The Way We Think About Imposter Syndrome Needs to Change
If we want to combat imposter syndrome, we have to stop thinking about it as an individual problem
“Facilitating adaptation to unhealthy systems does not lead to healthy development or fully lived lives.” — Arthur M. Horne
I first learned about the imposter syndrome as a first-year counseling psychology PhD student researching articles for a class assignment. What I had always referred to as “self-doubt that doesn’t fully make sense because of my history of objective achievement” actually had a (much shorter) name, description, and a plethora of associated research to back it up. The imposter syndrome also known as the impostor phenomenon describes the tendency for high-achieving people to discount their successes and, generally, feel like frauds waiting to be found out by people of significance to them.
In recent years, academia and the general public have grown fascinated by this concept and how it manifests in evaluative settings such as colleges and workplaces. While the original study coining the term is still noteworthy, it did very little to advance the cultural and contextual nuances that might explain how the development of this phenomenon may differ for those with non-privileged identities compared to those holding more…
