Plan to Attend Cell Bio 2024
ASCB logo LSE Logo

Skip main navigation
Special Issue on Equity, Inclusion, Access, and JusticeFree Access

Disrupting the Master Narrative in Academic Biology as LGBTQ+ Ph.D. Students: Learning, Teaching, and Conducting Research

    Published Online:23 Sep 2024https://doi.org/10.1187/cbe.24-02-0058

    Abstract

    LGBTQ+ individuals face discrimination and stigma in academic biology. These challenges are likely magnified for graduate students. However, there have been no studies documenting the experiences of LGBTQ+ life sciences graduate students. To address this gap, we conducted an interview study of 22 biology PhD students from 13 universities across the United States who identify as LGBTQ+. We used the master narrative framework to interpret our findings. Master narratives are guidelines that dictate the “expected” and “normal” way one is supposed to navigate life. We considered how graduate students engage with the societal master narrative that treats cisheterosexuality as the norm, as well as the master narrative that expects biology to remain an objective, apolitical space. We found that LGBTQ+ PhD students recognize the anti-LBGTQ+ narratives in academic biology, which can result in instances of discrimination and encourage them to conceal their identities. However, participants pushed back against these master narratives. Graduate students described creating alternative narratives by highlighting how their LGBTQ+ identity has allowed them to become more inclusive instructors and better researchers. Some also purposely reveal their LGBTQ+ identity in academic biology, violating the master narrative that non-science identities should not be discussed in the life sciences.

    INTRODUCTION

    Lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, and queer (LGBTQ+)1,2 identities are often considered to be marginalized and underserved in science, technology, engineering, and math (STEM; Cech and Waidzunas, 2021). While the LGBTQ+ community has gained increased acceptance in the United States (U.S.) over the past decade (Payne and Smith, 2011; Obergefell v Hodges, 2015), there is ample evidence that LGBTQ+ individuals experience discrimination, microaggressions, and invalidation of their identities in academic STEM spaces specifically. For example, Cech and Waidzunas (2021) found that LGBTQ+ people in STEM were more likely to face devaluation, experience harassment, and have career limitations, even after controlling for demographics, discipline, and job factors. Forbes (2022) found that LGBTQ+ undergraduates perceived STEM spaces to be less welcoming than non-STEM spaces, ultimately affecting their major choice. Further, LGBTQ+ students have lower persistence rates in undergraduate STEM compared with non-LGBTQ+ students (Hughes, 2018; Hughes and Kothari, 2023; Maloy et al., 2022), and a recent national study of LGBTQ+ science instructors shows that LGBTQ+ identities are underrepresented among science instructors compared with national averages (Busch et al., 2024a,b). In sum, evidence suggests that LGBTQ+ individuals must still navigate stigma and discrimination in the context of STEM spaces.

    The experience of holding an LGBTQ+ identity in biology is unique compared with other STEM majors, as biology content often intersects with certain aspects of this identity that can enhance the salience of being LGBTQ+ and may invalidate this identity when teaching or learning this content (Bazzul and Sykes, 2011; Ah-King, 2013). Discussions about reproduction, evolution, and genetics have the potential to be exclusionary about transgender and gender nonbinary individuals or LGBTQ+ partnerships (Cooper et al., 2020; Casper et al., 2022). There is also a dearth of LGBTQ+ representation in science textbooks; however, biology is unique in the fact that LGBTQ+ identities are discussed, but typically only in a disease context (for example, HIV/AIDS [Snyder and Broadway, 2004; Sundara, 2017]). These distinct aspects of academic biology suggest that examining the experiences of LGBTQ+ individuals within this context is necessary as we strive to create a more inclusive scientific community.

    In response to this need, prior studies have focused on documenting the experiences of LGBTQ+ undergraduates (Cooper and Brownell, 2016; Busch et al., 2022; Casper et al., 2022) and LGBTQ+ faculty (Cooper et al., 2019) in the specific context of academic biology. These studies revealed that the sometimes-concealable nature of the LGBTQ+ identity results in unique decision points and challenges for LGBTQ+ individuals. Specifically, LGBTQ+ identities are often considered to be concealable stigmatized identities, meaning that one needs to “come out” in order for others to know that they identify this way and revealing this identity can result in discrimination and loss of status in society (Ryan et al., 2015; Camacho et al., 2020). It is worth noting, however, that not all members of the LGBTQ+ community are able to conceal their identity and experience discriminatory events regardless of whether they come out. An in-depth interview study with LGBTQ+ students enrolled in biology courses in the Southwest U.S. revealed that while LGBTQ+ students did not experience overt discrimination in academic biology, they did not perceive their biology courses to be particularly welcoming to members of the LGBTQ+ community (Cooper and Brownell, 2016). The concealable nature of the LGBTQ+ identity further complicated their experiences in class, as students often felt uncomfortable sharing their LGBTQ+ identity with others out of fear that others would discriminate against them. Additionally, these undergraduates highlighted the need for LGBTQ+ role models in biology, with most describing that they had never met a biologist who was open about their LGBTQ+ identity. The benefit to students of instructors serving as our role models is recognized by some, but not all LGBTQ+ faculty (Patridge et al., 2014; Cooper et al., 2019; Busch et al., 2024b). Our research group interviewed a national sample of LGBTQ+ biology faculty and found that among those who reveal their LGBTQ+ identity to their students, most perceive a benefit to students (Cooper et al., 2019). However, biology instructors often concealed their identity in class because they felt as though it was irrelevant to course content and anticipated negative student reactions (Busch et al., 2022, 2024b; Casper et al., 2022). These studies highlight that despite the emerging potential benefits of revealing LGBTQ+ identities to students, science instructors remain hesitant.

    Despite the extant research focusing predominantly on LGBTQ+ instructors and undergraduates in academic biology, a recent study established that LGBTQ+ PhD students have lower rates of representation and persistence across STEM fields compared with their cisgender and straight counterparts (Reggiani et al., 2023). We argue that we cannot fully understand the experiences of LGBTQ+ individuals in biology without documenting the experiences of graduate students. Graduate school is often where students learn how to balance their social and professional identities in response to their department and field's culture, as well as decide whether they want to pursue a career in academia (Vaccaro, 2012; Goldberg et al., 2022). In the hierarchy of academia, graduate students are uniquely situated; they often serve as both instructors, in the form of teaching assistants, and research mentors to undergraduates, as well as simultaneously being taught and mentored by biology faculty (Kajfez and McNair, 2014).

