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Suggested Citation:"16 State of the Profession." National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine. 2023. Origins, Worlds, and Life: A Decadal Strategy for Planetary Science and Astrobiology 2023-2032. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/26522.
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16

State of the Profession

INTRODUCTION

The decadal survey’s statement of task charged the committee with addressing the state of profession (SoP), including issues of diversity, equity, inclusion, and accessibility (DEIA; see Appendix A). The committee regards the inclusion of these issues, for the first time in a planetary science decadal survey, to signal their importance and urgency. The committee’s work engaged with available SoP data (such as they are at present), white papers submitted to the decadal, several invited speakers, robust internal discussions, as well as the best social, behavioral, and neuroscience evidence about the causes and outcomes that affect the quality of science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) professions, of which planetary science and astrobiology (PS&AB) are a part. The findings and recommendations that flow from the committee’s analysis can strengthen PS&AB if NASA, as the primary funding agency of PS&AB, acts on these recommendations to build a strong system of equity and accountability that is necessary to locate, recruit, and retain the best talent, and to nurture and sustain the work they do. As requested in the statement of task, these recommendations are actionable and intended to help PSD bring the full force of its leadership and the engagement of the community to advance the profession as part of its scientific mission.

NASA’s aspirational nature, built on the idea of limitless exploration, provides a fitting backdrop to develop initiatives that will seek solutions to the issues that concern the state of the profession. This chapter is intended to assist NASA’s PSD to boldly address issues that concern its most important resource: the people who propel its planetary science and exploration missions.

Ensuring the broadest level of participation is necessary to produce high-quality science in an environment of fierce competition for limited human resources. The rich and unparalleled diversity of the people in the United States is NASA’s strongest advantage, but only if such diversity is tapped by robust procedures for identification and recruitment, onboarding and promotion, and consistent nurturing and fair and equitable reward structures. The committee acknowledges and applauds the hard-earned progress on diversification that has been made in STEM fields including PS&AB, especially with respect to the entry of women into the profession and the growing number of women in positions of leadership and prominence (including at the helm of NASA’s PSD). The committee recognizes that the goals and intentions of NASA science leadership with respect to DEIA are exemplary. However, much work remains to be done on gender parity broadly, with a singular focus needed on issues of basic representation by race/ethnicity which demonstrate a shocking lack of change over the past decade.

The chapter is organized to first provide background and present the available data and the inputs the decadal survey received from community white papers. The committee then presents its analysis of these data and its

Suggested Citation:"16 State of the Profession." National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine. 2023. Origins, Worlds, and Life: A Decadal Strategy for Planetary Science and Astrobiology 2023-2032. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/26522.
×

findings and concludes with a set of recommendations. This chapter begins with research on how unintended bias can impact decisions and a growing recognition of systemic bias embedded in individual minds, communities, and institutions. This discussion provides a backdrop against which issues specific to PS&AB can addressed to ensure diverse and robust fields of planetary science and astrobiology going forward.

IMPLICIT AND SYSTEMIC BIAS

Overall progress on matters of equity and accountability in STEM fields has been slow, and in the case of advancing some underrepresented racial/ethnic communities (URC), it has been surprisingly stagnant. New paths to advancement on this issue merit consideration, including the science of implicit bias and the notion of systemic bias that pervades all human activity, individual and institutional. The concept of implicit bias may explain why social change in STEM fields has been slow: the attitudes and stereotypes that contribute to bias can be hidden from conscious awareness. That which is unknown cannot, by definition, be a candidate for change or progress. If NASA PSD embraces evidence from the behavioral and social sciences and works to mitigate bias both in the minds of individuals and the structures of institutions, NASA PSD can move PS&AB forward in unprecedented ways. To be clear, explicit forms of bias although on a downward slope are not nonexistent in the daily lives of scientists. (As a widely discussed example, see Picture a Scientist, Cheney and Shattuck 2020.) Rather, there are two reasons for focusing on implicit bias: implicit bias by its nature is hidden and as such is likely to remain unidentified, posing unique resistance to change. Second, a focus on implicit bias naturally includes addressing explicit bias as tackling it requires setting a higher standard to address not only obvious and explicit forms of bias but also those that escape recognition.

Human social groups are a defining part of every society. Variations in gender identity and sexuality, race and ethnicity, age, socioeconomic class, religion, physical ability and features, personality, culture, national origin and many more, deeply determine life’s opportunities and outcomes. They do so because of the histories of intergroup contact and conflict, age-old and present-day attitudes (preferences) and beliefs (stereotypes) about social groups and the individual members of those groups. Attitudes and beliefs are the building blocks of all human interactions, and they carry with them the power to imbue individuals with certain essential features, whether such attitudes and beliefs are true or not, such as who is good and bad and specific traits such as who is naturally competent or incompetent. Because intergroup attitudes and stereotypes were first empirically investigated at the turn of the 20th century, survey evidence shows that they have consistently moved toward greater and greater neutrality—that is, a belief that all social groups deserve equal opportunity and equal treatment. This provides grounds for optimism in the ability to effect positive change. Yet, objective measures of behavior in the workplace reveal consistent evidence of discrimination; two people can perform the same action (produce the same quality of work) but are judged differently based on beliefs about what their group, not they, is capable of. How is this possible, today, given a fundamental belief in fairness and a commitment to pursuing the best talent?

The concept of implicit bias was introduced in the 1990s to suggest why conscious and explicit statements of egalitarianism may abound, while continued discrimination exists. Substantial and growing evidence shows that implicit forms of bias exist even in individuals who sincerely endorse egalitarian values. Implicit bias has been shown to play a role in the perception of potential, talent, deservingness, rewards, and so on. The disparity between what is explicitly expressed (no bias) and implicitly revealed (existence of bias) makes the problem challenging, because bias is hidden. Moreover, implicit biases influence behavior and become enmeshed in the practices and policies of organizations in ways that may be imperceptible but that can play an active role in shaping a system of discrimination, as signaled by terms such as “systemic racism” (Banaji et al. 2021). Specifically, the microcosm of individual minds reflects the macrocosm of culture and society and studies now demonstrate the shaping of bias as a function of simply geographic location (Charlesworth and Banaji 2021). Newer data suggest that even implicit or hidden bias can be changed (Charlesworth and Banaji 2022), and Cox and Devine (2019) demonstrate strategies that lead to change. From the white papers, the invited speakers, and the committee’s deliberations it appears that the community of PS&AB is optimistic and ready to do the work that is necessary at the individual level. By adding the strength of NASA as an organization to such an effort, the future holds increased promise and can be brighter than ever before. A convergence of views from across several sciences has led to the recognition

Suggested Citation:"16 State of the Profession." National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine. 2023. Origins, Worlds, and Life: A Decadal Strategy for Planetary Science and Astrobiology 2023-2032. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/26522.
×

that unless bias operating at many different levels is identified and analyzed as a whole, the possibility for change is unlikely in society at large. The analysis reveals built-in systems that undermine life’s opportunities and outcomes by racial category in particular, although extensions to the constraints placed by demographic variables such as socioeconomic status, age, disability, immigrant status and nationality, sexuality and gender identity, and religion are all a part of understanding the nature of systems of bias. The idea of systemic bias takes the long view, starting with American colonial history, and explicit practices and policies that reinforced disadvantage across all domains of life (Banaji et al. 2021). The analysis reveals that racial/ethnic segregation and isolation have led to disproportionate costs to Native Americans’ and Black Americans’ opportunities among other groups, whether in the form of social networks, education, physical health, or financial resources. Although a miniscule segment of American society, the fields of PS&AB have inherited this history and any attempt to analyze the state of the profession needs to recognize that it is part of the larger culture in which these sciences operate. Recognition of built-in inequities motivates actions to mitigate the effects of this history at least to the extent that it affects progress in PS&AB. NASA PSD is a part of the government of the United States and shares in the responsibility to objectively analyze itself and its procedures, processes, and practices to ensure that its own environment is free of systemic and institutional bias.

Creating the Conditions Necessary for Effecting Change

Once we recognize that bias is at least partly unintentional or implicit, implementing objective measures of self-examination that acknowledge this situation is surest path to progress. Many organizations routinely engage in such analyses (see, for example, Lauer and Roychowdhury, 2021). Groups that collect evidence on all aspects of their activities and use those data to improve procedures and make those data publicly available gain in credibility and engender the trust of the community.

Uncovering hidden bias often involves gathering evidence about disparities well beyond simply measuring the demographic composition of fields. If such evidence is responsibly collected and publicly disseminated, existing disparities will be brought to light and can be corrected. If the evidence shows that hiring, retention, promotion, grants, salaries, mission opportunities, leadership preparation, and recognitions are indeed distributed unevenly and not always based on merit, then legitimate action to correct such inequities in the interest of the best science and applications can be initiated. Among the main messages of this report is that such data are lacking today, and without them NASA PSD is hampered in its mission to effect positive change, no matter how motivated it is to do so. Further, knowing the evidence, while necessary, is not sufficient. There will be, as there always is, resistance to evidence that challenges the status quo. As such, the next step will involve educating members of the community about the corresponding cost borne by the science because of disparities in opportunity and treatment. Websites, seminars, and tests make it possible to educate about bias effectively by showing its effects on the quality of the work that emerges, so long as such education is conducted in an ongoing and rigorous way, in addition to annual reports that can serve to track change over time. Education and awareness of leadership and the workforce (community engagement in these issues is vital to success) are necessary but not sufficient. Concurrent with the education of individuals, organizations need to engage with experts to assist in transforming existing practices and policies to better ensure equity. Based on the best evidence from STEM fields in general, and to the extent available about PS&AB in particular, NASA PSD needs to actively seek to debias its procedures and policies. This includes analyzing every step of decision-making processes involved in advertising, recruitment, selection, onboarding, retention, promotion, compensation, symbolic recognitions, team dynamics, research and analysis, space mission opportunities and outcomes, succession planning, and engaging with the community and the public.

