Academic Twitter

[txpsychology]

Hi all - 

I was reading another thread in this forum and saw a discussion on Academic Twitter and many newbies to AT (me being one). I thought I would create a separate thread, as not to detract from the purpose of the other, where we can share our Twitter handles, follow each other, and recommend other academic accounts to follow (such as professors, researchers, etc.). 

I figure you can either share your twitter publicly or can DM each other if you don't want so many people to follow you.

[justacigar]

Hi y'all, I shared this on the regular thread but will share mine here too:

@jess_froe 

[txpsychology]

Oh poo, I didn't share mine lol.

@MegannLPA

[Chugwater2020]

Hi everyone.  This is me:  @babbsweissman.  

 

[Blanca97]

I'm @TaliaFR_98 :)

[frazyfar]

Piggybacking on this thread to ask: does anyone have any tips for navigating academic twitter/essential accounts to follow as an applicant? I’m putting together a doc for next year’s applicants in my current lab and there’s a lot of social media involved in academic networking now. Any thoughts?

[Psyche007]

38 minutes ago, frazyfar said:

Piggybacking on this thread to ask: does anyone have any tips for navigating academic twitter/essential accounts to follow as an applicant? I’m putting together a doc for next year’s applicants in my current lab and there’s a lot of social media involved in academic networking now. Any thoughts?

How important is social media to academic networking? Any advantages to twitter over facebook or any of the others, like LinkedIn?

[frazyfar]

24 minutes ago, Psyche007 said:

How important is social media to academic networking? Any advantages to twitter over facebook or any of the others, like LinkedIn?

I would definitely be interested in hearing perspectives on this! Social media is not something that’s typically covered in (my experience) traditional application advice, but I found it useful to be following PIs on Twitter, for example, because they often post about their interests, current projects, or any lab meet and greets. But that’s something I picked up on maybe 6 months ago. I want to help future applicants navigate these tools effectively. 

[SocDevMum]

On 2/8/2021 at 2:38 PM, frazyfar said:

I would definitely be interested in hearing perspectives on this! Social media is not something that’s typically covered in (my experience) traditional application advice, but I found it useful to be following PIs on Twitter, for example, because they often post about their interests, current projects, or any lab meet and greets. But that’s something I picked up on maybe 6 months ago. I want to help future applicants navigate these tools effectively. 

I'm a big fan of Academic Twitter, less so LinkedIn. LinkedIn is much less active, and often seems to only be useful for head hunters. I use Twitter to interact directly with PIs, early career academics and fellow grad students, not just in my field but also in those that are adjacent to my focus; I study sexual violence and LGBT issues, so I follow a lot of Sociology academics, for example. This has enabled me to keep up on research at all stages, from initial data collection through to paper or conference submission. Essentially, you can see what the most recent research is, as it is happening, which is priceless considering how far behind the publishing process really is.  Twitter has also allowed me to interact with scholars in other countries - for some this may be less relevant I suppose, but if there is cool work happening in Europe or Asia in your field, Twitter makes it easy to connect and keep up. This has opened up opportunities to talk not just about international research, but also potential post-doc or job openings in places other than the U.S. Given the sorry state of the U.S. academic job market I think this is super important. It's been my pleasure to get to know academics all over, and while we are not what I would call friends, it's been a blast to sit in a conference or committee meeting and have the speaker say "hey, I know you, what do you think?" I have met several early career or grad student folks who are in their current position because they "met" someone on Twitter, and through that person were able to make the connections to get an interview, write that grant or land that post-doc spot. 

Let's face it - academia is as much about who you know as what you know. If you have already interacted with a fellow scholar via Twitter, it makes it infinitely easier to reach out and chat IRL. You can create your own opportunities for joint projects, make plans to meet at conferences, ask for more details about a study or instrument they created; it's all about relationship building. Academic Twitter is an excellent tool for building a network outside of your home institution. Yes, you have to put some work into curating your Twitter. Some people keep a separate personal Twitter; it's a choice about how much you want to share with others. Obviously your frat party photos probably shouldn't be included, for example. And you have to invest some time into it. Not to say you need to spend hours a day on the app   but you do have to be willing to actually read some links, share posts for study recruitment or post-doc/job opportunities, leave comments or questions when you read something interesting, and yes, do the social stuff like say congratulations when someone is celebrating an achievement.  It's no good if you are strictly a passive follower. 

[Psyche007]

On 2/10/2021 at 10:39 AM, SocDevMum said:

I'm a big fan of Academic Twitter...

I tried to get into Academic Twitter, but I found it very political. I follow a few people I have direct interest in, but I stopped following highly visible and popular networking accounts (such as AcademicChatter). Part of the issue is that these accounts don't consider themselves political and nor do many of the individuals who participate. I wasn't getting a variety of work from diverse viewpoints. It felt like a bubble.

I'll follow some individuals for specific reasons but I steer clear of the larger hubs.

YMMV.

[SocDevMum]

2 hours ago, Psyche007 said:

I tried to get into Academic Twitter, but I found it very political. I follow a few people I have direct interest in, but I stopped following highly visible and popular networking accounts (such as AcademicChatter). Part of the issue is that these accounts don't consider themselves political and nor do many of the individuals who participate. I wasn't getting a variety of work from diverse viewpoints. It felt like a bubble.

I'll follow some individuals for specific reasons but I steer clear of the larger hubs.

YMMV.

That makes sense - it certainly is more useful for some people than others!

[LizLovesPsych]

I have found academic twitter really helpful. Particularly @Psychchatter and @PsychinOut