    Juggling the roles of student, research mentee, research mentor, and teacher can make it difficult for graduate students to identify the level of professionalism that is expected from them, especially if expectations change based on the environment they are in (e.g., teaching a class versus in a meeting with an advisor versus at a journal club that takes place during happy hour; Braxton et al., 2011). Studies have shown that graduate students often struggle with how to navigate this dynamic, especially when it comes to sharing concealable stigmatized identities (Wiesenthal et al., 2023). For example, graduate students with depression describe concealing depression from undergraduates to avoid compromising their authority and placing a burden on undergraduates, while simultaneously highlighting that revealing depression to their graduate peers and faculty is an important step in receiving needed support.

    Recent research suggests that the percentage of LGBTQ+ undergraduates pursuing biology degrees is far higher than the percentage of LGBTQ+ faculty (Eliason, 2023). While some of this gap is likely explained by generational differences, where older Americans are less likely to identify as LGBTQ+ than younger Americans (Jones, 2022), we expect that attrition during both undergraduate (Hughes, 2018; Maloy et al., 2022; Hughes and Kothari, 2023) and graduate (Reggiani et al., 2023) biology programs contributes to underrepresentation among biology faculty. Therefore, it is vital that we understand how graduate students’ LGBTQ+ identities impact their experiences during graduate school, with the intent to identify the potential to create more inclusive environments for LGBTQ+ individuals in academic biology.

    One way to explore the experiences of LGBTQ+ graduate students in biology is through the lens of the master narrative theory. Master narratives are culturally shared stories that provide guidelines on how to act, behave, and navigate life (McLean and Syed, 2015). Master narratives have five main components: ubiquity (they are shared by a group of people), utility (they state the “appropriate” way to live), invisibility (master narratives are pervasive and following them is often an unconscious process, so most people do not notice them), rigidity (they are difficult to change), and compulsory nature (master narratives hold a moral component, so those who do not align with them are oppressed; McLean and Syed, 2015). Master narratives and whether one's personal identity follows them shape the way people navigate their lives. One example of a master narrative is the path of the “life course” in which people are expected to engage. This narrative dictates that to be a good citizen, a person must go to school, get a stable job, get married, and have children. If someone does not follow this path, they often are met with societal barriers and hostility or a lack of understanding from others (McLean et al., 2020). Because master narratives hold moral weight in society, people whose identities do not align with a narrative can be negatively impacted. These negative impacts can be identified at both a personal level and a community level, as both individual and group identities can be outside a master narrative. People whose identities do not align with the master narrative may experience ostracization and discrimination from others and fewer legal protections (McLean and Syed, 2015).

    Cisheteronormativity is a pervasive master narrative. It is defined by an implied assumption that heterosexuality and identifying as gender associated with the sex you were assigned at birth is normal and right, and anything outside of this is abnormal. Effects of the cisheteronormative narrative are apparent in society as well as smaller communities within general society, as those who are LGBTQ+ face higher rates of discrimination, prejudice, loss of job opportunities, and fewer safety nets than their cisgender and heterosexual counterparts (Medina and Mahowald, 2023). The effects of this narrative appear in both subtle ways, for example, cisheterosexuality being the assumed default forcing queer people to “come out,” and more overt ways, for example, the laws being passed that allow doctors to choose not to provide hormone replacement therapy (HRT) to transgender patients and prevent doctors from prescribing puberty blockers to their minor patients (Barbee et al., 2022; Weiner, 2024).

    Master narratives do not just shape general society, but also the communities within it. STEM, and more specifically, the biology community, holds narratives that are unique to its environment, such as the attempted neutrality master narrative, which suggests that biology should remain a neutral and apolitical space (Bilimoria and Stewart, 2009; Cech and Waidzunas, 2021; Casper et al., 2022). The attempted neutrality narrative in biology includes the belief that biology is color-blind, a meritocracy, and gender-neutral (Casper et al., 2022). This narrative also discourages biology community members from sharing personal identities that are not deemed “relevant” to their science identity and can hinder the efforts made toward increasing representation in biology. This is particularly true for concealable stigmatized identities, including many LGBTQ+ identities, that must be revealed in order for others to know that one identifies in that way. This narrative is also becoming especially detrimental for individuals in biology who hold marginalized identities that are becoming increasingly politicized, including LGBTQ+ identities, racial identities, and disabilities (Coe and Griffin, 2020; Hughes and Kothari, 2023).

    One important aspect of master narratives is the ability for those who do not fit within them to create an alternative narrative or an opposing narrative that pushes against the guidelines that the master narrative creates (Andrews, 2002; McLean and Syed, 2015). These alternative narratives can increase the comfort of the people who create them, increase positive visibility for those who do not follow master narratives and are a vital step in the beginning to dismantle master narratives. One example of an alternative narrative is the creation of transnormativity in response to the cisnormativity master narrative. Cisnormativity declares that cisgender identities are the “normal” and “correct” way to be and marginalizes those who do not identify as the gender they were assigned at birth. In their interview study, Bradford and Syed (2019) discuss the way transgender people have created an alternative narrative that centers on the legitimacy of trans identities. The interview participants discussed how they underwent HRT and gender affirmation surgeries and were born trans to emphasize the validity of their identity and fight against the narrative that transgender people are abnormal.

    We know of one example where the master narrative has been used to contextualize the experiences of transgender and nonbinary individuals in biology. Casper and colleagues (2022) studied undergraduate students’ experiences in biology and found that biology holds two master narratives that specifically impact trans and non-binary individuals: gender essentialism (the idea that gender is a binary and conflated with sex) and attempted neutrality (nonscience identities are not discussed or deemed relevant in the context of biology). Despite these narratives impacting transgender students’ comfort in biology, Casper et al. (2022) noted that several of the students they interviewed created alternative narratives as a form of resilience.