Last, change is unlikely to manifest unless a system of accountability is put into place very much like the accountability scientists regularly exert on their own scientific work. Increasingly, attention to inequities and lack of transparency is being paid, even demanded, by a new generation of scientists. In our scientific work, we use the best measures to find the evidence we are seeking, we report our results publicly and transparently, we allow others to evaluate and challenge it, we improve it and get back to the drawing board. Why are we, members of STEM fields, slow to do the same to measure ourselves on matters concerning the SoP? Our answer is that it is because we regard ourselves to be generally fair and unbiased in matters of interpersonal evaluations. That assumption

Suggested Citation:"16 State of the Profession." National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine. 2023. Origins, Worlds, and Life: A Decadal Strategy for Planetary Science and Astrobiology 2023-2032. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/26522.
×

needs to be set aside because we now know better based on the science of implicit bias (Jost et al. 2009). As such, it will be important for NASA PSD to scrutinize its own procedures and policies in an open and accountable manner. There are indications of progress of this very nature in many STEM fields, and the committee aims to support NASA PSD to usher in practices and policies that ensure the advancement and well-being of a diverse community suited to pursue the deepest knowledge about the diverse worlds that lie beyond our own.

THE EVIDENCE

The impetus to deal with DEIA issues has increased dramatically over the past decade. Scientists understand that the diversity they observe and strive for in their methods and locations are critical to the success of the profession. Analyzing and understanding issues surrounding DEIA are just as important for an adaptive, high-functioning science community. NASA PSD recognizes the importance of diversity in target bodies, methods, and techniques (because no one method, however powerful, can provide a full understanding as can be achieved with a collection of diverse methods), and it is time to similarly recognize the importance of diversity of the members of its profession for the same reason—to improve the quality of the science and therefore the progress it hopes to achieve.

The first step in assessing “the state of the profession” is to look at accurate and sufficient evidence about trends in its demographics and culture. This decadal survey did not collect any original data. It utilized existing data but did so in a comprehensive manner that makes this repository of demographics data the most exhaustive collection anywhere within the PS&AB community.1 That said, very sparse data exist on the planetary and astrobiology science communities. Partly, this is because of the complexity of defining the boundaries of such multi- and interdisciplinary fields. The profession is drawn from the geological sciences, physics, astronomy, chemistry, biology, and other disciplines. Moreover, the new field of exoplanets has greatly expanded the population of planetary scientists and further blurred the boundary with astrophysics. These are positive features scientifically speaking, but they create greater complexity when measuring the demographics given the difficulty of categorization.

Until the first planetary science workforce survey was carried out in 2010–2011, there existed no data from which any estimates of the demographics, within an order of magnitude, could be made. Notably, no concerted effort has been made by NASA over the past decades to collect, analyze, and present self-identified data or to support the routine collection of rigorous data of the profession that encompasses PS&AB. The data that do exist are largely owing to (1) the commitment of individuals (including within NASA) who pursued data collection about the state of academic planetary and other scientists and (2) community-driven surveys. Recent efforts to collect data are helpful but there is a need for collection of better data and for continuous monitoring and improvement of procedures and policies beyond what is being done today. As a relatively newer subfield of study, there are essentially no data on astrobiology, so the bulk of the data presented here focus on planetary science (Table 16-1). This situation will need to be rectified in order to conduct a comprehensive review. Open session meetings with the committee and astrobiology representatives suggest a heightened awareness of issues and ongoing work to address this current lack of information.

The data presented in this chapter are a comprehensive collection of the available information on the field of PS&AB. The data have been used to provide insights into the SoP. The committee emphasizes that rigorous data collection and analyses are required to draw robust conclusions, which is not currently possible.

University Departments Surveys, 2011 and 2018

University department surveys were initiated and collected by Fran Bagenal at the University of Colorado’s Laboratory for Atmospheric and Space Physics. This is an example of the goodwill of individual members who have collected such data, but this cannot be relied upon as a method for future data gathering. Ensuring proper

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1 State of Planetary Science Profession: a presentation of data on demographics on the planetary science research community that were gathered to support this decadal survey are available via University of Colorado’s public document depository, CU Scholar, at https://doi.org/10.25810/VNTG-FK10.

Suggested Citation:"16 State of the Profession." National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine. 2023. Origins, Worlds, and Life: A Decadal Strategy for Planetary Science and Astrobiology 2023-2032. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/26522.
×

TABLE 16-1 Overview of the Datasets on the Planetary Science Workforce

Abbreviation Name of Survey Year of Survey Fields Surveyed Response Rate Total Number Sent to (N)
Dept-1 2011 Survey of U.S. Planetary Science University Departmentsa 2011 (Academic Years 2008–2009, 2009–2010) U.S. university departments that include planetary science 54 departments at 40 universities
Dept-2 2018 Survey of U.S. Planetary Science University Departmentsb 2018 (Academic Years 2016–2017 and 2017–2018) U.S. university departments that include planetary science 36 departments at 29 universities
AIP-1 2011 Survey of the Planetary Workforcec 2011 AAS Division for Planetary Science, LPSC, AGU Section on Planetary Science 62% 4252
AIP-2 2020 Survey of the Planetary Workforced 2020 AAS Division for Planetary Science, LPSC, GSA Planetary Geology Division 48% 4965
NSPIRES NASA Science Mission Directorate Demographics Datae 2021 Personal profiles on NSPIRES 31,172 PIs and Co-Is of planetary proposals
Missions NASA Announcement of Opportunity Science Team Demographicsf 2021 Mission leadership of competed missions 933 proposals

a Laboratory for Atmospheric and Space Physics (LASP), University of Colorado (CU) Boulder, 2015, “Summary of Results of Survey of U.S. Academic Departments that Include Planetary Science,” https://lasp.colorado.edu/home/mop/files/2015/08/DeptSummary3.pdf.

b F. Bagenal, 2021, “Planetary Science Academic Department Surveys 2011 & 2018,” LASP, CU Boulder, https://lasp.colorado.edu/home/mop/files/2021/07/DeptComparison2011-2018.pdf.

c S. White, R.Y. Chu, and R. Ivie, 2011, “Results from the 2011 Survey of the Planetary Science Workforce,” Statistical Research Center, American Institute of Physics (AIP), https://lasp.colorado.edu/home/mop/files/2015/08/Report.pdf.

d A.M. Porter, S. White, and J. Dollison, “2020 Survey of the Planetary Science Workforce,” Statistical Research Center, AIP, https://dps.aas.org/sites/dps.aas.org/files/reports/2020/Results_from_the_2020_Survey_of_the_Planetary_Science_Workforce.pdf.

e L. Barbier and C. Wilson, 2021, “Demographic Data Presentation to: Planetary Science Advisory Committee,” NASA, https://science.nasa.gov/science-red/s3fs-public/atoms/files/07-Barbier-Demographics-061421.pdf.

f H. Jensen and L. Pappas, NASA, 2021, “NASA Announcement of Opportunity Science Team Demographics,” Presentation at the NASEM Increasing Diversity and Inclusion in the Leadership of Competed Spaced Missions Committee Meeting #6, June 16, Washington, DC, https://www.nationalacademies.org/event/06-16-2021/increasing-diversity-and-inclusion-in-the-leadership-of-competed-space-missions-meeting-6.

and regular data collection and consistent standards on composition of the community and taking the pulse on climate are going to be essential.

Small Number and Diverse Programs

There are only ~13 U.S. university departments, with “planetary” in the department’s name. Furthermore, being such an interdisciplinary field, it is difficult to track down all the academic institutions in the United States where planetary scientists do research and teach courses. Many of the planetary researchers at universities are not in academic departments but in independent research labs. Here the committee uses survey results of academic departments to seek information about the career pathway from bachelor’s to PhD and beyond. The 2011 and 2018 surveys were conducted by an ad hoc committee with questionnaires sent to departments sought largely by word-of-mouth. Some universities had multiple departments that housed planetary science faculty.

Suggested Citation:"16 State of the Profession." National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine. 2023. Origins, Worlds, and Life: A Decadal Strategy for Planetary Science and Astrobiology 2023-2032. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/26522.
×

In 2011, only 39 universities stated that they had any faculty who identified as planetary scientists, with 105 of the 233 faculty positions located at just six universities. The surveys focused on the previous two academic years: fall 2008 to spring 2010 for the 2011 survey and fall 2016 to spring 2018 for the 2018 survey. Neither survey asked about astrobiology and only the 2018 survey asked if there were people in the department who studied exoplanets (41 faculty).

Demographics of Bachelors, PhDs, Faculty

Few universities have bachelor’s degree programs in planetary science and/or astrobiology but many teach upper-division courses in these fields. Accordingly, the survey asked, “How many undergraduates completed a bachelor’s degree in your department with a concentration in planetary science (took 2 or more upper division courses in planetary science) during the past two academic years?” The total is about 100 bachelor’s degrees per year, of which about one-third are women. Figure 16-1 shows the top 10 departments for total faculty as reported to the committee. The change between decades is highly variable between institutions, and only goes to show that the data available today are insufficient to draw accurate conclusions about the state of the profession.

Regarding PhDs, 50–65 are awarded per year in planetary science, of which 40–45 percent were awarded to women. These data suggest the gender gap is narrowing. The 2018 survey asked departments for data on students’ U.S. citizenship or permanent resident status and found that 30 percent of graduate students were non-U.S. citizens. The departments also reported a mere 7 percent of graduate students identifying as members of underserved racial/ethnic communities.

The departmental surveys suggest that the total number of women faculty (tenured and tenure-track) in planetary science has increased marginally over the past decade from 233 to 250—that is, 14 percent to ~20 percent. The percentage of tenure-track women faculty increased from 24 to 35 percent showing increasing gender diversity in the academic career pathway. Figure 16-1 shows the top 10 departments for total faculty. The change between decades is highly variable between institutions.

