strategies—to understanding and successfully managing fear that may occur throughout the doctoral journey. Acknowledging that fear exists is key to making peace with it. Her goal is to provide a medium for us to share our perspectives on learner fear and liberate ourselves in doing so.
This blog topic may be of interest to all learners who occasionally experience self-doubt and fear about their ability to achieve the doctoral degree.
By the end of this series of blog posts on learner fear, you will be able to:
• Identify at least one non-productive fear that you may be experiencing
• Know the impact of fear on your learning
• Understand the sources of learner fear
• Develop strategies for better managing fear so that goal achievement is more efficient and certain.
Last month we examined the sources of learner fear. This month, we will explore strategies to mitigate it.
STRATEGIES TO MITIGATE LEARNER FEAR
How can we manage fear that may accompany us or appear unexpectedly as we progress in our doctoral journey? Here’s a few ideas:
Academic Strategies
• Identify challenges in your ability to learn and succeed academically. Is it time management? Unsure about research methods? Make a list. What strategies are you employing to mitigate them?
• Take advantage of the Capella University Support Services. (See below for list.)
• Establish a support network. It is especially helpful to establish a support team of current doctoral learners to exchange information and offer support. Sometimes, consulting with and being supported by a Capella graduate can be a great source of information, resources, ideas, and support.
• Hire an editor, if you feel that one will be helpful to your dissertation writing and give you the confidence needed to continue moving forward.
• Get adequate sleep, hydration, and exercise. Eat healthfully.
• Visit the Capella Online Writing Center and take that Personal Writing Assessment—which will assess your knowledge of writing, such as grammar, style, and APA. It will also give you tips and good, practical information.
Psychological Strategies
• Watch self-talk. Staying focused on fear and negativity will exacerbate these feelings and you could actually create what you’re thinking. Be careful of establishing a counter-productive, self-fulfilling prophecy.
• Say Affirmations. Believe it or not, they may be effective in helping you engage in positive self-talk and steer you and your subconscious in a forward direction.
• Ask yourself: “Do I have any concrete data to support this fear?”
• Ask yourself: “Is my fear rational?”
• Make a list of the fears you are feeling. Address each one in turn. How can you manage each? Identify the best action to mitigate for each listed fear.
• Brainstorm and identify the hurdles and challenges you have successfully navigated—and all of the fears associated with them that you had to face. If you have accomplished success in the face of adversity, you can use this success as a source of strength and confidence to face additional challenges.
• Visualize “Dr.” in front of your name to help you maintain a positive, forward-looking attitude and to keep your eyes on the achievable prize.
• Don’t fight your feelings. Rather than trying to overcome and conquer your fears, find ways to cope with them, deal with them, and move beyond them.
Reframe your fear to something positive, e.g., “Sure, I’m afraid of failing. But I would fail if I didn’t try. I’m gonna go for it.” Hockey star, Wayne Gretzky says this about risk taking: “You’ll always miss 100% of the shots you don’t take.”
• Seek guidance and support from a professional–someone with expertise in the academic stress involved in a doctoral program.
• If you have a medical diagnosis of depression or anxiety, contact Capella University’s Disability Services to receive accommodations for your courses and to explore other sources of support.
• Remember that your dissertation is important. You will contribute to scholarship and to the literature on the topic; however, it is not your magnum opus. Your great book will come later!
• Back up your work! Use strategies, such email your drafts, get an external hard drive, and use a flash drive. Back up your material every time you make a change.
• Keep your mind on the dissertation milestone at hand. Don’t look ahead and see how much more you have left to accomplish. Do what is in front of you.
• If you can make the doctoral journey not about you—that will help. Try to keep your eyes on the prize—contributing to the research and scholarship in your field.
• Make this journey about contributing to the literature on the topic and not about reflecting who you are or putting your self-esteem on the line.
• Banish the “Impostor Syndrome” from your consciousness. Banish self-doubt. You wouldn’t have made it this far if you were not qualified and competent.
Faculty-Learner Relationships
• Parker Palmer (1998) maintains that the teacher (i.e., mentor or courseroom facilitator) is the one who bridges the chasm of fear. Mentors and course facilitators need to reach out and offer guidance and support to learners. They need to be aware of how their learners are experiencing the academic journey, as reflected in emails, phone calls and manifested by learners’ affective, behavioral, and cognitive responses.
• At the same time, we’re also responsible for managing our own fear and taking charge of our learning. Staying in ongoing contact with our mentors and facilitators offers opportunities to address challenges, ask questions, pursue clarification, seek additional information, and obtain direction. In other words, don’t be afraid to contact your mentor or facilitator if you’re struggling or unsure. Share your needs with your instructors and mentors. The doctoral journey is yours only, and you need to be responsible for it.
• Take ownership of your own fears and work constructively with your mentor or course facilitator to address and work with your fears.
• Submit rough drafts of your work to your mentor and ask for feedback. Remember mentor feedback is designed to make your work stronger and your dissertation a work you can be proud of. Be open to your mentor and committee members’ suggestions, and you will make steady progress toward degree completion. View feedback as a opportunity to strengthen your work. Remember, if you submit articles for publication, journal editors likely will ask for revisions.
• Remember your mentor and committee members want you to succeed.
• Be aware of and sensitive to faculty points of view.
• Acknowledge and respect differences.
• Avoid putting faculty on the spot or putting them in a potentially defensive position.
• Never use language that could offend a faculty member. Be diplomatic and considerate. Use the title, “Dr.” when addressing your mentor and committee members.
University Support Services
Seek formal support from Capella University resources:
Library Resources (includes APA information)
Thinking, Reading and Writing Resources
Becoming a Scholar: Successfully Completing the Comprehensives & Dissertation
• Tour and read Ask Doctoral Advising Blog posts and comments
Can you add to this list? What fear-management strategies work for you?
In February’s post, we’ll explore “Fear of Success”
References:
Palmer, P. (1998). The courage to teach: Exploring the inner landscape of a teacher’s life. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass.
2 Responses to "Learners on the Doctoral Journey: Understanding and Managing Fear"
Betty MartinMouton says:
Earning the PhD with other dedicated and committed learners is a wonderful experience. We fall but we get up to be wiser and more knowledgeable in our specific studies to enjoin what we have gained as individuals and team members of a great institution, Capella University. Each student embraces the scholarly path that leads to the endowment of supper leadership from a global perspective to help all people. Through our doctorial journey, we shared many hours establishing our perspectives for success and achievement to improve conditions and positive changes in society, our personal attributes, and liberty to attain the highest degree a university offers. I am grateful to have come this far in the doctorial program.
lschroeder3 says:
Thank you for your inspirational message, Betty MartinMouton. Earning the doctorate is the culmination of a challenging and rewarding academic journey. Along the way, doctoral learners experience disappointments and successes. The latter is made all the more wonderful in light of the former.
In fact, failure offers unexpected and often unintended gifts. We may tap into a personal reservoir of creativity, persistence, and resilience that we never knew existed. We also grow in wisdom and humility. Author William Saroyan notes, “Good people are good because they’ve come to wisdom through failure.”
Indeed, and as you suggest, earning the doctorate is not an end but a continuation of the positive. It reflects a commitment to grow, to give back, and to leave a legacy of good. This commitment is not failure free either, yet it is only when we risk failure do we allow ourselves to succeed.