How has “publish or perish” become “publish and perish” in academia?

Welcome! The demands of academic life have been well documented: you must publish in order for your career to survive. But “publish or perish” has evolved as demands on academics and universities have intensified, leading to burnout and a new reality of publish and still perish regardless.

We explore this serious issue at length in the cover story of our September issue of QS Insights Magazine. I encourage you to read it, because it presents a concerning reality in which the engines of social progress (whether that be technology, sustainability, welfare or anything in between) simply can’t deliver on their research mission.

Stay insightful,

Anton John Crace, Editor-in-Chief, QS Insights Magazine, QS Quacquarelli Symonds

Publish and Perish

By Claudia Civinini

In Brief

• Academia's "publish or perish" culture is now "publish AND perish," leading to widespread work stress, mental health problems, and burnout among researchers globally.
• This intense pressure results in high rates of mental health struggles and neglect of personal life to cope with extreme demands, particularly affecting early-career researchers.
• Tackling this systemic issue requires rethinking academic work culture, challenging productivity metrics, addressing mental health stigma, and ensuring accessible support to foster a healthier environment.

Interview questions are usually not meant to be funny.

But asked whether universities are family-friendly workplaces, a US researcher who wishes to remain anonymous chuckles.

“I wouldn’t say that,” they say.

“A couple of colleagues in the department had a child not long ago, and they were talking about how thankful they were that they finally found a day care that could watch their child for more than 12 hours each day.”

They add that “it was a bit of a shocker” to see staff at a prestigious institution in Europe work 9 to 5 and take full hours for lunch.

Working conditions are obviously not the same in every university or even every department or team.

However, work stress in academia is a well-documented fact, and some stressors are systemic. In research authored by Dr Thomas Hanitzsch, Dr Antonia Markiewitz and Dr Henrik Bødker, pressure to publish was the top occupational stressor respondents worried about, closely followed by future career prospects.

The research found that 62 percent of participants – communication and media scholars – had experienced mental health problems at some points in their lives, in line with other studies investigating mental health in academia but higher than the general population. Other studies also found lower wellbeing levels in academia compared to the general population and higher levels of stress compared to other professional contexts.

Dr Hanitzsch, Chair and Professor of Communication in the Department of Media and Communication at LMU Munich, tells QS Insights Magazine that the inspiration for initiating research on the topic came from both his personal experience and the realisation that researchers themselves sometimes spread misperceptions of academic work that may be detrimental.

“When you scroll through social media, you see people’s successes. But how many times do people say, ‘Oh, all the papers I submitted got rejected’? People only speak about their successes, and this gives you a very biased image of what is going on,” he says.

Age is Just a Number

Pressure to publish has been blamed for negatively affecting research quality and originality and even fuelling misconduct. In past issues of QS Insights Magazine, the publish or perish culture was highlighted as one of the causes behind the ongoing problem of predatory and unethical publishing, now exacerbated by Generative AI.

Research has also documented its negative influence on academics’ mental health.

Its effect is particularly evident for early-career researchers (ECRs).  

According to a qualitative report gathering the views of UK researchers, pressure to publish starts early in a researcher’s career.

“[…] if you don't have publications during PhD time you won't be able to get a post-doc, you won't be able to get funding and you're done,” said a participant, condensing the experience of many PhD students around the world.

Continual pressure of this kind, the report reads, “was considered to be damaging to researchers’ mental health and wellbeing – often leading to researchers leaving the sector and, in a small number of extreme circumstances, taking their own life.”

Dr Bonginkosi Mutongoza, a lecturer at the University of Fort Hare, conducted research into the mental health effects of the publish or perish culture among early career researchers in South Africa. His research found that the pressure to publish was resulting in mental health challenges as ECRs “pushed themselves beyond their limits.”

Speaking to QS Insights Magazine, he mentions several instances of burnout and mental health difficulties he has witnessed or heard of in his academic community. “It’s almost like in academia boundaries don’t exist,” he says.

“This is something that must cause all institutions to come to a standstill and rethink their work cultures.

“It's an environment where one is constantly being told ‘you're not enough’. You need to do more. You need to work more. You need to push more. Once you've published a paper, when is the next one coming in? After you publish the next one, when is the next one coming in? When are you going to a conference?”

He always urges the PhD students and ECRs he mentors to get enough sleep and guard their personal time, he says.

As pressure to publish is particularly linked to incentives or promotion, Dr Mutongoza says it fizzles out as academics progress in their career.

While career progression is less of a worry as researchers attain higher academic positions, such as tenure, many other demands emerge. “The number of plates that you are spinning has a tendency to creep up over the years as your research expands,” Dr Johnathon Anderson, a research scientist and Associate Professor at the University of California Davis, and a start-up co-founder, explains.