The AIP Surveys, 2011 and 2020

The Statistical Division of the American Institute of Physics (AIP) has developed a survey protocol that takes email lists from multiple organizations, sorts them into unique addresses and sends out a questionnaire designed (e.g., by a committee of planetary scientists guided by the AIP’s experience) to gather demographics and workforce climate data. The AIP follows up with reminders to produce response rates often more than 50 percent. The responses remain anonymous, with reporting shielding personal identification when bin sizes are too small. This is commendable.

In 2011, the survey was sent to 4,252 unique contacts via conference mailing lists (AIP 2011). Responses were received from 62 percent of these people. Because a major goal of the survey was to find out the number of active planetary researchers in the United States, the survey focus was on the responses from 1,518 participants who had earned a doctorate and lived in the United States. Among them, 946 identified as planetary scientists actively working full-time and on research (rather than mission operations, management, or teaching). Assuming the 62 percent response rate applies equally across all populations, one may infer that 1,525 planetary PhD scientists were actively working full-time on research in 2011.

In anticipation of this decadal survey, work started in 2017 on a follow-up to the 2011 survey. The American Astronomical Society’s Division for Planetary Sciences (DPS) led this survey and partnered with AIP for data collection and analysis. The 2020 Planetary Science Workforce Survey was sent to 4,965 members of the planetary science community in April 2020 (AAS-AIP 2020). Of the 2,367 responses (48 percent response rate), about 941 have PhDs and are working in the United States in planetary research. Again, assuming the 48 percent response rate applies equally across all surveyed populations, one may infer that 1,960 planetary PhD scientists are actively working on research in 2020. This suggests a ~25 percent increase over the decade or 2.5 percent/year.

Suggested Citation:"16 State of the Profession." National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine. 2023. Origins, Worlds, and Life: A Decadal Strategy for Planetary Science and Astrobiology 2023-2032. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/26522.
×
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FIGURE 16-1 Gender of planetary scientists from bachelor’s degree candidates, PhDs, and tenure-track faculty by major academic institutions.

Area of Degree

The 2011 survey showed that only 2 percent of planetary scientists received their undergraduate degree in planetary sciences, while 37 percent were in physics, 22 percent in geology and geophysics, 7 percent in chemistry, 8 percent in astronomy and astrophysics, 5 percent in Earth science, 4 percent in biology, and 2 percent in math (AIP 2011). When considering PhDs, 40 percent of working planetary scientists received their PhD in planetary science, 15 percent in geology and geophysics, 13 percent in astronomy and astrophysics, 12 percent in physics, and just a few from other areas. Questions about the area of degree were not asked in the 2020 survey.

Suggested Citation:"16 State of the Profession." National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine. 2023. Origins, Worlds, and Life: A Decadal Strategy for Planetary Science and Astrobiology 2023-2032. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/26522.
×

Employment

Relatively few planetary scientists work at NASA centers: 14 percent in 2011, and only 7 percent in 2020. The largest portion of planetary scientists work at a university or college (48 percent in 2011, 41 percent in 2020). The next largest employers are research institutes/federally funded research and development centers (FFRDCs)/nonprofits which employ about 33 percent. This third of the community depends on research grants to support themselves. This is in contrast with the field of astronomy where 56 percent are employed at a university/college, while only ~14 percent are at research institutes/FFRDCs/nonprofits (14 percent of astronomers are employed at NASA centers). Overall, according to the AAS-AIP 2020 survey, approximately half of the planetary science workforce (post-PhD) are in tenured or hard-money/permanent jobs (varying by about ±10 percent depending on gender and/or race/ethnicity). The other half are in soft-money, tenure-track, post-doctoral, freelance or “other” positions.

Current Demographics

The gender, race, and ethnic diversity of the planetary science workforce is shown in Figure 16-2, which compares the 2011 and 2020 survey numbers as well as the demographics of the U.S. workforce, U.S. STEM workforce, and U.S. physical sciences workforce. Data intentionally focusing on the representation of communities who have been historically underrepresented in PS&AB is presented to draw attention to the needs of these communities. Currently, 37 percent of the planetary science workforce are women and 1 percent are nonbinary or another gender. This is in contrast with a Pew Research Center report (Fry et al. 2021), that found that 50 percent of those employed in STEM jobs are women and 40 percent of those employed in the physical sciences are women. Asian Americans comprise 6 percent of the U.S. workforce, 13 percent of all STEM jobs, 18 percent of physical science jobs, and 13 percent of the planetary workforce.

The recent survey identified a severe underrepresentation of Black and Latinx researchers in planetary science. Although Latinx/Hispanics are 17 percent of the U.S. workforce, 8 percent of all STEM jobs, and 8 percent of physical science jobs, only 5 percent of respondents to the 2020 AAS-AIP survey were Hispanic or Latinx. Moreover, although Black/African Americans are 11 percent of the U.S. workforce, 9 percent of all STEM jobs, and 6 percent of physical science jobs, only 1 percent of respondents to the 2020 AIP survey were Black or African American.

There is little data on Indigenous researchers. Following data reported by NASA on its workforce, American Indian/Alaskan Natives comprise 1.1 percent of the national civilian labor force, 1 percent of all NASA employees, and 0.8 percent of the agency’s science and engineering employees (NASA 2019). The 2020 AAS-AIP survey indicates that 10 percent of the field is LGBTQ+, with 1 percent of respondents identifying as nonbinary or another gender. Disability is claimed as an identity by 15 percent respondents to the 2020 AAS-AIP survey. These figures are not comparable to other population surveys because the questions in the AAS-AIP survey are more inclusive of a broad range of identities. In general, indigenous, LGBTQ+, nonbinary, and people with disabilities are examples of demographics that are not consistently reported nor consistently defined in surveys. This hinders the ability to support these communities.

Demographics Over the Past Decade

Over the past decade, the field has made some improvements in the representation of historically excluded people. Notably, the percentage of women in the planetary science workforce has increased from 25 percent in 2011 to 37 percent in 2020, and the representation of Asian Americans has increased from 7 percent in 2011 to 13 percent in 2020 (see Figure 16-2). Asian Americans comprise only 3 percent of planetary scientists having earned their degree on or before 1970, but 17 percent of those who earned their degree between 2011 and 2020 (Table 16-2).

Although remaining below national workforce numbers, the representation of Latinx/Hispanics has increased from 1 percent in 2011 to 5 percent in 2020. In fact, although 0 percent of planetary scientists who earned their PhD on or before 1980 are Hispanic or Latinx, 6 percent of those who earned their degree between 2011 and 2020 are Latinx/Hispanic. Crucially, the representation of Black/African Americans has shown no growth over the past decade, continuing at 1 percent, well below the national workforce value. This is consistent with analysis

Suggested Citation:"16 State of the Profession." National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine. 2023. Origins, Worlds, and Life: A Decadal Strategy for Planetary Science and Astrobiology 2023-2032. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/26522.
×
Image
FIGURE 16-2 Representation of men and women, and demographics by race and ethnicity as reported in the 2011 and 2020 planetary science workforce surveys along with the demographics of physical science jobs, all STEM jobs, and all U.S. jobs as reported by a Pew Research Center study. The STEM jobs data for American Indian/Alaskan Native are from a NASA report on demographics of its workforce. Data are lacking for physical sciences and from the 2011 planetary science survey for American Indian/Alaskan Native.
Suggested Citation:"16 State of the Profession." National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine. 2023. Origins, Worlds, and Life: A Decadal Strategy for Planetary Science and Astrobiology 2023-2032. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/26522.
×

TABLE 16-2 Demographics of the Planetary Science Workforce by Year of PhD Degree Conferral as Presented in the 2020 AAS-AIP Planetary Science Workforce Study

Year of Degree Black, African American or Another Race/Ethnicitya Hispanic/Latinx Asian American White LGBTQ+b
1970 or earlier 5% 0% 3% 92% 4%
1971–1980 3% 0% 5% 92% 4%
1981–1990 3% 3% 4% 90% 2%
1991–2000 4% 2% 11% 83% 6%
2001–2010 4% 5% 10% 81% 6%
2011–2020 5% 6% 17% 72% 12%

a Other race/ethnicity included respondents who are Native American/Alaskan Native, Native Hawaiian/Other Pacific Islander, or wrote in another race/ethnicity.

b LGBTQ+ included respondents who are lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, nonbinary or another noncisgender identity, and other non-heterosexual orientations.

of the geoscience’s profession (Bernard and Cooperdock 2018), as well as physics and geoscience PhD recipients (Rivera-Valentín et al. 2020).

The 2020 AAS-AIP survey further showed that the percentage of PhD degree recipients identifying as LGBTQ+ has been increasing over the past 20 years. Although only 4 percent of planetary scientists who earned their PhD on or before 1970 self-identified as LGBTQ+, 12 percent of those who earned their degree between 2011 and 2020 self-identified as LGBTQ+.

Age Structure of the Profession

At present, NASA does not report age data of proposal submitters and awardees. Data on the average age of planetary scientists and astrobiologists as well as the full age distribution are necessary. Such data can then serve as the baseline to compare to further data on (a) the age distribution of proposal submitters and (b) the age distribution of proposal awardees. Given the tendency in science to continue to fund those who have previously been funded (and often with good reason), such data will allow NASA to monitor whether its funding is sufficiently nurturing and growing the field of new proposers. Perhaps NASA is already collecting and analyzing such data; however, in the absence of published data on this demographic variable, it leaves the field wondering about potential age-based bias.