    In the current study, we examine the experiences of LGBTQ+ PhD students in U.S. biology programs using a master narrative lens to better understand how they navigate the cisheteronormative culture of academic biology. By exploring the experiences of LGBTQ+ PhD students in biology, we aim to better understand how cisheteronormative assumptions in academia shape their experiences and the way they push back against them. Further, we intend to identify steps that can be taken within academic biology to promote the positive representation and participation of LGBTQ+ PhD students. Our specific research questions are:

    1. How do master narratives in biology, particularly the cisheteronormativity master narrative and the attempted neutrality master narrative, influence the way LGBTQ+ PhD students navigate the biology community?

    2. In what ways are LGBTQ+ PhD students pushing back against these narratives?

    METHODS

    This study was approved by Arizona State University's IRB (STUDY00011040).

    Recruitment

    In the Fall of 2019, we sent an email to program administrators of all U.S. life science graduate programs listed in U.S. News and World Report to recruit PhD students to participate in a survey (U.S. News and World Report, 2019). Of the 259 graduate programs that we contacted, 75 program administrators (29.0%) agreed to forward our survey to students enrolled in their graduate program. Of the 840 graduate students who participated in the survey, 175 (20.8%) self-identified as a member of the LGBTQ+ community. Of those students, 132 agreed to be contacted for a follow-up interview.

    In the Spring of 2021, we sent a recruitment email to these 132 LGBTQ+ biology graduate students using the Yet Another Mail Merge software (YAMM) and invited them to participate in an hour-long interview about their experiences in graduate school as a member of the LGBTQ+ community. In exchange for their time, the participants each received a $15 gift card. Twenty-two LGBTQ+ PhD biology students agreed to participate in an interview.

    Interviews

    The interview script was based on one our research group had used in a prior study that successfully elicited in-depth information about the experiences of Christian graduate students in biology through the lens of concealable stigmatized identities (Barnes et al., 2021). The questions were revised to probe the experiences of LGBTQ+ graduate students. They aimed to assess students’ experiences as individuals who hold concealable stigmatized identities, focusing on salience (“When you are interacting with scientists, are you ever reminded of your LGBTQ+ identity?”), anticipated stigma (“If you were to tell someone in the biology community that you are a member of the LGBTQ+ community, would you worry about what they would think about you? Why or why not?”) and revealing/concealing the identity (“How do you decide whether to tell someone in the biology community that you are LGBTQ+?”).

    Because many graduate students serve as teaching assistants, we also added a section focused on examining how graduate students navigate teaching considering their LGBTQ+ identity; specifically, we probed how their LGBTQ+ identity impacts their interactions with individual students, the entire class, and the course curriculum (“To what extent do you bring your LGBTQ+ identity with you into the classroom? Please explain.”; “Do you think you have ever presented biology content differently given your LGBTQ+ identity?”; “To what extent has an undergraduate come and talked to you about their LGBTQ+ identity because of your LGBTQ+ identity?”). All interviews were conducted by one researcher (N.J.W.) and recorded via Zoom, lasting on average 45 min. A copy of the interview script is provided in the Supplemental Material.

    Survey

    After each interview was completed, we emailed a demographics survey to the participants. The survey was designed to collect additional identities of the graduate students and specific information about their graduate program and their LGBTQ+ identity. Participants reported the extent to which they were out, as well as the extent to which they experienced conflict between their LGBTQ+ identity and the biology community. A copy of the survey is provided in the Supplemental Material.

    Interview Analysis

    Interviews were professionally transcribed, and all interviews were anonymized before analyses were conducted. We used a combination of inductive and deductive coding (Fereday and Muir-Cochrane, 2006) to analyze the interviews with the intent to answer our research questions. We began by using the concealable stigmatized identity framework outlined by Barnes and colleagues (2021) to identify instances in the interviews where participants discussed the centrality of their identity, perceptions of cultural stigma, anticipated stigma, and experienced stigma. We also used this framework to identify instances of concealing and revealing one's identity as well as the extent to which the LGBTQ+ participants were “out” in academia. Finally, we coded instances where participants discussed impression management and the salience of their identity. In addition, we used inductive coding to allow additional themes to arise from the text and to create subthemes related to the previously established codes.

    After the interviews were transcribed, S.A.M. and N.J.W. were both assigned five different interviews. They reviewed each interview and took analytic notes (Azungah, 2018), highlighting any previously established themes from the concealable stigmatized identity framework, as well as any new emerging themes. Once they each completed their five interviews, all four researchers came together to discuss the new themes that had appeared, including themes related to feelings of value and perception of biological climate, and to develop a codebook that included all themes. S.A.M. and N.J.W. then went back and recoded their assigned interviews and an additional five interviews with the updated codebook. Then, all four researchers met to finalize the codebook.

    The codebook was revised until the researchers unanimously agreed to a finalized version which can be found in the Supplemental Material. To establish interrater reliability, two researchers (S.A.M. and N.J.W.) were randomly assigned the same five interviews to code separately. They then came together after finishing all five interviews and compared their codes. Interrater reliability was established (k = 0.94), and one researcher (S.A.M.) coded the remaining 17 interviews.

    Presentation of Results

    We present the results and discussion together so that student quotes can be contextualized through the lens of the cisheteronormative master narrative and attempted neutrality master narrative. Graduate student interview quotes were slightly edited for grammar and clarity. All student names were anonymized (i.e., Student 1), and any identifying feature of the quotes was removed. We intentionally chose not to use pseudonyms because names are often gendered and some of our participants identify as nonbinary. We let students self-report their identities and included these identities in the parentheses next to quotes.

    Author Positionality

    Some members of the author team identify as holding an LGBTQ+ identity, which has impacted their interest in making biology spaces more inclusive for LGBTQ+ individuals. Our lived experiences as members of the LGBTQ+ community in academic biology helped us understand participants’ interview responses, while differences regarding our LGBTQ+ identities, generations, geographic and religious upbringings, and experiences with discrimination allowed us to counteract potential biases. Collectively, one or more of us identify as women, men, nonbinary, gay, white, and first-generation college-going. Two of the researchers are biology faculty who have completed PhDs in biology departments while navigating their LGBTQ+ identity (S.E.B. and K.M.C.), one has completed his master's degree (N.J.W.), and one has completed their undergraduate degree (S.A.M).