Publish and Perish

“It can be an extremely rewarding career...but burnout is a real thing in academia. The job requires one's total focus, which often comes at the neglect of other parts of their lives,” says Dr Anderson, speaking of the “tremendous pressure” academics are under to constantly publish papers and obtain external funding.

“The pressure to deliver is high. And if you don't deliver, then you're asked to move on. And if you're asked to move on, that's the end of your research career. So, it's a huge investment, but it's very risky.”

But even if the risk pays off professionally, the price may still be high.

The original phrase, publish or perish, only concerned the professional context: either you publish, or you lose your job. But awareness is growing that professional success attained via intense stress will still have negative consequences.

In Dr Hanitzsch and colleagues’ research, 43 percent of respondents were at severe or very severe risk of burnout.

“Everyone is speaking about publish or perish as if one thing goes at the expense of the other. But for many scientists, both are actually true. They kind of perish psychologically, despite publishing quite a lot,” Dr Hanitzsch says.

According to a study he co-authored, working conditions are not exactly conducive to a healthy work-life balance. Asked what it takes to be successful in academia, 77 percent of the media and communication researchers that participated in the study agreed that working overtime and on vacation is ‘a must’. More than a third said that prioritising work over other things in life is necessary to make it in academia. Unsurprisingly, 73 percent said that they found it hard to balance their professional and private lives.

“Probably none of these roles come with a nice work-life balance. But that pressure to publish pushes boundaries even more, and that puts our health at risk,” explains Dr Marie-Helene Pelletier, a psychologist and executive coach who has been working with academics for two decades.

Putting boundaries in place is hard, because publication count often becomes tied to one’s identity as a sign of professional success.

Things can snowball from pressure to publish to burnout. The pressure can increase stress, which decreases the cognitive resources for attaining the goal to publish and all the other tasks academics need to perform, and this can affect mood, Dr Pelletier explains.

“You get exhausted, a bit hopeless, cynical about whether your goals are even possible – and then your performance starts decreasing. This is the definition of burnout.”

She urges academics to notice warning signs.

Changes in behaviour, such as being more impatient, taking longer to make a decision, struggling to concentrate, or feeling numb, isolated, or powerless, need attention.

“When you notice these signs, you want to step back. And often you need to step back with someone,” Dr Pelletier explains.

“Whether it's a trusted peer, a mentor, or an executive coach, you need someone to support you because it’s hard to look at this on your own. It's useful to have another perspective.”

A teacher turned education journalist, Claudia has been writing about international education for the best part of 10 years. Originally from Italy, she worked and studied in Australia before moving to the UK in 2014. As a journalist, she worked for publications in the education sphere such as EL Gazette, The PIE News and Tes, specialising in research and data-led reporting, before going freelance in 2021. She holds an MSc in Educational Neuroscience and is passionate about education research.

Wānanga: Where Māori knowledge shapes higher education

By Rohan Mehra

In Brief

• New Zealand's wānanga are Indigenous Māori higher learning institutions that embed Mātauranga Māori (Māori Knowledge) as fundamental to teaching, research, and governance, offering an alternative to Western academic models.
• These three publicly owned institutions offer NZQA-accredited degrees, balancing accountability to iwi (tribes) for cultural integrity with regulatory bodies for academic recognition, integrating both Māori and Western worldviews.
• Wānanga are global leaders, making Indigenous knowledge foundational in higher education. They produce graduates fluent in both knowledge systems, fostering cultural integrity, advancing Māori intellectual sovereignty, and driving positive community outcomes.

All of Aotearoa’s (New Zealand) recognised universities are in the top 2 percent of the QS World University Rankings. These eight institutions seemingly incorporate aspects of Indigenous Māori culture, whether through teaching content including te reo Māori (Māori Language) and use of it alongside English on their websites, or something deeper such as Māori leadership initiatives and specialised student support services. Such efforts no doubt help integrate Māori culture and traditions into the Western academic framework.

The Three Wānanga

Those interested in Māori culture may wonder about institutions where Mātauranga Māori (Māori Knowledge) serves as the basis for tertiary education. This is where the publicly owned wānanga come in. There are three at present, established to fashion an indigenous alternative model of higher learning, places where cultural content is not an add-on but is fundamental to the teaching, research and governance of institutions.

They are Te Wānanga o Raukawa (TWoR) founded in 1981, Te Wānanga o Aotearoa (TWoA) founded in 1985, and Te Whare Wānanga o Awanuiārangi (Awanuiārangi) founded in 1992.

All three offer accredited diplomas and degrees and are formally associated with the New Zealand Qualifications Authority (NZQA). This means they undergo the same external evaluation and review processes as mainstream universities and polytechnics to maintain credibility for the qualifications they award.

This distinction matters as in recent years there has been discussion in the country about whether traditional knowledge should be taught as comparable with contemporary science in schools.