Given the lack of data for proper characterization and assessment of even the age of the profession (as NSF does not track PhDs in planetary science), the only available data the committee could piece together on the age of the profession (not proposal submitters or awardees) were from the two DPS surveys (AIP 2011; AAS-AIP 2020). The 2011 workforce survey provides an age profile (AIP 2011). It shows the age range of the profession to be between 35 and 54 with a median age of about 44 years. The 2020 workforce survey only provided the age profile information for DPS members; it did not provide data for all respondents (AAS-AIP 2020). It reports that 28 percent of DPS members are 60 and older and that about 60 percent of DPS members are between 30 and 60. In comparison, some 20 percent of the U.S. population is 60 and older. The data provided by these two workforce surveys are not directly comparable (one speaks to the age of the field, the other speaks to the age of the DPS members only). The difficulty the committee encountered in responding to questions about the age of the profession and award recipients was a common occurrence as it attempted to provide a description of the state of the profession in the absence of evidence. If the committee’s main recommendation is to begin collecting and reporting on the many variables that can illuminate the state of the profession and the life of working PS&AB, it is to avoid a future decadal from making the same discovery of a lack of evidence. The committee’s emphasis on this issue

Suggested Citation:"16 State of the Profession." National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine. 2023. Origins, Worlds, and Life: A Decadal Strategy for Planetary Science and Astrobiology 2023-2032. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/26522.
×

of high-quality data-gathering and reporting is not unique. The state of the profession chapter in the most recent astronomy and astrophysics decadal survey (NASEM 2023) raises the same issues.

Comparison across Sub-Fields of Planetary Science: Geology, Astronomy, and Physics

Both the Geological Society of America and the American Geophysical Union gather data from their members and publish gender demographics as a function of career stage (AGU 2018; GSA 2021). Like planetary science, there are clear indications of trends of increasing percentage of women across these fields. The geosciences, astronomy, and planetary science each have ~35 percent women while in physics the change is slower, barely reaching 20 percent. The numbers of Latinx/Hispanic Americans are also increasing across the fields, reaching 5–7 percent. Of greater concern are the numbers for Black/African Americans, which have remained around a percent or two for astronomy and the geosciences for the past two decades (Bernard and Cooperdock 2018; Rivera-Valentín et al. 2020).

Astrobiology

No data have systematically been collected on the astrobiology community. Although encompassing similarities in disciplines to planetary science, astrobiology in the United States has a single flagship conference, the Astrobiology Science Conference or AbSciCon, which began in 2000. AbSciCon has had 600 to 800 attendees roughly every other year before 2010, and 700 to 900 attendees in the 2010s. Additional regular astrobiology conferences are the Gordon Research Conference on the Origins of Life (biennial small-format meetings since 1982) and meetings of the International Society for the Study of the Origins of Life (ISSOL; every 3 years since 1957, gathering about 150 participants in post-2000 meetings). The 2020 AIP survey found that some 26 percent of respondents’ primary research interest was astrobiology. Of these respondents, the AIP reported to the committee that 40 percent were women and 2.5 percent were nonbinary or another gender. There are no reliable and public data on racial/ethnic representation, members of LGBTQ communities, or other demographic axes in astrobiology.

NASA PSD Proposal Submissions and Selections

In 2016, NASA began collecting demographic data of Principal (PI) and Co-Investigators (Co-I) on proposals submitted through the NASA Solicitation and Proposal Integrated Review System (NSPIRES). Collected demographic information included binary gender, race, ethnicity, career stage, and questions related to disabilities and serious health conditions; all questions provided a “prefer not to answer” (PNA) option. Demographic information for PIs and Co-Is submitting proposals to NASA PSD was then “back-casted” to 2014 where possible. Here the gender, race, and ethnic demographic data reported for proposal PIs to the Planetary Science Advisory Committee (PAC) on June 14, 2021, is shown (Barbier and Wilson 2021).

Demographic of Proposal Submissions

In Table 16-3, the committee presents PI demographics in terms of binary gender, race, and ethnicity from proposals submitted to NASA PSD between 2014 to 2020. Based on these data, it presents trends in proposal submission rates from different groups. To preserve respondent anonymity, information for PIs who identified as American Indian/Alaskan Native, Black/African American, Latinx/Hispanic, Native Hawaiian or other Pacific Islander, Multi-Racial, and other race/ethnicity is reported as a single category, Under-Represented (Racial/Ethnic) Community (URC).

As can be seen in Table 16-3, between 2014 and 2020, 63 percent of proposal submissions were led by men and 25 percent by women, with 13 percent of respondents choosing PNA. This contrasts with the finding of the 2020 AAS-AIP workforce survey that 37 percent of planetary scientists are women. Additionally, 5 percent of PIs identified as URC between 2014 and 2020, which contrasts with the AIP survey’s suggestion that 8 percent of the field is URC. Both points are, however, influenced by the identity of those that chose not to respond.

Suggested Citation:"16 State of the Profession." National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine. 2023. Origins, Worlds, and Life: A Decadal Strategy for Planetary Science and Astrobiology 2023-2032. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/26522.
×

TABLE 16-3 Demographics of Proposal Submissions by Binary Gender, Race, and Ethnicity

Identity 2014 2015 2016 2017 2018 2019 2020 Combined
Gender Woman 22% 25% 23% 26% 24% 27% 28% 25%
Man 64% 62% 65% 60% 62% 63% 64% 63%
Gender-PNA 15% 13% 12% 15% 13% 10% 8% 13%
Race-Ethnicity White 63% 64% 64% 62% 62% 62% 65% 63%
Asian American 9% 9% 9% 9% 12% 12% 12% 10%
URC 4% 5% 6% 5% 5% 6% 7% 5%
Race/Ethnic-PNA 23% 22% 21% 24% 22% 21% 16% 22%

Selection of Proposals

Figure 16-3 shows the percentage of proposals selected for funding (selection rate) in terms of reported binary gender, race, and ethnicity of proposals submitted to NASA PSD from 2014 to 2020. Overall, the selection rates of women and men are reasonably comparable, averaging 23 and 20 percent respectively, although the selection rate for women has in all but one year been higher than that of men. Overall, the selection rate of proposals led by White PIs is 22 percent while for URC PIs it is 15 percent (i.e., the selection rate of White PIs is 1.5 times higher than for URC PIs).

Furthermore, Figure 16-3 shows that every year the selection rate of URC PIs was less than the overall selection rate and the selection rate for proposals with White PIs. To illustrate this point, the committee followed the framework established by Reid (2014). Reid found that women were found to be consistently less likely to be awarded time on the Hubble Space Telescope by comparing the number of selections made (Na) to the number of expected selections (Ne) given the demographics of proposal submissions. In Reid (2014), this difference was normalized by the square root of Ne, such that a positive quantity shows over-selection, a negative quantity under-selection, and ratios much greater than ±1 indicate selections beyond reasonable expectation. The committee replotted the data presented to the PAC for grant selections made by race and ethnicity following this framework in Figure 16-4. Every year, URC-led proposals have been under-selected, and selections were below reasonable expectation (<−1) in 2014, 2016, and on average over the years. Proposals led by Asian Americans are not consistently under-selected, but selections were below reasonable expectation in 2015 and 2019. In contrast, proposals led by White PIs are consistently over-selected, and selections were above reasonable expectation (i.e., >1) in 2015, 2016, and 2018.

Image
FIGURE 16-3 NASA PSD R&A proposal selection rates per year binned by (A) reported binary gender, and (B) race and ethnicity.
Suggested Citation:"16 State of the Profession." National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine. 2023. Origins, Worlds, and Life: A Decadal Strategy for Planetary Science and Astrobiology 2023-2032. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/26522.
×
Image
FIGURE 16-4 NASA PSD grant selection rate by race and ethnicity between 2014 and 2020 plotted following the framework of Reid (2014). The average selection rate over all years is shown on the far right. Solid black lines at ±1 show when selection rates were above (>1) or below (<−1) reasonable expectation.

WHITE PAPERS SUBMITTED TO THE SURVEY

White papers submitted to the committee in the summer to fall of 2020 are the main source of evidence to hear directly and more broadly from the profession. Moreover, the white papers represent a labor of love, by working planetary scientists and astrobiologists seeking to improve the quality of the profession both in terms of the work that is produced and their lives. To derive the best-fidelity evidence from the white papers, the committee evaluated evidence referenced in the white papers by reaching the original source for verification. In addition to shaping the topics addressed in the Summary of Findings, the white papers on the SoP were quantitatively analyzed for additional data on the profession. A total of 36 papers were read and interpreted for this chapter, specifically referencing white papers that included verifiable data and/or data sources.

White paper authors provide insights into the geographical distribution of institutions that make the PS&AB community: 45.8 percent are from institutions in the western United States, 34.7 in the south, 8 percent in the northeast, 4.4 percent from the midwest, and 7.1 percent were international. On the gender axis, 52.5 percent of white paper authors were women, 37.9 percent were men, and 9.6 percent were nonbinary.

The white papers reveal that interest in SoP concerns is robust and high but underscore a sparse evidence base. Almost half the papers offered only an occasional statistic. The white papers discussed concerns about race/ethnicity (50 percent), general issues concerning URCs (41 percent), and gender (31 percent). A few also raised issues of disability, neurodiversity, socioeconomic class, and sexual identity and orientation. The content of the white papers covered a range of topics relevant to the State of the Profession ranged from issues concerning precollege and college education, PhD, tenure track and career pipeline, grants and funding, authorship, collaboration, mentorship, mission and field sites, conferences/workshops, child raising and work family balance, sense of belonging and workplace culture, recognition of service, a need for education and awareness of bias, dual anonymous peer review (DAPR), no proposal due dates, and broadening opportunities

Suggested Citation:"16 State of the Profession." National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine. 2023. Origins, Worlds, and Life: A Decadal Strategy for Planetary Science and Astrobiology 2023-2032. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/26522.
×

SUMMARY OF FINDINGS

Urgent and Important Need for Evidence About (1) the Size and Identity of PS&AB, (2) Demographic Data of PS&AB, and (3) Workplace Climate

NASA’s Science Mission Directorate has expanded its core values to embrace inclusion (NASA 2020): “dedicated to creating a multi-pronged approach that brings systemic and lasting change in this area by fostering inclusion, diversity, equity and accessibility across all elements of our work through dedicated activities and sustained engagement.” Actions that bridge opportunity gaps are applauded. However, although NASA fulfills its fiduciary and legal responsibilities with respect to DEIA, it falls short and behind the times for a world leader in planetary science and astrobiology. Data gathering needs to be undertaken with a sense of evolving attempts to get at the most important information. The methodical approach undertaken by the Space Telescope Science Institute in implementing DAPR, and the NIH approach to evolve and address DEIA issues in their programs are excellent examples of the importance of iterative and continuous efforts to reach better clarity of and address the underlying issues. Progress toward equity and accountability can be assessed by evidence that supports the themes and basic tenets shown in Box 16-1 below.