    RESULTS AND DISCUSSION

    Participants

    Interviewees held an array of LGBTQ+ identities, including lesbian, gay, bisexual, pansexual, queer, transgender, genderqueer, and intersex. Notably, students often held more than one LGBTQ+ identity (Table 1). Participants represented 13 U.S. PhD-granting institutions and primarily identified as women, white, and in the first two or four years of their PhD program.

    TABLE 1. Student demographics

    DemographicsVariablen = 22
    LGBTQ+ identityaLesbian5
    Gay4
    Bisexual5
    Pansexual4
    Queer10
    Transgender2
    Genderqueer2
    Intersex1
    GenderbMan5
    Woman13
    Non-binary4
    Race/EthnicityWhite/European American20
    Asian/Asian American2
    Length in PhD ProgramTwo years8
    Three years4
    Four years4
    Five years3
    Six years1
    Finishedc2
    Field/DisciplineBiology5
    Evolutionary Biology1
    Microbiology1
    Cell/molecular Biology2
    Plant Biology1
    Ecology6
    Environmental Sciences2
    Entomology1
    Plant Science1
    Neuroscience1
    Biological Anthropology1
    Region of U.S.West4
    Northwest2
    Southwest4
    Midwest7
    Northeast1
    Southeast3
    Mideast1
    Institution typedPublic21
    Private1

    aStudents were able to write in more than one LGBTQ+ identity.

    bStudents were able to write in other options besides man, woman, and nonbinary.

    cStudents who were active PhD students at the time of the recruitment survey but had since graduated were included in the interview study.

    dStudents represented 13 different PhD-granting institutions.

    Finding 1: Because LGBTQ+ identities violated the cisheteronormativity and attempted neutrality master narratives, LGBTQ+ PhD students are sometimes reluctant to reveal their identities in biology.

    We found that LGBTQ+ biology PhD students anticipate facing stigma from their colleagues, primarily surrounding perceived inappropriateness/unprofessionalism, sexualization of their identity, and perceived irrelevancy. Although the first two fears are common for LGBTQ+ people to experience in general society owing to the cisheteronormativity master narrative (Worthen, 2023), the fear of perceived irrelevancy of their identity is unique to attempted neutrality narrative of STEM because of the widely held belief that STEM is objective and apolitical (Bilimoria and Stewart, 2009; Cech and Waidzunas, 2021; Casper et al., 2022).

    LGBTQ+ PhD students describe hearing and experiencing discrimination against the LGBTQ+ community.

    Despite calls to make biology more inclusive (Cooper et al., 2020; Zemenick et al., 2022), LGBTQ+ PhD students recognized the prevalence of cisheteronormativity and assumed neutrality master narratives in the context of academic biology. Specifically, students described instances of covert and overt discrimination.

    Student 16 (lesbian, queer): “I've heard lots of derogatory slurs not necessarily directed at me, but about the [LGBTQ+] community as a whole, primarily from faculty members that belong to the white male over 40 crowd. In hallways, at social gatherings, things like that. That always makes me feel sad. I've heard from faculty members saying that they didn't like undergraduate students who identified as LGBTQ+ because they were emotionally unstable.”

    Student 22 (pansexual, nonbinary): “Without saying anything [about my identity] to my class, I had homophobic experiences anyway because I think people read me as queer. So I had an anonymous survey come back where a bunch of the students decided to call me a fag on it […]. But I feel like that's very much a culture that is allowed to exist, a very big culture of homophobia at the institution that I'm at.”

    Multiple studies have shown that individuals who hold concealable stigmatized identities will “test the waters” and try to assess how others would respond if they were to come out before they reveal their stigmatized identity (Jones and King, 2014). Both Students 16 and 22 have gathered evidence to suggest that some people in their department would not respond positively if they were to come out. Student 22 is also an example of how LGBTQ+ identities are not always concealable. Although they never came out to their class, they still experienced overt discrimination as if they had. This shows that concealing an LGBTQ+ identity is not always a guarantee of protecting oneself against negative biases.

    PhDstudents anticipate that revealing their LGBTQ+ identity in academic biology could be perceived as inappropriate or unprofessional.

    The compulsory nature of the cisheteronormativity master narrative, defined as the idea that there is a moral component to master narratives that rewards those who align with them and harm those who do not, makes LGBTQ+ identities taboo to discuss due to the sexualization of these identities (Worthen, 2020). We found evidence of this assumption within the interviews of biology PhD students; they often described that they feared others in academic biology might perceive them sharing their LGBTQ+ identity as inappropriate or unprofessional. This fear is likely to be more prevalent in biology and other STEM fields than in the humanities due to the assumed neutrality narrative (Cech and Sherick, 2015; Casper et al., 2022), in which identities should be kept to oneself. The narrative that one should not bring any nonscience identities into scientific spaces to ensure their research is objective makes it difficult for LGBTQ+ students to come out without feeling like they are jeopardizing their place in biology. This also reflects a conflation between one's personal identity and an assumed political agenda, making individuals feel as though they cannot share their identity for fear of being politicized. This is demonstrated by LGBTQ+ students’ hesitation to reveal their identity to people in their biology communities, particularly their undergraduates.

    Student 19 (lesbian, nonbinary): “Sometimes I think I feel like I'm worried about [revealing my identity to undergraduates] being deemed inappropriate actually, even if it shouldn't be.”

    Student 11 (queer, trans, genderqueer, intersex): “I am concerned that people would see it as inappropriate or distracting to make a reference to somebody in my life who is my queer partner in a way that I would not have worried about it if I'd had a boyfriend at the time. Just because I was worried about getting negative teaching evaluations saying like, well, they were unprofessional, or pushing a radical leftist agenda, or inappropriate somehow.”

    Student 18 (pansexual): “With an undergrad, because you're also trying to be respectful of the power dynamic and not making anyone feel uncomfortable, I would need to get a good sense of who they were as a person before coming out to them, and if this felt necessary. Not so much in a, ‘will they accept me or not,’ because I don't really care. But more in a, ‘would this be uncomfortable or accidentally viewed as flirting?’”