Tradition with Modern Academic Rigour

“Navigating between Māori and Western academic knowledge systems is a daily reality. Our programmes are designed so students can critically engage with both worldviews,” says Professor Wiremu Doherty, Chief Executive Officer for Awanuiārangi. “Research methodologies incorporate Mātauranga Māori, while academic excellence remains benchmarked against national and international standards.

“We encourage learning that produces solutions, and leads to tangible, positive outcomes for students’ communities. We're producing graduates who can speak fluently in both knowledge systems while maintaining their cultural integrity and advancing Māori intellectual sovereignty.”

A decade ago, a New Zealand Tertiary Education Commission report showed the wānanga as underperforming. But both Awanuiārangi and TWoR argued that national performance metrics don’t account for their unique learner demographic, often mature, part-time students from socio-economically disadvantaged backgrounds.

Wānanga essentially have dual accountability, to iwi (tribes), to maintain cultural integrity and local priorities, and to the NZQA and other regulatory bodies, to ensure academic and vocational recognition domestically and abroad.

This dual framework is what allows Mātauranga Māori its inclusion within higher education without sacrificing academic rigour, making Aotearoa New Zealand a global leader in recognising indigenous knowledge as foundational, not supplemental.

“Balancing traditional knowledge with innovation is important to Māori researchers. It requires reflection, weighing risks, and asking ‘How will this affect our mokopuna (descendants)?’ If the answer is positive, then we know we’re on the right path,” says Dr Joni Angeli-Gordon, a researcher at Te Manawahoukura Rangahau centre of TWoA.

“In mainstream settings, Māori researchers often feel like they are constantly trying to fit a circle into a square, which can be exhausting. At wānanga, values are shared, wellbeing sits at the centre, and this creates the right environment for transformative research.”

The three Wānanga have much in common, they are founded and run by iwi, they are open to all and broadly share in their intended impacts. Each aims to produce regional, economic, social and cultural benefits, while also forming partnerships with local groups such as health providers, who can become more effective in their interventions when imbued with local knowledge.

While this emphasis on tangible community outcomes is shared, Wānanga have their own distinct identities, features and focuses too. For example, Awanuiārangi is very research-focused, can award PhDs, forms partnerships with Indigenous educational establishments around the world, and concentrates its community orientated focus on Māori intellectual sovereignty.

“We are the only institution offering full academic pathways in Te Ao Haka (Māori Performing Arts), from foundation to doctoral level. Our postgraduate curriculum in Indigenous Development is co-constructed with tribal communities across the Pacific and North America, affirming Indigenous Knowledge as globally relevant and academically rigorous,” says Professor Doherty.

“We are helping to build an Indigenous teaching model with the Tulalip tribe in Washington State, and we supported Sami University in Norway to gain its doctoral qualification. We are also the only New Zealand tertiary institute delivering our Bachelor of Education to First Nations people in North America.”

TWoR strongly promotes the cultural survival of iwi, and the revitalisation of te reo Māori, which is embedded in all courses taught. They do this through whakapapa (loosely, one’s relationship to their shared past, providing a sense of identity, belonging and responsibility), and tikanga (Māori customary practices and values).

And TWoA places great emphasis on inclusivity, with a large scale nationwide network of locations for study and research. This intentionally opens doors for second-chance learners amongst others, necessarily leading to opportunities for graduates to work in a range of industries.

“We have campuses and delivery options across Aotearoa New Zealand, from major cities to small towns, making education accessible to students in remote communities. This allows tauira (students) to study locally while staying close to whānau and work,” says Evie O'Brien, Chief Executive at TWoA.

“Founded as a bold response to mainstream education’s failure to serve rangatahi Māori (youth), our institution has grown into one of the largest tertiary providers in Aotearoa New Zealand, offering inclusive, holistic education. Today, with over 80 sites, we empower thousands through programmes in te reo Māori, education, business, trades and more.”

Many avenues for study at wānanga connect with regionally specific issues of health, wellbeing, language, culture and education, with a fair share of activities you would expect more broadly including business, IT and the creative arts. And when it comes to research at wānanga, depending on the subject area, things may appear more, or less, familiar to researchers from mainstream universities.

“We typically utilise conventional research techniques, both qualitative and quantitative. However, the process can be somewhat different, particularly in terms of engagement with participants and follow-up. Data is also interpreted with a cultural lens to ensure accuracy of conclusions and recommendations,” says Professor Te Kani Kingi, Executive Director of Research and Innovation at Awanuiārangi.

Rohan is a STEAM communicator based in Tokyo. He works with universities to improve the depth, breadth, quality, and quantity of their public facing communications output. His main focus is on writing, producing short films, and lecturing post-graduates about research communication. Typical of STEAM communicators, he’s worked in a broad range of roles including as a TV producer, animator, researcher, editor, museum curator, public speaker, and journalist. Alongside these things he’s also taught continuously since the mid 2000’s, running workshops for adults, children, and under-represented groups on film production, animation, and more.