Collaborating with professor that denied me admission

[HyacinthMacaw]

Hello folks,

I've enthusiastically accepted an offer to enroll in a doctoral program that seems like a wonderful fit, and I've started planning a new life in a new city. One thing I wonder, however, is whether I can collaborate with a professor at another university that denied me admission. This professor is examining exactly the same issue that I am at the university in which I'm about to enroll. This is a specific area--as specific as "interventions to aid gang-affiliated youth," perhaps. She hasn't published any work yet, but we are reading the same theoretical and empirical papers. If we don't collaborate, I fear that our two labs will replicate each other's independent work while only one lab will have the honor of publication.

So will it be safe to contact this professor and ask her the status of her research program, what experiments she has conducted and will conduct, etc.? Should I forthrightly express interest in collaborating, and if so, how should I do that? I would really appreciate your thoughts and comments.

Thanks, and all the best!

[lewin]

So will it be safe to contact this professor and ask her the status of her research program, what experiments she has conducted and will conduct, etc.? Should I forthrightly express interest in collaborating, and if so, how should I do that? I would really appreciate your thoughts and comments.

People are usually unwilling to answer that first question because of concerns that others will scoop their ideas. Most likely, the only things someone will share are papers already in press, nothing earlier.

If you'd really like to collaborate, my first suggestion is to offer your study ideas first and ask whether she'd like to run those studies with you, then see how it develops. This is also dangerous, because the person could decline and scoop your ideas. Definitely talk to your new advisor first. He/she might have advice or opinions about starting a collaboration somewhere else, such as wanting you to focus on your local work, not collaborate somewhere else.

Another option is to run a few studies first, then send her an email saying "These are the studies we've run. I know you do similar work. Would you like to compare notes? Maybe by combining our data we have a paper." But again, this is something you should run past your advisor.

My recommendation? Don't bother. Run your studies with your advisor and publish your paper the two of you. The other prof hasn't done anything yet and many "reading and planning" ideas never coalesce into actual studies. But you know she's working on it, so that's an incentive to work fast. And practically speaking, almost nothing exactly replicates something. There's always a way to make something look novel--with the theoretical framing or by running follow-up studies.

[HyacinthMacaw]

People are usually unwilling to answer that first question because of concerns that others will scoop their ideas. Most likely, the only things someone will share are papers already in press, nothing earlier.

If you'd really like to collaborate, my first suggestion is to offer your study ideas first and ask whether she'd like to run those studies with you, then see how it develops. This is also dangerous, because the person could decline and scoop your ideas. Definitely talk to your new advisor first. He/she might have advice or opinions about starting a collaboration somewhere else, such as wanting you to focus on your local work, not collaborate somewhere else.

Another option is to run a few studies first, then send her an email saying "These are the studies we've run. I know you do similar work. Would you like to compare notes? Maybe by combining our data we have a paper." But again, this is something you should run past your advisor.

My recommendation? Don't bother. Run your studies with your advisor and publish your paper the two of you. The other prof hasn't done anything yet and many "reading and planning" ideas never coalesce into actual studies. But you know she's working on it, so that's an incentive to work fast. And practically speaking, almost nothing exactly replicates something. There's always a way to make something look novel--with the theoretical framing or by running follow-up studies.

Thank you for your thoughtful reply, and my apologies for the delay in posting a follow-up! I think this is definitely something to speak with my advisor about. I was perhaps overestimating the danger of being "scooped." Thanks again, and all the best.