The urgency of restructuring the landscape of behavioral medicine: Commentary from early-career diversity institute scholars.

ABSTRACT

Structural and systemic barriers entrenched in academia have sustained for decades, and resulted in a lack of diversity in leadership positions, inequitable workloads for women and underrepresented racial/ethnic groups, and increasing issues with retention of faculty, particularly following the COVID-19 pandemic. Increasing opposition to diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) efforts in higher education via legislation, policies, and general anti-DEI sentiment contextualizes the importance of prioritizing DEI. The goal of this commentary is to open discussion among academic institutions regarding changes in DEI culture that will facilitate the growth of diverse early-career faculty (ECF). We use an adapted framework which incorporates DEI into a faculty competency model to (i) guide our discussion of the rationale for restructuring academic systems to promote DEI and (ii) recommend strategies for institutional progress for ECF that can translate across academic institutions. Implementing policies and practices that seek to recruit, retain, and support historically underrepresented ECF are needed, and may involve faculty mentorship programs, establishing equitable funding mechanisms, reforming faculty evaluation practices, and examining and correcting inequities in faculty workloads. The onus is on institutions to recognize and replace the exclusionary practices and biases that have existed within their walls, and continuously promote and monitor their DEI efforts and initiatives to ensure their efficacy. Inclusive academic cultures that demonstrate their value of diversity and commitment to equity promotion at all levels of the organization, including among ECF, are necessary for ensuring excellence in scholarship in academia.

Existing structural and systemic barriers in academia have continued for decades, and resulted in a lack of diversity in leadership positions, inequitable workloads for underrepresented gender and racial/ethnic groups, and increasing issues with retention of faculty, particularly following the COVID-19 pandemic. We outline the need for promoting diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) practices in academia, and that it will involve changes to the existing structures within universities. This is especially important as we want our higher education workforce to reflect our increasingly diverse society in its own diversity, but current policies and structures do not promote diversity in our institutions and in our research. Our rationale for restructuring academic systems to promote DEI also stems from a need for behavioral medicine and research more broadly to recognize and challenge the biases and practices that sustain inequity in our research­from the questions we ask, the participants we include (and exclude), and the ways in which the system creates unnecessary barriers for researchers who try to mitigate or address these biases in our work. We recommend implementing strategies for institutional progress that benefit diverse early-career faculty including mentoring programs, developing funding opportunities, changing faculty evaluation practices, and creating equitable workloads.