    Although most graduate students were out to their PIs/mentors, some still acknowledged that revealing to those in positions of power could negatively impact their biology careers. Students who were not out to their PIs mentioned that revealing their identity could be perceived as irrelevant, inappropriate, or unprofessional, and they did not want to jeopardize their relationship with their mentor or their future in biology.

    Student 3 (queer): “Well, the biggest [reason I'm not out to my PI] is the power difference. I'm always aware that my PI's opinion of me is what's going to define my career as an academic. I'd rather not risk doing anything that makes them think of me as less professional.”

    Student 2 (bisexual): “I feel like [my LGBTQ+ identity] is never assumed, and it would have to be very explicitly stated. There's never a time in which that doesn't feel like I am imposing some kind of personal information in a professional setting on somebody. And so, I just don't do it.”

    Student 14 (queer, bisexual): “I've been to plenty of conferences where safe spaces have been provided. And we've had guest speakers come that are open and run LGBT-type safe spaces. And definitely, I've thought about it many times to come out. But every time, I get scared to do it because I'm fearful of the way it'll get back to my PI, and then that affecting our relationship and me being able to successfully finish the program.”

    The difference in the underlying reasoning between students’ hesitancy to come out to undergraduate students versus their PIs/mentors can often explained by the power differential in these relationships. PhD students sometimes described that they avoided coming out to the undergraduates for fear that they may make the undergraduates uncomfortable; this concern has also been expressed by graduate students who choose to conceal their depression from undergraduates (Wiesenthal et al., 2023). Less commonly, PhD students discussed concealing their LGBTQ+ identity from undergraduates in fear of a professional consequence, such as a negative teaching evaluation. However, a fear of negative professional consequences was the most common reason PhD students cited for concealing their LGBTQ+ identity from their PI; if a PhD student reveals to their PI and the PI reacts in a negative way, this could force them to leave their lab or the biology community as a whole (Broadnax and Segarra, 2022). Because graduate students are in subordinate positions as compared with their research mentors, PIs have a disproportionate amount of power when choosing to enforce or rebuke the cisheteronormativity and assumed neutrality master narratives (Broadnax and Segarra, 2022). Some students even remarked that they would be more comfortable revealing to their undergraduate students and graduate peers due to the power dynamics.

    Student 11 (queer, trans, genderqueer, intersex): “I worry about [revealing my LGBTQ+ identity] less with undergraduates, [although] I do worry about it a lot with teaching. But if it's like one person in my lab, then I already have a relationship with them. And if I'm the boss, then there's not as much that they could do to make my life difficult if they had a bad response to it, as opposed to somebody who decides whether I get paid and has a lot more influence over my career progress and stuff.”

    Student 13 (queer, bisexual): “[My decision to come out is based on] a position of authority. It's easier to come out to my peers who don't really have an impact on my work and position at the institution (…) It was just a lot easier coming out to postdocs and graduate students than it was anybody that's like higher authority. I think oddly, I'm more authentic with undergrads. (…) I think their generation is just like more accepting in general, and maybe because the power dynamic has switched where I'm the one in charge.”

    Principles of ubiquity and rigidity are both at play as graduate students express more comfort around undergraduates and hesitancy around faculty; negative stereotypes about LGBTQ+ people tend to be less prevalent within younger generations, and therefore the overall view of LGBTQ+ people has been shifting to a more positive one (Peele, 2023).

    The neutral and apolitical nature of science promotes the concealment of LGBTQ+ student identities.

    Due to the high politicization of the LGBTQ+ identity in general society, those who are LGBTQ+ are often expected to “leave their identity at the door” (Bilimoria and Stewart, 2009; Mattheis et al., 2020). Many interviewees highlighted that they were discouraged from sharing their identity because of the attempted neutrality master narrative present in their department.

    Student 3 (queer): “I feel either people wouldn't really understand [why I'm revealing], and if people don't care enough to understand, I feel that the perception would be more negative than positive. But then also , I feel, at least in my department, being open about your personal life in general seems to be frowned upon.”

    Additionally, students discussed how others, both within and outside of the LGBTQ+ community, directly contributed to this master narrative.

    Student 1 (queer, bisexual, genderqueer): “I remember one guy saying like, ‘Well, it doesn't matter if I'm gay; that has nothing to do with science.’ And that was odd. Basically, just like, ‘No, I don't have anything to say about being LGBT and science. It shouldn't have anything to do with the science that I do and who I am in science.’”

    Student 11 (queer, trans, genderqueer, intersex): “I gave a presentation for my department on this topic of how do we make biology education more LGBTQI+ inclusive. And after I gave it, there was just a kind of silence. And then somebody who's actually on my committee raised his hand and was like, ‘It sort of seems like you're talking about two different things, the science and then this sort of like inclusion stuff, and when can we stop marching under the banner of identity and just focus on the science?’”

    PhD students’ experiences align with other LGBTQ+ peoples experiences in STEM who have been encouraged to conceal their identities to maintain a professional identity (Mattheis et al., 2020). Even undergraduate biology students are aware of this norm (Peele, 2023). Science has historically been treated as a “pure” field in which the data are not perceived to be impacted by the researcher's identity or beliefs. Although there is a plethora of evidence that shows how science is not always as objective as people claim (Martin, 1996; Douglas, 2000; Lacey, 2004; Intemann, 2009), this narrative has still led to the discouragement of revealing non-science identities to prevent distractions. As a result, several PhD students noted how they believed they would be viewed as less capable scientists if they revealed their LGBTQ+ identity.

    Finding 2: Geographic locations that uphold the cisheteronormative master narrative force Ph.D. students to conceal their identity, limit where they work, or risk discrimination.

    Aspects of one's work in academic biology can be potentially affected by negative ideologies held by peers and superiors when teaching, researching, and applying for jobs. Because there are so many environments within biology to conduct work, including labs, classrooms, and the field, there are a multitude of places where one's LGBTQ+ identity becomes relevant (Bazzul and Sykes, 2011; King et al., 2021) and can make it difficult for those individuals to succeed within the academic biology community.