The systems and mechanisms to define, measure, and publicly report on the profession are currently inadequate. The data presented above represent a tremendous investment of time and resources by individuals and organizations who have sought to understand the SoP. Yet, these data do not result from a common framework and community agreement on the scope of PS&AB, including consensus about the items for data gathering and analysis. NASA PSD stands to gain tremendously from such knowledge and the data will have credibility if they are accompanied by NASA’s imprimatur.

Finding: Data on field identity and size, demographics, and workplace climate are lacking. Once obtained and regularly updated, they will rationally guide NASA’s monitoring of the SoP and assist to maximize equity and accountability goals. The first wave will serve as the baseline for tracking progress and serve as a core vehicle of accountability.

Education of Individuals and Changes in Institutional Procedures, Practices, and Polices

Data collected in response to the above will serve to shape the nature and scope of (a) education of individuals within NASA and associated institutes and (b) initiating and institutionalizing efforts to transform procedures,

Suggested Citation:"16 State of the Profession." National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine. 2023. Origins, Worlds, and Life: A Decadal Strategy for Planetary Science and Astrobiology 2023-2032. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/26522.
×

practices, and policies that constitute systemic barriers to scientific progress. This major initiative will require convening meetings consisting of experts in PS&AB as well as behavioral science to identify the specifics behind SoP issues or that hinder scientific progress. Examples of processes to examine and improve are advertising, recruiting, selection, hiring, onboarding, retention, promotion, lab, and field team dynamics. Likewise, processes involved in tenure, publications, special recognitions (such as keynote addresses), funding, missions, administrative loads, and teaching loads, can be unpacked to identify where and how bias can enter and to develop strategies to mitigate its effects. The findings that follow in this section are examples of issues and paths to improve the core processes involved in PS&AB.

Dual Anonymous Peer Review

Analysis of NSPIRES data collected over the past six years shows that while proposals with female PIs have been more likely to be selected than those of male PIs, proposals submitted by URC PIs are consistently less likely to be selected than those submitted by a White PI (see Figure 16-3). Several factors may contribute to this disparity, including (1) biases during the proposal review by the review panel, (2) biases during decision making process for selections and funding, and (3) opportunity gaps for URC PIs (e.g., access to mentorship and service on review panels).

The experience at the Space Telescope Science Institute (STScI) illustrates the impact and value of removing sources of bias. Prior to 2018, a systematically higher success rate in Hubble proposals for male PIs over female PIs was observed (Reid 2014). It might appear that this could reflect a bias based on seniority, not on gender, because proposals written by more senior investigators might be stronger and more likely to be selected on average, and senior scientists are proportionally more male-dominated. However, the Reid analysis found that the under selection of female PIs compared to male PIs was more pronounced for senior women than for junior women, inconsistent with this explanation. To combat implicit bias affecting the results of proposal selection, STScI instituted stepped adjustments to obscure the identity of the proposing team. The Hubble proposal review went to a fully DAPR system in Cycle 26 (Strolger and Natarajan 2019), with positive impact on the selection rate of female PI proposals (Reid 2018). Dual anonymous peer review has also helped close the success gap for proposals led by new PIs. New PIs represented, on average, only 6 percent of proposal awards for Cycles 19–25. In Cycles 26–28, after the institution of DAPR, this fraction jumped to approximately 25 percent of awards. DAPR has even been observed to increase author diversity of papers (Budden et al. 2008; Darling et al. 2015) and so has utility beyond the proposal selection process.

At STScI, DAPR was achieved through an iterative process of deliberately implementing a change in the process, measuring its impact, noting that little to no progress had occurred, and returning with further interventions, one step at a time, until DAPR had achieved its goal of greater fairness in the review process. This approach and experience can serve as a model for all procedures and processes going forward.

Bias exists in other selection programs beyond Hubble. A study of National Radio Astronomy Observatory and Atacama Large Millimeter Array (ALMA) proposals has indicated a significant gender-related bias affecting proposals (Lonsdale et al. 2016). ALMA has instituted DAPR in 2021 (Cycle 8). For European Southern Observatory (ESO) proposals, the success rates are 16.0 ± 0.6 percent for women and 22.0 ± 0.4 percent for men, respectively (Patat 2016; ESO 2021).

NASA has begun experimenting with DAPR in a few of its ROSES programs. Initial data appear promising: for example, in the Astrophysics Data Analysis Program, the percentage of proposals with female PIs in the top two proposals ranked from each panel rose from about 15 percent in 2018 (no DAPR) to about 30 percent in 2020 (with DAPR), bringing the success rate of female-led proposals in line with the fraction of proposals led by women in the total pool (per presentation by Michael New to the committee).

Finding: DAPR mitigates bias in proposal selections. The process by which it was achieved at STScI is a model for improving other procedures and policies.

No Proposal Due Dates

Having immovable proposal due dates has led to numerous issues. Examples of the issues created by rigid due dates for proposal submissions include (1) requests to shift due dates for proposal submissions owing to natural

Suggested Citation:"16 State of the Profession." National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine. 2023. Origins, Worlds, and Life: A Decadal Strategy for Planetary Science and Astrobiology 2023-2032. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/26522.
×

and/or social disasters, which can delay other programs; (2) program officers have high-amplitude, long-duration spikes of effort centered on reviews, which have created workflow challenges; (3) owing to budget cycles misaligning with proposal cycles, programs with due dates late in the year can be disproportionately affected to correct for cost overruns during a fiscal year; (4) overburden of smaller institutions with more limited institutional support; (5) disproportionate pressure on heads of family, caregivers, and women.

Agencies such as NSF and DOE are experimenting with a no due date (NoDD) format for some of its programs. NASA began to implement NoDD in 2021 for several solicitations within ROSES. NASA consulted with NSF to understand the benefits and pitfalls of NoDD implementation. Motivators expressed to NASA for NoDD programs include (NASA 2021) (1) illness, natural phenomena, family circumstances; (2) eliminating conflicts between due dates; (3) flexibility for small institutions (important for diversity, increased time flexibility for thinly staffed AOR departments); (4) separating inspiration from the proposal cycle (less time between having a new idea and proposing it); (5) allowing proposers to participate in reviews more readily; (6) providing additional flexibility for program officers to manage workload; and (7) spreading budget risks naturally across programs. Several challenges have also been identified, including (1) extra efforts to avoid conflicts of interest during reviews and (2) increases in workload, albeit spread out in time, for program officers for forward planning of budgets and timely awards.

Finding: NASA has begun experimenting with NoDD in the ROSES program. Initial data are not yet available. Increased flexibility for PIs and program officers could be of benefit to the community overall (e.g., through improved selection rates). Monitoring whether NoDD has the intended effect over deadlines as a motivator, or whether it creates differential impact on submissions or challenges in administration of proposal reviews will be important (see also Research and Analysis chapter).

Lack of Diversity in Mission Teams

The AAS-AIP 2020 demographic survey found that men were a PI or Co-I on mission proposals significantly more than women (Figure 16-5). Additionally, this survey found that non-LGBTQ+ individuals were a PI or

Image
FIGURE 16-5 Percentage of women on competed planetary mission teams from 2006 to 2019. Here, Rathbun (2017) inferred gender from names and pictures of team members (i.e., inferred gender). The inferred percentage of women on mission teams is lower than the representation of women in the field but is increasing, particularly for planetary science compared with the other divisions in the NASA Science Mission Directorate (SMD).
Suggested Citation:"16 State of the Profession." National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine. 2023. Origins, Worlds, and Life: A Decadal Strategy for Planetary Science and Astrobiology 2023-2032. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/26522.
×

Co-I more frequently than LGBTQ+ respondents. No significant differences were observed in mission proposal participation based on disability. While the AAS-AIP 2020 demographic survey report found no significant race/ethnicity differences in being a mission PI, it does note that Hispanic/Latinx respondents served as Co-Is less frequently compared to other racial groups (AAS-AIP 2020). The combined under-selection of proposals led by URC PIs, and, as shown by the AIP 2020 survey, the higher representation of URC planetary scientists in nonuniversity jobs that depend more on grant funding, may contribute to the lower number of URC researchers in planetary science and, possibly, astrobiology.

Finding: NASA mission team demographics do not reflect the broader planetary science community.

Bridging Mission Opportunity Gaps with Participating Scientist Programs

Rathbun (2017) highlighted that NASA’s participating scientist and guest investigator programs have increased the inclusion of women on mission teams (see Figure 16-5). As of 2017, the average percentage of women selected through these programs, 24 percent, is higher than the fraction of women on the original teams, although still lower than the 2017 fraction of women in the field (about 30 percent). For the Mars Science Laboratory (Curiosity) mission, the participating scientist program brought the percentage of women on the science team from 12 percent on the initial 2012 team to 31 percent in 2018, in line with the fraction of women in the community (Zorzano 2020). Participating scientist programs have also been highlighted to provide mission experience for early-career scientists. Prockter et al. (2020) found that almost one-third of participating scientists are within 7 years of their PhD, and half are within 10 years of their PhD.

