On Curiosity and Motivation in Research
Dear Neurons,
This week I was at the CPC course in Zurich, which, as always, was an inspirational place to meet and discuss ideas with fellow researchers in the field of computational psychiatry. One of the questions I had for almost everyone there was what they are most curious about currently and what keeps them motivated to stay in science.
When we consider a standard trajectory in science, it often starts with doing a Bachelor's, Master's, and afterwards a PhD project. At the beginning of your PhD project, you most likely had a burning question that you wanted answered, so you started on the multiyear journey of finishing your research project. Once completed, you have potentially answered a small part of this question. However, for most of us, we are actually left with more questions.
Then starts a very liminal part of the scientific career, one I am currently also in. And that is being a postdoctoral researcher. As a postdoctoral researcher, you know enough about your field to not be immediately charmed by new ideas or implausible theories. You have already gathered and tried different methods, and thus a certain amount of scepticism is starting to set in. Although being sceptical of scientific results and work is one of the cornerstones of scientific training, I personally miss the boundless curiosity that I had as a budding PhD student.
Thus, I asked the seniors and fellow colleagues in the field: what keeps you going, and what do you remain curious about? The answers I got ranged and varied quite a lot. However, I did see three common patterns that I want to list below:
Working with brilliant minds and curating your environment
For most senior scientists, they explained that the reason they enjoyed working in science as well as at university is that it gave them a chance to work on and discuss some of the most interesting problems of our generation with brilliant minds that are equally as curious as themselves. To have the privilege to sit every day and discuss, during lunch and coffee breaks, complex problems that have baffled human civilizations for a long time is something that keeps them motivated to stay.
As a more senior scientist, you will at some point also have the luxury to choose the people you would like to work with. Young, enthusiastic students with 'wild' ideas will come to your door for a chance to work together and potentially start a completely new research line that you have never considered before. One of the professors explained to me that she finds working with her students one of the most joyful experiences of her career. Even though the PhD and postdoc period can seem quite solitary, as a senior scientist you will have the opportunity to build your own scientific team, which allows you, to a certain extent, to curate your social environment even more.
Even though most of us are not at this stage yet, where we can create our own teams, we do have the opportunity at university to join different scientific circles and learn from our peers. One of the risks I see with current PhD students is that they often see and experience the PhD as a solitary project. However, this does not have to be the case. Find a group of fellow PhD students and a mentor that inspire you and that you enjoy discussing difficult problems with. Through this, you will reap some of science's sweetest fruits: a collaborative mind working towards new solutions.
Ignoring the results and finding enjoyment in the questions
One of the reasons another senior scientist gave as to what keeps him curious enough to stay was that he found inherent enjoyment in asking questions without any expectation of ever fully answering these questions. For him, the scientific process was not necessarily moving from one answer to the next, but more the process of asking good follow-up questions. I believe that most scientists I have met over the years need this mentality, as even when you follow the scientific protocol perfectly, it can still be the case that some or most of your results will be disproven in the following years. This constant updating and movement of scientific knowledge is the inherent progress that we need to accept.
Often, I find that as students, we enjoy the process of learning established knowledge, and when we enter a PhD, we assume that we will come out of the PhD even more knowledgeable. However, what I would say actually happens in practice is that you do not become more knowledgeable; instead, you become more questioning of most scientific results that are presupposed as "fundamental" knowledge. This is not inherently bad, as it means that you have developed a critical mind. However, sometimes students struggle with this path of breaking down their own preconceived notions and, furthermore, with the feeling that they are not moving forward but instead are moving back ten steps.
I believe that the advice of this senior scientist helps in this case. Instead of enjoying the process of learning or finding solutions, pay most attention to the process of asking questions. Question your own research, your fellow scientists' research, and even some of the fundamental knowledge of your field. And as you finish your PhD, you will start to notice that the questions you ask become more elegant and also allow a deeper exploration of your field.
Enjoying the day-to-day of exploring an impossible puzzle
Finally, on the last dinner of the CPC course, I sat next to a quite well-known scientist, and when I asked him this question of what makes him curious, one of the answers he gave me was that he inherently likes exploring complex systems and patterns that are present both in human data, but also in environmental, weather, and other physics data. For him, a lot of the enjoyment came from elegantly solving these puzzles that keep appearing across multiple scales and systems throughout our universe.
Hearing him explain what he found so fascinating about these systems reminded me a lot of the times I studied physics. Theoretical physics research does not often have a direct impact or applications, but what scientists, researchers, and students alike enjoyed was the process of creating equations that describe the physical world as parsimoniously as possible. The endless discussions that we had with fellow students on how to derive an equation felt very similar to solving a difficult puzzle or Sudoku. The enjoyment then was in the intellectual struggle and the hope of finding a solution together.
I'm curious, Neurons: what is your motivation? What do you remain curious about that, every morning upon waking, gives you a spark and makes you want to answer that question?
🧠Machine Learning for Precision Psychiatry
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