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Belonging without certainty

Different kinds of doubt in different careers and settings

Belonging, but unsure about the next step

Asked whether she had ever doubted belonging in STEM, Roz Katz says she did not doubt that she belonged. She recalls equally demanding educational expectations for girls and boys, while domestic responsibilities were divided along much more traditional lines.

When asked about her biggest challenge, she describes a different worry. Moving from academic research into a commercial role, she wondered whether she could think strategically and connect science with people. She describes taking business administration studies to develop that ability. She felt she belonged in science, but was unsure about a new kind of work.

Zuza Henshaw offers a different starting point. Receiving the podcast invitation itself made her wonder whether she belonged: her work involved headhunting and advice, requiring an understanding of technology without creating it. Her doubt is present in the conversation and concerns what counts as participation in STEM. Her question remains open; she does not describe rejection by colleagues in this passage.

She also recalls an earlier feeling that STEM education was reserved for men, while explicitly saying she no longer sees it that way. That change does not settle whether her current work belongs under the label.

In these conversations, the word doubt does not always mean the same thing. Someone may feel comfortable in a field yet unsure about the next responsibility. Another researcher may struggle with a particular problem and question her abilities. The interviews are accounts of experience, not clinical diagnoses or a single measure of confidence.

The question changes what can be read from the answer

Sabrina Diano is asked, in one question, whether she ever doubted belonging in STEM or considered another career. She begins by describing frequent uncertainty, then discusses whether she is asking the right research question and using the right approach. Failed experiments and rewarding results structure her answer. She clearly describes uncertainty about research, but the exchange does not clearly establish whether she also doubts belonging. Because the question joins belonging with career alternatives, the response cannot be read as a clear yes or no about belonging.

Liza Konnikova is asked whether knowing what she loved protected her from self-doubt. She says she has long loved the work but still reports recurrent doubts about being good enough. Her answer challenges the assumption that passion means certainty.

Angela Russell initially answers a question about belonging and career alternatives by discussing other possible careers, then returns to doubt and describes uncertainty about competence at successive transitions. Becoming an independent researcher meant asking whether she could lead others toward a research vision. Her later account adds a change in what she noticed: fitting into a male-dominated setting earlier gave way to greater awareness of the lack of women in independent positions and an interest in advocacy.

She also interrupts her own explanation. Discussing the encouragement she still needs to seek awards or promotion, she first connects it to being a woman, then says she does not know whether gender explains this particular trait.

More than a confidence problem

Uli Solovieva describes herself as a rising fifth-year doctoral student; becoming a professor remains an aspiration. Asked about doubt, she initially agrees, then says it was not specific to STEM. She recalls repeated graduate-school applications and an encounter she experienced as disbelief in her readiness. Her biggest challenge becomes more concrete when she describes speaking: she could express ideas on paper, but found introductions and contributing during laboratory discussions difficult. She wanted to participate and often struggled to say what she meant in time.

In the same interview, she describes her field as predominantly women and says this helps her sense of belonging. Advisers and other mentors shared their difficulties, making her own struggles feel less exceptional. This support sits alongside the earlier account of doubt. Near the end, seeing a respected scientist give an excellent talk after appearing nervous offers a different possibility: competence need not require the disappearance of nerves. She allows that practice may lessen them, or may not.

Aziza Almanakly recalls enjoying her undergraduate subject while repeatedly feeling required to prove herself in new groups. She describes hostility in that setting, followed by a graduate laboratory where it was absent. Her adviser made room for her contributions, stopped interruptions and put her forward for opportunities.

She distinguishes continuing research when nothing works from accepting insults. The work itself requires persistence; mistreatment adds a burden that people could remove. Her account calls for changes in how people are treated, alongside persistence with the research itself.

Support and difficulty coexist in these accounts in different ways. The doctoral student describes a welcoming field alongside ongoing trouble speaking; Almanakly describes a change in how she was treated between settings.

Sabrina Diano's later account introduces competing responsibilities. Caring for her children sometimes meant missing scientific meetings; attending meetings could mean missing time with them. She recalls feeling inadequate in either role, depending on which demand she met. Taking children to a conference was one compromise she found, not proof that everyone has the resources to make that arrangement. Her encouragement to persist remains attached to these costs.

Asked about the presence of women in her field, Diano distinguishes rank: she remembers many women alongside her as an assistant professor, but few full professors. Seeing women in senior positions helped her imagine that future. For her, the question was where women appeared in the profession, as well as whether they were present.

When doubts overlap

Elena Giorgi explicitly connects continuing doubt about belonging with doubt about ability and the experience of being stuck. She describes repeatedly wondering whether she is good enough while continuing because she wants to understand. The difficulty of making mathematics work is part of her doubt about her place in the field.

She describes simplifying a problem to make progress, then finding that removing the simplification can undo the approach. She separately recalls the challenge of committing to a doctorate without certainty that she could do it. Enjoyment of the larger project coexists with daily problems. She also leaves open the possibility of doing something else with her life if a path does not work out.

The social setting matters in her account as well. She recalls entering rooms as one of very few women and finding that experience difficult. Talking with women mathematicians helped her see the imbalance in relation to how society was arranged, rather than as evidence that women did not belong in the field. This is her explanation of the imbalance, not a measured causal finding.

She places the importance of these encounters particularly in her doctoral and postdoctoral years. Women doing excellent mathematics while having families and other interests helped her imagine a fuller life in the profession.

Encouragement without a perfect ending

Elena Giorgi ends by telling an interested girl that she belongs in mathematics without having to resemble the people already visible there. She encourages openness about future decisions rather than demanding a complete career plan.

Encouraging someone else does not mean she has stopped doubting herself. These accounts leave a more specific question: what is this guest unsure about, in this situation?