Finding: Participating scientist programs can be a vehicle to achieve a measurable and positive impact on the demographic diversity of mission teams if the imperative to do so is emphasized. The improvements achieved in the participation of women in PS&AB are encouraging, but do not necessarily imply that all aspects of gender issues have been corrected.

Work-Life Balance

Work-life balance is voiced as the leading cause negatively impacting career satisfaction in for all researchers in the PS&AB community, especially for women and LGBTQ+ individuals (AAS-AIP 2020). Brue (2019) highlighted the challenges women in leadership positions face when managing work and life obligations. Surveys show that both men and women look for jobs that provide flexibility to balance work and family, but women are more likely to cite work/family balance difficulties as a major reason behind lack of gender diversity in STEM (40 percent versus 28 percent), with women frequently citing work-life balance issues as a primary reason (Funk and Parker 2018).

A 2019 colloquium presented by the associate administrator for the NASA Science Mission Directorate, to advise prospective mission PIs on “Writing Successful Proposals: Observations from NASA,” indicated an expectation that “[A PI’s] life will be taken over, including evenings and holidays,” reflecting perhaps the reality of a highly competitive process, and once selected, mission cost and schedule constraints. However, such unbalanced work-life expectations clash with the importance of work-life-balance for a diverse mission PI pool, and thus can be a deterrent to broadening the diversity of the mission PIs, and counter to the colloquium’s intended goal.

Finding: Lack of work-life balance in PS&AB can deter community members from staying in the field and leading NASA PSD missions.

A Closer Look at Publications as Key Indicators of Merit

Publications are the vehicle by which scientific progress is primarily documented and the central factor in assessing the merit of researchers. It is the life blood of any science. Ensuring the highest standards by which

Suggested Citation:"16 State of the Profession." National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine. 2023. Origins, Worlds, and Life: A Decadal Strategy for Planetary Science and Astrobiology 2023-2032. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/26522.
×

research is produced and evaluated merits attention in any discussion of the SoP. Studies have shown bias in the peer review process and opportunity gaps that may lead to differences in publishing that reflect the role of social rather than scientific factors. For example, the American Geophysical Union (AGU) has tracked authors’ gender, age, race, and ethnicity at its meetings and in publications (Lerback et al. 2020). Data suggest gender bias in who is invited to review. AGU addressed the reviewer issue by encouraging a more diverse reviewer pool on the manuscript submission form, which resulted in an increase in women reviewers. Women corresponding authors have a higher acceptance rate on their submissions, however, they submit fewer papers overall. Author networks are important in professional development and career advancement. Analysis of author networks in AGU publications (Hanson et al. 2020) showed that male scientists tend to have a higher proportion of male co-authors and more international collaboration than women. Because most planetary research is conducted in teams, addressing the source of such differences may assist early-career scientists in improving their scientific output. Tracking authorship, reviewer, and citation statistics by professional societies and organizations that manage publications can help identify and correct potential sources of bias.

Finding: There are important factors in addition to publications that merit consideration when assessing professional merit.

Equity at Conferences

Selection of session conveners, as well as oral versus poster assignments at conferences, have demonstrated biases in the planetary sciences, thereby creating measurable inequities. Attendees from URC at the American Geophysical Union winter meeting, which has a significant attendance by planetary scientists (AIP 2011), are the least likely to have their work selected for oral presentation. URC women are consistently the least likely to be selected to present when compared to URC men and non-URC women and men (Ford et al. 2019). Many scientific societies analyze who speaks at conferences, especially in high-status events like, for example, presidential symposia, keynotes, and awardees of prizes. They proceed over time to rectify bias. In PS&AB, such efforts to document these biases have been undertaken but methods have relied on assumed gender by either name or appearance, which is problematic for many reasons including accuracy and disadvantaging nonbinary and trans members of the community (Strauss et al. 2020). Conference environments also present challenges to members of the community through barriers to accessibility and harassment at meetings. A general awakening around equity is occurring that involves not only gender but race/ethnicity, disability status, and the treatment of sexual and gender minorities, who face higher rates of harassment.

Finding: There is a need for systematic tracking and reporting by institutions that organize conferences of the demographics of conference attendees and of the visibility given to their scientific contribution.

Tenured Positions

The demographic composition of present tenure/high-status academic positions tend to be dominated by white males. Current recruitment and selection processes may continue to limit opportunities unless sources of explicit and implicit bias are addressed. Tenure is based on the university’s needs, not solely the achievements of those seeking tenure, and the university sets the rules and controls the outcome. Changing budgets and administrations vary the standards for those receiving tenure over time, making comparisons with earlier cases difficult. In addition, when new faculty members differ from current members, establishing relationships can be more difficult, creating potential challenges for new faculty members, particularly members from underrepresented groups (Phinney 2009). Within the broad umbrella of higher education, URC members held 12.7 percent of faculty positions in 2013, an increase from 8.6 percent in 1993, but only 10.2 percent of those faculty positions were tenured positions. Similarly, in 2013 women held 49 percent of all faculty positions, an increase from 39 percent in 1993, but only 38 percent of those faculty positions were tenured positions in 2013. (Finkelstein et al. 2016). The 2020 AIP survey showed that URC plus the Latinx community compose 9.9 percent of planetary scientists, 12.6 percent of

Suggested Citation:"16 State of the Profession." National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine. 2023. Origins, Worlds, and Life: A Decadal Strategy for Planetary Science and Astrobiology 2023-2032. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/26522.
×

tenure-track faculty, and 8.9 percent of tenured faculty. Similarly, women accounted for 35 percent of planetary scientists, 52 percent of tenure-track faculty, and 24 percent of tenured faculty.

Finding: Tenured/high-status positions are under-populated by URC members and women. Keeping track and understanding the reasons for the imbalance is critical and to the extent that a disparity exists—that is, the pipeline contains greater representation of particular groups than the selection rates reveal, the reasons for this disparity need to be understood and corrected.

Broadening Opportunities to Advance the State of the Profession

Recognizing the Value of Community Service Work

Work through professional organization committees (e.g., Professional Culture and Climate Subcommittee of the DPS, Committee for the Status of Women in Astronomy, and Committee for the Status of Minorities in Astronomy) is a valuable component of a vibrant community that is often undervalued. URC and women are burdened with an uneven share of community work because the inequities they face heighten their drive to serve, and/or because they are solicited to be the face of the community.

Finding: Community service and administrative duties are important contributions, but ones that tend to be distributed inequitably across individuals and appear to fall disproportionately on members of particular groups. Given historical traditions of who performs such work, members of some groups (e.g., women) often willingly take on such work and do it effectively. This places a disproportional burden on URC members and women by virtue of their smaller numbers and other (number, culture/family, etc.) responsibilities.

Service work also includes education and public outreach (EPO). During the past decade, EPO efforts at NASA have become centralized; while this has been beneficial in some respects (Erickson 2021), it has also resulted in loss of opportunity for engagement of planetary scientists and astrobiologists in EPO. Grantees and NASA mission teams no longer receive funding for EPO activities. Instead, grantees are left to volunteer time (i.e., conduct unpaid work) to conduct these important activities as subject-matter experts involved by dedicated funded EPO teams. The former direct link between researchers and EPO audiences is important for advancing the profession (Schmidt et al. 2020), for example, as researchers from underrepresented backgrounds serve as role models and inspiration for future generations. They also can help serve as mentors and guides for first-generation college and graduate school students of all backgrounds.

Finding: Funding for EPO can provide researchers from underrepresented backgrounds the opportunity to serve as role models and provide inspiration for future generations as mentors and guides for first-generation college and graduate school students of all backgrounds.

Inclusion of URC Members in Initiatives to Improve the Diversity of the Community

Interest in physical sciences seems evenly distributed among the U.S. population in childhood and teenage years. However, the representation of women and URC in the physical sciences starts to decrease in college (see Figure 16-1). Despite improvement along the gender axis, the PS&AB communities still have low racial and ethnic diversity, especially regarding Black/African American scientists (Bernard and Cooperdock 2018; Rivera-Valentín et al. 2020), indicating that current and past initiatives have not helped increase membership of some underrepresented racial groups (Rathbun et al. 2020).

Researchers who encounter few community members sharing traits of their identity, especially those at the intersection of two or more underrepresented axes (Cole 2021), may experience a lower sense of belonging in PS&AB. Additionally, faculty and staff at institutions serving URC are insufficiently represented in the community of PIs and Co-Is. Yet, these faculty train the next generation of scientists who could help address existing workforce imbalances. Many URC faculties are passionate about returning knowledge to and empowering their communities,

Suggested Citation:"16 State of the Profession." National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine. 2023. Origins, Worlds, and Life: A Decadal Strategy for Planetary Science and Astrobiology 2023-2032. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/26522.
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but as they are few, they also tend to receive many more requests from students as well as committees (Schmidt et al. 2020), which can be detrimental to their research and teaching activities. Although it is becoming increasingly clear that traditional social categories are becoming more complex, the committee has retained their usage given the sparsity of available data. For instance, in the domain of race/ethnicity, various types of bi-racial and multiracial identifications are on the rise. In addition, gender which was largely viewed as a binary can no longer be viewed as such. Additionally, when crossing two or more levels of race, gender, socioeconomic status, sexuality, or age, it becomes clear that the effects of bias may fall disproportionately on those who sit within particular intersectionalities (URC sexual minorities for instance).

There is limited participation of primarily undergraduate institutions (PUI) and URC researchers in NASA PSD research, partially owing to lower numbers of faculty at these institutions who do research. Engagement of URC in research and education has been fostered through the Minority Institute Astrobiology Collaborative Program, as well as the previous Astrobiology Faculty Diversity Program and its precursor Minority Institution Research Support Program (MIRS); however, the culture in which they have been implemented has limited the efficacy of such dedicated programs. Additionally, such dedicated programs are prone to cancellation. A previous program that NASA supported and has since eliminated for unknown reasons is the Harriett G. Jenkins Predoctoral Fellowship Project (JPFP), which supported students from underrepresented communities, students with disabilities, and low income/first generation students. In addition to graduate stipends and summer research opportunities, the award provided a community of awardees that would meet and share their research annually. Today, there is still an active JPFP alumni network.