    Biology fieldwork is often in rural or international locations that may be unfriendly to LGBTQ+ individuals.

    Participants highlighted that the cisheteronormative narrative can be particularly pervasive in certain regions of the U.S. and in areas of the world where they need to conduct fieldwork. Indeed, anti-LBGTQ+ views tend to be more strongly perpetuated by both the laws and the communities in more conservative regions (Adamczyk and Liao, 2019). As such, graduate students highlighted that even if they are comfortable within their university, fieldwork can cause them to feel less comfortable if they are questioning the extent to which their identity would be accepted in a particular location or by others they need to interact with.

    Student 17 (gay): “Any of the difficulties surrounding being out in the context of biology or academia is not the community of academia itself. It's the actual physical location where I'm based because the field station I worked at is in a very small, super conservative town. So I'm more worried with my outside interactions with people than with anyone inside the biology community.”

    Student 6 (bisexual): “I have seen colleagues not share their identity in academia when we're doing international fieldwork. Some communities are really not on board, and it's actually dangerous to [come out]. And I've seen that be a thing. I worked in Argentina. I didn't get a huge vibe that would be the case there, but again, I wasn't totally sure. So, I didn't bring it up.”

    Student 9 (lesbian): “It's not so much that it's the subdiscipline as much as the greater context of society's influence on our subdiscipline. Our people work with farmers. That is a demographic which is often painted with one brush. And so, I think they're used to working with a certain type of person who has a certain type of ideology. Until I can feel confident with individuals on a one-to-one level, I'm more interested in protecting myself than being the one out lesbian at a conference.”

    PhD students’ perceptions align with those of other graduate students working in rural or conservative geographic locations who have reported difficulty navigating scientific fieldwork because of hostile beliefs toward LGBTQ+ individuals (Gibney, 2019; Zebracki and Greatrick, 2022). Contending with social and legal threats compounds the stress that graduate students already feel being LGBTQ+ in academia (Demery and Pipkin, 2021; Kamran and Jennings, 2023).

    Some academic jobsarein places thatareknown to be particularly unfriendly toward LGBTQ+ individuals.

    Academia assumes that one must be willing to move to wherever a graduate program or a faculty job is, but this practice can disproportionately discourage LGBTQ+ people from pursuing a position or career in academia (Yan et al., 2020). Ideologies held by the majority and hostile legislation in specific geographic locations or within particular institutions can cause LGBTQ+ individuals to feel unsafe, limiting their job prospects (Kulis and Sicotte, 2002). With an increasingly competitive job market in biology, particularly for faculty positions, the small number of opportunities often means that faculty applicants have one or two options (Malloy et al., 2021). However, if these are in locations that are anti-LGBTQ+, interview participants explained that they may have to sacrifice their comfort and safety for the position or decide not to pursue a career in academia.

    Student 4 (queer): “I'm sure there are people out in this world that wouldn't hire me based on my status as a queer person. And I don't know if necessarily I would even be applying for positions that would put me in exposure to that, but I think that that's a real possibility for sure. My career advancement could depend upon people's openness to supporting LGBTQ candidates or a position. I mean, as I advance my career, there might be job openings in which I just don't feel comfortable as an openly LGBT person to work in those positions. I mean, it actually does come down to it that some of the best places for someone in my field are in states that I just wouldn't even consider living in like Texas and Arizona.”

    Student 8 (gay, trans): “I think, most personally, my concern over moving various places is such a big concern that I genuinely am not planning on relying on academia as a career trajectory. If the only position that I could apply for was in Arkansas, I'm not going to move to Arkansas. I've gone through a genuine grieving process thinking about that. I'm not going to move somewhere that is actively attacking trans people legislatively. So that, I think, is the primary thing because so much of academic culture and the job market is premised on the idea that anybody will move anywhere at any time.”

    Many study participants thought that sharing their LGBTQ+ identity would cause them to lose opportunities or be discriminated against in the academic biology environment. The basis of this fear has been documented in prior literature. Some biology faculty report worrying about being fired if others at their institution were to know about their identity (Cooper et al., 2019), and survey data has shown that queer and transgender people face exclusionary behavior in their workplace due to their sexual or gender identity (Medina and Mahowald, 2023). Because we conducted these interviews, there has been an increase in the amount of antitrans legislation being passed regarding bathroom bills, sports, and medical care (2024 Anti-Trans Bills Tracker, n.d.), which can act to justify preexisting prejudices, making it more difficult for LGBTQ+ students to feel safe coming out, and decrease the number of LGBTQ+-friendly job locations.

    Finding 3: LGBTQ+ Ph.D. students are pushing back against master narratives, despite potential consequences.

    Although master narratives hold a lot of power within society, they are dynamic and can be changed (McLean and Syed, 2015). This typically comes in the form of top-down and bottom-up resistance, in which people who hold the most power work to create policies that sway the narrative, and people who have less power resist the dictates of the master narrative and create change as a collective, respectively (McLean et al., 2017). Graduate students are uniquely situated, as they are in both a position of power over undergraduate students whom they teach or mentor and in a subordinate position to their PIs and advisors. This allows them to resist the master narratives simultaneously using both top-down and bottom-up methods.

    LGBTQ+ PhD students reveal their identities to act as role modelsfortheundergraduates.

    Having a role model who shares one's identity is an important factor in feeling a sense of belonging and promoting academic development in that environment (Kilgo et al., 2019; Sarna et al., 2021). To challenge the assumed neutrality master narrative, which champions that identities should not be discussed within science contexts, several participants revealed their LGBTQ+ identity to undergraduate research mentees and undergraduates in their courses. Graduate participants acknowledged that they were in a position of power over their students and wanted to positively impact representation for LGBTQ+ people in STEM, a goal shared by many instructors who reveal their concealable identities in science courses Busch et al., 2024b; Cooper et al., 2019; Busch et al., 2022). PhD students reported that by revealing their identity to undergraduates, they were able to be the role models they didn't have when they were pursuing their undergraduate degrees.

