Marek Kwiek (University of Poznan) and Lukasz Szymula (Poznan) have published a longitudinal study of scientists from 38 OECD countries in Higher Education, examining retention and attrition in the scientific community. The authors analyze the publishing careers of STEMM (science, technology, engineering, mathematics, and medicine) scientists who started publishing in either 2000 or 2010 and found that the reasons and factors contributing to them “leaving science ” are widely nuanced and are changing over time. Among these differences, they noted that attrition is becoming less gendered over time: The 2000 cohort saw a higher attrition rate for women than men, while no significant gender differences were noted for the 2010 cohort. Kwiek and Szymula conclude that traditional assumptions about attrition in the sciences may need to be revised.