A key stage for career development is the period just after earning the PhD. Many budding planetary scientists and astrobiologists need information about available job opportunities; how to function as part of a larger research group or team; how to succeed in academia; and how to develop skills to write and review papers and proposals. NASA’s Planetary Science Division, including its Astrobiology Program, manage successful programs (FINESST, NASA Postdoctoral Program, and Early Career Award) to help students and early-career researchers establish themselves. In NASA PSD mission announcements of opportunity, inclusion of early-career scientists, engineers, and managers is expected and evaluated (New 2021). NASA’s Science Mission Directorate has sponsored workshops on proposal writing at conferences and institutions.

NASA’s Astrobiology Program, too, has funded such summer and winter programs: the Nordic/NASA summer and winter schools in Iceland and Hawaii, respectively, the NExSS winter school, and the International Summer School in Astrobiology hosted in Santander, Spain. These and the graduate student and postdoc-led Astrobiology Graduate Conference have shaped a collegial and closely networked astrobiology community. However, opportunities to attend such schools have decreased in the past decade.

Finding: NASA’s engagement programs have supported the increased representation of women in planetary science over time, but to date have had a lesser impact on URCs. Measures to increase participation of URC students in NASA’s student and early-career fellowship funding programs, and in fellowship programs that facilitate engagement of NASA-funded PS&AB researchers with faculty URCs, are crucial to improving racial and ethnic diversity in PS&AB. Previous NASA programs—such as NASA’s JPFP and MIRS programs and the National Research Council Resident Research Associateships—were valuable activities to this end. Long-term commitment to these efforts is essential to achieve measurable progress.

Improving NASA Mission Team Diversity

NASA PSD has initiated efforts to diversify the pool of possible mission PIs through the PI Launchpad workshop program (NASA 2022). A first, invitation-only workshop was held in 2018 in Washington, DC, followed by a workshop at the University of Arizona in 2019 with an open application call. In 2021, a virtual workshop was held at no cost to participants. Other programs aimed at broadening the pool of NASA PSD mission participants include the Planetary Science Summer School (PSSS) hosted by JPL and sponsored by NASA PSD, where teams of students develop mission concepts. Data show most alumni from the PSSS are employed or conducting postdoctoral research at NASA centers; FFRDCs; universities; or other research or aerospace centers (Budney et al. 2017). NASA Goddard Space Flight Center (GSFC) offers a similar Planetary Science

Suggested Citation:"16 State of the Profession." National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine. 2023. Origins, Worlds, and Life: A Decadal Strategy for Planetary Science and Astrobiology 2023-2032. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/26522.
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Winter School to participants located at GSFC. Such programs help bridge opportunity gaps by increasing access to information about mission concept development, design, and proposal. Last, internship positions, like NSF Research Experience for Undergraduates to work with mission teams, can provide valuable mission experience at even earlier career stages.

Finding: The demographic makeup of the U.S. population is evolving toward increased racial and ethnic diversity. The demographics of the PS&AB community, as is the case with some other sciences, are substantially out of sync with the U.S. demographics. Increasing diversity and representation in NASA PSD missions requires a concerted effort to engage members of URCs at early stages of career/education. The PI Launchpad, Planetary Science Summer School, and other similar programs are excellent vehicles to broaden the pool of participants.

Creating an Inclusive and Inviting Community Free of Hostility and Harassment

Codes of Conduct as Tools to Promote Equity and Inclusion

Members of research and mission teams are expected to follow “Rules of the Road” (ROTR) policies, which outline topics such as team membership, authorship, and data sharing. NASA PSD opportunities also reinforce anti-harassment policies in opportunities. A code of conduct (CoC) augmenting ROTR documents can help enable a safe and equitable environment on mission teams (Diniega et al. 2020). A CoC is also indispensable to promote a culture of safety and inclusion for conferences, workshops, and research teams. NASA PSD is implementing a CoC for peer reviews (New 2021).

An effective CoC documents acceptable behavior, describes how policies will be enforced, provides clear instructions on how to report incidents, and explains the consequences/enforcement mechanisms for rule violations. It is important that CoCs be reviewed regularly and updated, if necessary, particularly for long duration missions and other long-lived teams.

Finding: Codes of conduct enable a culture of safety and inclusion.

Enabling Safety, Equity, and Inclusion in Field Work

Terrestrial field work is a crucial component of planetary and astrobiology research. Current barriers to effective and safe field research include physical safety hazards inherent to field sites, accessibility for persons with disabilities, and harassment in field settings (Richardson et al. 2020). An egregiously high 64 percent (N = 423/658) of participants in the Clancy et al. (2014) study on field research report personal experiences with sexual harassment, with 70 percent of women and 40 percent of men in the study reporting sexual harassment. LGBTQ+ scientists in physics have been found to experience isolation exacerbated by remote environments and related to their sexual orientation or gender identity (Atherton et al. 2016; Vander Kaaden et al. 2020; USAP 2022).

Field work often involves access to indigenous lands. Ongoing and substantial cultural changes aim to honor and equitably engage native peoples, who request prior and informed consent for access to their sacred sites. Both long-term and modern events continue to highlight the importance in recognizing the mores of Indigenous cultures (Alpaslan-Roodenberg et al. 2021; Sahagún, 2021). These concerns can be addressed with thoughtful CoC and training that require field safety plans outlining physical and mental safety, strategies for reducing barriers to field work, and the need for coordination with local communities, including Indigenous community leaders. This can be facilitated by funding such training, funding students and early-career scientists performing field work, and providing avenues for appeals to report issues and concerns over unsafe or disrespectful practices in the field.

Finding: Relevant focused education about changing norms and greater sensitivity to history, and reflecting these in codes of conduct, can make field work safer and more inclusive to all parties involved (participants and communities on whose land field work is carried out).

Suggested Citation:"16 State of the Profession." National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine. 2023. Origins, Worlds, and Life: A Decadal Strategy for Planetary Science and Astrobiology 2023-2032. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/26522.
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Finding: Engagement of Native communities require thoughtful engagement and the creation of genuine relationships that are respectful of traditions and gratitude for their contribution to the scientific process (Kaluna et al. 2020). This goes beyond field work but is particularly salient for field work conducted on Native lands.

Improving the Conference and Workshop Experience

Ensuring safe conference environments continues to be a community concern (Bennett et al. 2020; Diniega et al. 2020; Vander Kaaden et al. 2020). NASA deserves credit for describing its policy on discrimination and harassment, including reporting procedures, in its funding solicitation for topical workshops, symposia, and conferences, and in its solicitations and mission announcements of opportunity. Similar policies are merited for any programmatic funding that would result in conference support. It is incumbent upon NASA PSD to continually remind the PS&AB communities and institutions that support these fields that everyone is welcome as we strive to create an environment free of harassment and discrimination of any form.

Finding: Harassment and concerns for safety are most prevalent amongst groups underrepresented in STEM (Clancy et al. 2017).

Finding: Initial LGBTQ+ inclusive programs have made positive change in the planetary science and astrobiology community and their continuation will increase their impact (Vander Kaaden et al. 2020).

RECOMMENDATIONS

An Evidence Gathering Imperative about the State of the Profession

The committee recommends that NASA PSD create a three-part foundation of evidence to examine and understand the community so that it can confidently proceed to advance the SoP. With this, NASA PSD can ensure that it is in command of facts and figures of the PS&AB communities. The expectation is for NASA to augment and deploy the resources necessary to effect progress based on evidence and proactive steps to address this recommendation and the recommendations that follow. The following three types of data are essential:

  • Disciplinary size and identity. The identity and boundary conditions of PS&AB are amorphous, given their interdisciplinary nature. Interdisciplinarity is a strength, but accurate information is still needed about (1) the size of these disciplines, (2) the feeder disciplines from which PS&AB identities develop over time, and (3) the spread and location of individuals and institutions that identify as PS&AB (e.g., data on colleges, universities, other institutions with programs in PS&AB and individuals who identify as such). Data are needed on the number and rank of employees of these communities at each institution, the evolution of the field from bachelor’s through PhD programs and faculty, annual numbers of PhDs in relevant disciplines, and percentage of U.S. and foreign nationals contributing to the profession, and other appropriate dimensions of data-gathering.
  • Demographic composition. At present the demographic variations that make up PS&AB are poorly documented, their data collection depending on the goodwill of individual scientists or professional organizations. Without concrete data about the demographic variations that make up PS&AB, NASA cannot know if it is utilizing the best possible talent available and, by extension, cannot ensure the competitiveness of American PS&AB. With concrete demographic data on all dimensions, including but not restricted to age, gender identity, sexual orientation, race/ethnicity, citizenship/residency status, and disability status, NASA’s work to improve the quality of PS&AB will be targeted and precise.
  • Workplace climate. NASA PSD has not conducted climate surveys of the disciplines that make up PS&AB. As such it currently lacks knowledge of the working conditions of the scientists involved regarding (1) professional issues (e.g., grants, conferences, mentorship) and (2) social factors that are part of the fabric of all sciences and affect the quality of science (e.g., work-life balance, workplace safety, mental health), particularly during
Suggested Citation:"16 State of the Profession." National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine. 2023. Origins, Worlds, and Life: A Decadal Strategy for Planetary Science and Astrobiology 2023-2032. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/26522.
×
  • stressful periods such as the present pandemic. Climate surveys are now routine in many organizations. A focused effort by NASA PSD to produce evidence about the climate of PS&AB would enable them to reveal hidden issues that unintentionally, yet adversely, impact American competitive advantage in PS&AB.