    Student 12 (bisexual): “I think representation is really critical. I want [my students] to see me being maybe a successful scientist and feel that they can achieve that as well; I'm really hoping that by being out to my undergrads, at least, that maybe the next generation won't feel that they need to closet themselves.”

    Student 9 (lesbian): “When I was talking with my PI, he didn't tell me that he was part of the LGBTQ+ community at all. And so I didn't really see anybody from our community teaching or being in a greater position, and I wanted my students to have that. So that's why I [came out to my students].”

    By coming out to undergraduates, these PhD students stand to normalize the existence of queer people in STEM (Cooper and Brownell, 2016; Busch et al., 2022), directly contradicting both the cisheteronormativity and assumed neutrality master narratives. Because having a role model leads to a higher sense of belonging (Busch et al., 2022; Busch et al., 2024b) more out LGBTQ+ biology instructors could lead to a higher retention of LGBTQ+ students in biology (Bettinger and Long, 2005; Hughes and Kothari, 2023). Although there has been a movement internationally for broader representation of queer scientists, including the 500 queer scientist website (500 Queer Scientists Visibility Campaign, n.d.) and Scientist Spotlights (The Scientist Spotlights Initiative | San Francisco, n.d.) these representations are devoid of personal connections. Future research should assess the importance of knowing, as opposed to knowing of, LGBTQ+ individuals in academia (Woodford and Kulick, 2015; Linley et al., 2016).

    LGBTQ+ PhD students intentionally teach biology content in an inclusive manner.

    Despite the assumed neutrality master narrative promoting the assumption that one's identity is not relevant in biology (Mattheis et al., 2020), we argue that it can be difficult to dissociate from one's LGBTQ+ identity in the context of biology courses given the intersection between biology content and topics of sex, gender, and sexuality (Snyder and Broadway, 2004; Casper et al., 2022). From how reproduction and sexuality is presented in physiology to assumptions of gender binary in genetics, LGBTQ+ students in biology courses can be made to feel invisible, abnormal, mutated, or like evolutionary failures (Macgillivray and Jennings, 2008; King et al., 2021; Casper et al., 2022). Further, biology textbooks are typically devoid of LGBTQ+ examples, with the exception of discussions surrounding HIV and the AIDS crisis, and present a heteronormative and gender-normative view of sexual behavior, hormones, genetics, and evolution (Snyder and Broadway, 2004). PhD students highlighted how cisheteronormativity can be propagated when teaching biology.

    Student 1 (queer, bisexual, genderqueer): “I remember we had to give presentations at the end of [the course]. I think it was just kind of whatever topic you wanted to [that was] vaguely related to science. And this one person gave a presentation on how homosexuality was a genetically linked disease. And I think I wrote an email to the professor like, ‘You should have screened this. It was not appropriate for somebody to present to a class.’”

    Student 15 (pansexual): “In some of my classes, we talk about hermaphroditism. The term hermaphrodite can be used for plants and maybe some animals, but it's very offensive to use that with humans. I think there was a professor who mentioned that for people like, ‘Oh. You're a hermaphrodite if this happens.’ Anatomically, a human cannot be a hermaphrodite because that literally means 50/50, and that's not how our reproductive system works. Also, not even to mention that we don't use that term for people, like that's not okay.”

    Pushing back against the cisheteronormativity master narrative, LGBTQ+ graduate students made a point to teach these topics in an inclusive manner. This trend remained true for both the participants who were out to their students, as well as the ones who were not.

    Student 10 (pansexual): “I try to be a good TA for genetics. Instead of saying male and female, I said folks with XX, and XY chromosomes. And then afterwards, I actually got a text from this person, and it said, ‘Hey, thanks for doing that; that was really kind of you.’”

    Student 14 (queer, bisexual): “Even though I'm not out, I still incorporate LGBTQ themes within my teaching, and so I hope that comes off that I am being inclusive, whether [or not] my students can figure out that I am LGBTQ.”

    If not conducted in an inclusive manner, discussions about sex chromosomes, reproduction, and hermaphroditism can unintentionally devalue and delegitimize a person's LGBTQ+ identity (Long et al., 2021; Casper et al., 2022). The discussions surrounding these concepts are often oversimplified, alienating those who do not identify with the gender binary, an aspect that can lead to a higher rate of LGBTQ+ students choosing not to take or dropping out of biology pathways (Kosciw et al., 2012, 2020). By normalizing content that covers gender/sexuality and teaching in an inclusive manner, LGBTQ+ graduate students use top-down methods to resist the cisheteronormative and apolitical master narratives in biology.

    LGBTQ+ graduate students chose to come out to their PIs.

    Despite the perceived risks of coming out, the majority of LGBTQ+ biology graduate students interviewed were out to their PIs. Students revealing their identity often did not tell their advisors, but rather revealed through indirect ways such as making it known that they attend annual pride parades, introducing or mentioning a partner, or being involved in LGBTQ+ organizations and initiatives. Students revealed for a multitude of reasons, including to gauge the PI's and lab's perception of LGBTQ+ identities and decide if the lab would be a good fit or not.

    Student 9 (lesbian): “When I was interviewing for graduate school, I was intentional about talking about I have a partner, and I used her preferred pronouns, which are she and her, to clearly indicate that, ‘Hey, I'm coming up as a woman and self-identifying.’ It was important to me to see their responses before coming. It was important for me to know that it was going to be a welcoming environment. And so, I was intentional about that.”

    Student 16 (lesbian, queer): “Actually, it was an interaction with another faculty member who is LGBTQ+ when I first joined the department. And he shared his experience, and he was like, ‘If you don't come out to your PI, it can have all these negative repercussions […] The best thing you can do is to be straightforward before you join the lab so that way you'll know right away if the PI is going to be accepting or not.’ So, I did that. And when I went for my first interview, I just told everybody because I don't want to join a lab where that's going to be held against me.”

    To have the most productive experience in labs and PhD programs, students stated that they needed to be in a space that is welcoming toward their identity, which aligns with prior literature (Morris, 2021). Relatedly, students cited coming out to strengthen their relationship with their PI.