The committee recognizes the complexity of obtaining such data, given the many academic institutions, research institutes, and for-profit corporations that house PS&AB communities. However, NASA PSD as a major supporter and funder of individuals and groups at these institutions has convening power to engage associated institutions in regular discussions of matters concerning equity and accountability. Equity and accountability require accurate and complete data about the facts at the ground level. NASA PSD can create a pathway for the highest quality data on the professions to be regularly collected by engaging with the best behavioral science knowledge about such data collection. An overall goal would be to commence work immediately to have a complete set of data within a reasonable timeframe of 3 years into the period of this decadal. These data, providing an accurate sense of (1) size and identity, (2) demographic composition and (3) workplace climate, will become the foundation on which NASA PSD can successfully identify where resources need to be invested. This in turn will allow NASA PSD to assure itself that it is exploring and finding and retaining the best talent in the world, bringing the same attitude it brings to the science of planetary exploration to matters of SoP.

It is important that such data collection be conducted with proper input to ensure quality through an appropriately constituted advisory body with the authority to recommend actions as required. Given that this effort will take time to set up and implement, it is advisable to continue other activities that can be undertaken alongside the preparation, administration, and analysis of these data. Additionally, some effort is warranted to persuade the community that participation in climate surveys is important to improve the state of the profession.

Recommendation: NASA PSD and NSF, with its wide experience with programs such as the Louis Stokes Alliances for Minority Participation and Organizational Change for Gender Equity in STEM Academic Professions (ADVANCE), should make it a priority to obtain currently lacking evidence about fundamental aspects of the state of planetary science and astrobiology communities. NASA PSD and NSF should engage with experts to undertake data collection on 3- to 5-year cycles with a focus on obtaining accurate data on

Undertaking Education of Individuals About the Costs of Bias and Improvement of Procedures, Practices, and Policies to Create Institutional Change

By engaging in education about bias of all forms (explicit and implicit) that holds back progress in PS&AB, NASA PSD will be able to promote changes in existing policies and procedures to remove or compensate for bias. When people are persuaded about the need for change, they will participate in creating that change.

By engaging in the work of the above recommendation, NASA PSD will have in hand a valuable map of the interdisciplinary fields that constitute PS&AB. It will then possess full and accurate knowledge of the demographic character of the population of PS&AB, and the community’s assessment of the climate issues. NASA PSD can assess where bias is evident and where it does not exist. Institutions of every kind, including organizations devoted to STEM fields, are transforming themselves by engaging with newly developing ideas about implicit bias and where such bias unintentionally plays out in the critical work of any scientific organization. It is important that this effort be conducted in parallel with that of the recommendation above.

It is important that NASA, NSF, affiliated institutions, and professional societies work to mitigate bias at all levels. NASA PSD may provide leadership in creating, sharing, and encouraging the propagation of educational experiences about bias, both within NASA and in the organizations, NASA supports and funds. Human beings and their workplace circumstances are such that they lead them to be both creators and receivers of bias. That is, although groups surely differ in the degree to which they have historically experienced discrimination and experience it today,

Suggested Citation:"16 State of the Profession." National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine. 2023. Origins, Worlds, and Life: A Decadal Strategy for Planetary Science and Astrobiology 2023-2032. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/26522.
×

each person can also be the propagator as well as the target of bias. Moreover, bias does not lie just in the minds of the human perceiver. Members of historically disadvantaged groups are known to hold themselves and others of their group back because of biased expectations of their own abilities. To add to this, bias is systemic, by which we understand that in addition to bias being hosted in the minds of individuals, it is also embedded in the social infrastructure of organizations. High quality education, credible to scientists and engineers, is necessary to confront something so hidden that it is often only apparent following the application of the best methodologies available.

It is sometimes wrongly assumed that implicit bias education is sufficient to reduce and remove bias. Implicit bias education is both deeply necessary and wholly insufficient to reduce the impact of bias. While NASA engages in high-quality education on implicit bias to change hearts and minds, a review of its own procedures and policies is also merited. NASA has set an example in its tackling of DAPR following the pioneering effort at the Space Telescope Science Institute for the Hubble Space Telescope program. This type of continuous effort to improve a procedure by obtaining data regularly and returning to the drawing board to improve the process is needed in all aspects of the work, well beyond grant reviewing. The improved situation on gender diversity can serve as an impetus for additional, broader diversities. With proof that we are capable of change, steps can be taken to reach the next stages of equity and accountability. Continued attention to issues of gender is merited, given the data in presented earlier in this chapter. Starkly, involvement of members of underserved communities, especially African Americans, shows a deeply troubling stagnation at all levels. It is for NASA leadership to step in immediately and decisively to understand and improve this state of affairs. Evidence on LGBTQ+ communities and those with disability is sorely lacking but underrepresentation, based on data from STEM fields broadly, is likely.

Recommendation: NASA PSD should adopt the view that bias can be both unintentional and pervasive. To address potential bias issues, NASA should:

Broadening Opportunities to Advance the State of the Profession

While there have been benefits to centralizing public engagement in NASA’s Science Activation Program initiatives (Erickson 2021), education and public outreach and engagement activities by members of the community have been left unfunded. Engaging URCs at the pinch point of transition from high school to college and providing support systems (including introductory courses) to encourage and retain them along the path of PS&AB is going to be essential to create and grow a diverse community. For example, the opportunity to propose outreach activities as an optional extension to funded R&A grants would allow grantees to make a positive impact on community diversity and inclusion activities.

NASA missions, particularly those to distant parts of the solar system, can span multiple decades from initial planning through launch, cruise, and operations, to end of mission. Multiple generations of scientists and engineers

Suggested Citation:"16 State of the Profession." National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine. 2023. Origins, Worlds, and Life: A Decadal Strategy for Planetary Science and Astrobiology 2023-2032. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/26522.
×

are involved in their planning, development, and operations. Succession plans offer an opportunity to grow the diversity of the community as part of a long term and sustained effort.

Recommendation: NASA PSD should revisit the centralization policy on public engagement and consider mechanisms to support direct engagement of planetary scientists with members of society, particularly students in STEM fields.

Recommendation: PSD should regularly evaluate programs that enhance participation of students and faculty from URCs; fellowship programs that facilitate engagement of NASA-funded planetary scientists and astrobiologists with faculty at URC institutions; and mechanisms for supporting education and outreach as an integral part of research via, for example, the inclusion of outreach activities as optional add-ons to R&A grants, or as a requirement for missions or cooperative agreements.

Recommendation: PSD should strengthen and expand programs aimed at educating the community about the mission proposal process (e.g., PI Launchpad) and actual mission operations (e.g., participating scientist programs), particularly to reach out to URCs. Providing access to personnel or tools that can help guide investigators through the process should be considered, including participation as contributing members of the mission teams.

Recommendation: NASA and PSD should reinstate the Harriett G. Jenkins and similar predoctoral fellowship projects as part of an effort to retain members of URC in the fields of PS&AB prior to them reaching existing pinch points at which substantial decline in URC representation is seen in both fields.

Creating an Inclusive and Inviting Community Free of Hostility and Harassment

Creating an environment that reinforces welcoming and inclusive behaviors, and where members of the communities (i.e., researchers, support staff, local communities) feel safe at work and are treated with respect and appreciation is essential to a healthy scientific community. PS&AB research can involve field work in planetary analogue environments where physical and mental isolation and interpersonal frictions can arise and infringe on CoC policies and agreements. Local community concerns and the cultural mores of indigenous communities can also be a source of friction between researchers and local communities. Basic principles for the success of field campaigns that acknowledge the importance of these stakeholder communities include the following (Appaslan-Roodenberg et al. 2021):

  1. Ensuring that all regulations are followed in the places where they work and from which field samples are derived;
  2. Preparing a detailed plan prior to beginning any field study;
  3. Minimizing damage to study areas and their environs;
  4. Ensuring that data are made available following publication to allow critical reexamination of scientific findings; and
  5. Engaging with other stakeholders from the beginning of a field study and ensure respect and sensitivity to stakeholder perspectives.

Recommendation: PSD should implement codes of conduct (CoC) for funded field campaigns, conferences, and missions, and should expect acknowledgement of receipt and understanding. The CoC should be codified, reviewed, and updated at regular intervals. An effective CoC should outline expected behavior, explain unacceptable behavior, explain how policies will be enforced, provide clear instructions on how to report incidents, and explain consequences of violations. The process should demonstrate sensitivity to the difficulty of bringing forward accusations and to the rights of the accused.

Recommendation: NASA PSD and affiliated institutions should clearly identify a point of contact or ombudsperson as part of the CoC to provide access to individuals who experience violations to the CoC. The egregious nature of sexual harassment reported in field work requires immediate attention by NASA.

Suggested Citation:"16 State of the Profession." National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine. 2023. Origins, Worlds, and Life: A Decadal Strategy for Planetary Science and Astrobiology 2023-2032. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/26522.
×

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Suggested Citation:"16 State of the Profession." National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine. 2023. Origins, Worlds, and Life: A Decadal Strategy for Planetary Science and Astrobiology 2023-2032. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/26522.
×

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Suggested Citation:"16 State of the Profession." National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine. 2023. Origins, Worlds, and Life: A Decadal Strategy for Planetary Science and Astrobiology 2023-2032. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/26522.
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The next decade of planetary science and astrobiology holds tremendous promise. New research will expand our understanding of our solar system's origins, how planets form and evolve, under what conditions life can survive, and where to find potentially habitable environments in our solar system and beyond. Origins, Worlds, and Life: A Decadal Strategy for Planetary Science and Astrobiology 2023-2032 highlights key science questions, identifies priority missions, and presents a comprehensive research strategy that includes both planetary defense and human exploration. This report also recommends ways to support the profession as well as the technologies and infrastructure needed to carry out the science.

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