    Student 7 (gay): “I chose to be [out] at an earlier stage because I knew that well, A, it was affecting my behaviors during that time. So, that is why, we had to have a talk about whether, like my scheduling, but also if I was stressed or whatever. Because during the PhD program, a lot of times they do sort of check in with you to see how you're stressed or whatever. I did do it for that reason, but the secondary reason was because I knew that I was going to want to. I mean, my PI wanted to be my PI, and they wanted to have a personal connection with their students. And I knew that I wanted that too. And I knew that I wasn't going to be able to talk about my personal life or relationships without mentioning it.”

    Other students described revealing their identity as an act of refusing to abide by the cisheteronormatity master narrative.

    Student 5 (lesbian, dyke, queer): “I can't hide who I am. So inevitably, like I have a wife, and I'm not going to censor myself by who I date, or who I bring to a conference, or a social event or something like that. So, I don't want to cut that part [of my life] out by someone who I'll be interacting with a lot.”

    Not only does being open about one's identity in biology disrupt the cisheteronormativity and assumed neutrality master narratives by normalizing queer identities taking space within the biology community, this action supports an alternative narrative that revealing personal identities is integral to establishing better relationships with one's PI and others in the science community (Christe, 2013). As more LGBTQ+ PhD students make the decision to reveal their identity to their PIs, graduate peers, and undergraduate students, the master narratives that have upheld biology as a neutral and apolitical space will begin to have less hold.

    General Discussion

    Overall, there is an underrepresentation of LGBTQ+ individuals in academic biology (Hughes, 2018; Maloy et al., 2022; Eliason, 2023; Hughes and Kothari, 2023; Busch et al., 2024a,b). This lack of LGBTQ+ representation in biology is a combination of at least two issues: 1) higher attrition rates of LGBTQ+ people and 2) the hesitancy of LGBTQ+ instructors to reveal their identities in professional academic settings. These concerns are compounding, as a dearth of role models likely leads to a lower sense of belonging and, subsequently, higher attrition rates of LGBTQ+ students (Cooper and Brownell, 2016). Graduate school serves as an integral step between receiving an undergraduate degree and entering the scientific community as a professional. During this time, individuals often develop their professional identity, expand their social network, and decide whether they want to continue in academia. As such, focusing efforts on making graduate school more inclusive of LGBTQ+ identities is essential to increasing LGBTQ+ representation in biology.

    In this study, we were encouraged to find that most graduate participants are out in some capacity in their graduate program. Further, several were out to their students and mentees with the intent to serve as a role model. However, our study suggests that there is still more effort needed to increase the extent to which LGBTQ+ individuals feel safe and welcome within academic biology. Faculty and administration being more welcoming of LGBTQ+ graduate students and encouraging people to share their non-science identities in the science contexts, will fight the attempted neutrality narrative and show the future generation of biology that one can both be LGBTQ+ and a successful scientist. Future research should focus on how receptive undergraduates, faculty, and administrators are to graduate students revealing their LGBTQ+ identity and how this varies based on the climate/region of the institution.

    Limitations

    The individuals who participated in our interview study may have been more comfortable with their LGBTQ+ identity than other individuals who decided to not participate in this study. Additionally, because harm associated with anti-LGBTQ+ attitudes is not evenly distributed across the U.S., our sample likely did not fully capture the experiences of the LGBTQ+ students who are most marginalized or located in extremely hostile regions. Despite a national sampling effort, the PhD students who participated in the study were mostly white students, and only five of our interview participants were noncisgender students. This means that our study did not fully capture the unique experiences affecting LGBTQ+ identifying PhD students who are not white or cisgender. Because of the small sample size of trans and gender nonconforming (TGNC) individuals, we were also unable to make any robust comparison between the experiences of TGNC and LGBQ individuals. Further studies should be conducted to specifically focus on the experiences of racially/ethnically diverse students and of crucially underrepresented identities within the LGBTQ+ community, such as TGNC individuals. Additionally, all four researchers were white, so this limited our interpretations of the experiences of the participants of color. Future research should explore the experiences of LGBTQ+ biology PhD students on a larger scale using both quantitative and qualitative approaches to possibly account for the intersectionality between other underrepresented identities and their LGBTQ+ identity.

    CONCLUSION

    In this qualitative interview study, we interviewed 22 PhD biology students from 13 universities across the U.S. who identified as LGBTQ+ to explore their experiences holding an LGBTQ+ identity in their biology PhD programs. We found evidence of both the cisheteronormativity and assumed neutrality master narratives being present in biology graduate programs. The pervasiveness of these narratives caused PhD students to worry that revealing their LGBTQ+ identity would be seen as unprofessional or inappropriate and that others would view them as less capable scientists. Additionally, students acknowledged that cisheteronormativity and assumed neutrality master narratives are often particularly apparent at field sites or prospective job locations, forcing them to choose between concealing their identity, avoiding opportunities, or being discriminated against. Encouragingly, we uncovered evidence that biology PhD students push back against the master narratives by revealing their identities in academic biology, normalizing the identity. Students also discussed intentionally teaching in ways that correct cisheteronormative assumptions. Graduate students’ experiences simultaneously demonstrated the need for additional efforts to create a more inclusive biology community for LGBTQ+ individuals while highlighting that this upcoming generation of scientists is actively working to disrupt cisheteronormativity and assumed neutrality master narratives.

    FOOTNOTES

    1The term “LGBTQ+” is being used as a placeholder for a multitude of sexual and gender minority identities. These include, but are not limited to, lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, queer, pansexual, and asexual. We recognize that each identity is unique and contributes to different experiences among individuals.

    2Language surrounding LGBTQ+ identities is evolving and some terms that were historically used in the medical community are now considered offensive (e.g., homosexual) and some terms that were historically used exclusively as a slur have now been reclaimed by the community (e.g., queer; Cooper et al., 2020). To increase transparency, we have created a glossary of relevant terms located in the Supplemental Material.

    ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

    We are incredibly indebted to the 22 LGBTQ+ PhD students who shared their experiences with us. This work was funded by an National Science Foundation IUSE grant (#2021393). K.M.C. is funded by an NSF CAREER award (#2143671). Any opinions, findings, conclusions, or recommendations expressed in this material are those of the authors and do not necessarily reflect the views of the NSF.

    REFERENCES