{"id":612,"date":"2019-06-11T09:07:52","date_gmt":"2019-06-11T08:07:52","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blogs.bath.ac.uk\/business-and-society\/?p=612"},"modified":"2019-06-11T09:07:52","modified_gmt":"2019-06-11T08:07:52","slug":"researcher-spotlight-thomas-roulet","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.bath.ac.uk\/business-and-society\/2019\/06\/11\/researcher-spotlight-thomas-roulet\/","title":{"rendered":"Researcher in the Spotlight - Dr Thomas Roulet"},"content":{"rendered":"

He used the \"Spiral of Silence\" to predict Trump's election, and is now speaking out about imposter syndrome in management academia. In the second of our \"Researcher in the Spotlight\" series, we talk to Thomas Roulet<\/a> about his research, the freedom of academic life and the value of social media.\u00a0<\/em><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

You\u2019re now in Cambridge \u2013 tell us about the path you took to get there<\/strong><\/p>\n

I finished my PhD in 2014 and then did my post doc in Oxford. I\u2019ve taught in various universities \u2013 including some time in Bath \u2013 and I joined Cambridge in August 2018. I\u2019m a Senior Lecturer in Organisation Theory at the Judge Business School, but I\u2019m also attached to a college \u2013 I\u2019m a Fellow in Sociology and Management Studies at Girton, the college founded by the feminist movement 150 years ago. I enjoyed being part of a college in Oxford so I\u2019m glad that I have that opportunity here too. It means that I teach undergraduates in sociology as well as lecturing in management in the Business School.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

What are you working on at the moment?<\/strong><\/p>\n

The main focus of my research is negative social evaluations, things like stigma, scandals and disapproval. I look at this at both the organisational and individual level. I\u2019ve just finished writing a book on the subject which hopefully will be out next year, published by Stanford University Press. Writing a book is a long process \u2013 I started this in 2015!<\/p>\n

The work around stigma and scandals is very current and pretty scary \u2013 for example politicians using controversies to fuel campaigns. Have a look at the new BBC show Years and Years<\/a> \u2013 it\u2019s all about fake news and the rise of new populist politicians. It\u2019s a drama but it\u2019s so close to reality.<\/p>\n

I\u2019m also interested in how social evaluation can have an impact on other issues like the environment and waste management. It\u2019s interesting how people compete with each other - people want to be positively evaluated so they start engaging with pro-environmental practices such as reducing their waste, for example.<\/p>\n

It was through my work on evaluation and stigma that I became interested in imposter syndrome. How we perceive ourselves, and how others make us perceive ourselves, are major drivers of our behaviours. This is the subject of a recent paper<\/a> I wrote with Joel Bothello \u2013 we were particularly interested in what we saw as a growing phenomenon amongst junior academics like ourselves, this sense of anxiety and self\u2010doubt about the legitimacy of our profession and our position within it.<\/p>\n

In addition to my own academic production, I am the co-editor in chief of M@n@gement \u2013 which was founded 20 years ago as the first open access journal in the field of management. I'm trying through my editorial activities to change our publication ecosystem, to make it more inclusive and less profit oriented.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Which piece of work are you most proud of?<\/strong><\/p>\n

While I was at Bath, I published a theory paper<\/a> on public opinion and the stigmatisation of practices. It was about this theory of the Spiral of Silence<\/a>. It\u2019s a theory that individuals have a fear of\u00a0isolation, resulting from the idea that a social group or society in general might exclude members due to them holding what they think is a minority opinion. So people stay quiet rather than voice what they perceive to be unpopular opinions.<\/p>\n

At the time, it didn\u2019t seem like it was that relevant or have much practical application. But now, we find that it\u2019s extremely relevant for explaining the polarisation in political opinion that we\u2019re seeing at the moment, and the unexpected triumphs of Trump, Johnson and Brexit.<\/p>\n

Before the Trump election, I had an opinion piece published in the Telegraph<\/a> \u2013 I used the theory to explain why we were underestimating Trump\u2019s chances of being elected. He had a huge number of hardcore supporters but they were totally invisible because they didn\u2019t want to admit publicly to their support. So the pollsters didn\u2019t capture what people were really thinking. Things are a bit different now \u2013 people are much more vocal, but back then it was impossible to capture how prevalent these opinions were. And so the result was a huge shock for many.<\/p>\n

The same theory has been applied more recently to the Indian election. We\u2019re seeing much more polarisation, people becoming more and more opposed to each other \u2013 we\u2019re more divided than at any other time.<\/p>\n

I made the prediction about Trump to be provocative, because I thought people were not really taking notice of what was happening. I didn\u2019t really believe he would be elected, but then it came true! Brexit had already showed us what could happen. Political mobilisation is now quite high. People realise what can happen, that there are others who might share their apparently unpopular opinions and they\u2019re becoming more vocal. We see people being very controversial to stir up support and encourage opposition.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Who would you say as had the most influence on your work? \u00a0<\/strong><\/p>\n

There are many academics who have been inspiring \u2013 many senior people who are very well known, experts in their field.<\/p>\n

But what I have found really helpful is not necessarily looking up to very senior people, but enjoying discussions with my peers and other junior scholars. I\u2019ve taken inspiration from people who are a little bit more senior. For example when I just started my PhD, one of the others who was just finishing theirs was Jean-Phillipe Vergne<\/a>. He was incredible at looking at new topics and his work really inspired me. He now works on crypto-currency. He was one of a wave of junior people who came up with new ideas, who was interested in new phenomena and really pushed the boundaries of our field. It was he who inspired me to write my book as he himself wrote an exciting book on piracy and capitalism with Rudolph Durand.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

What would you have done if you weren\u2019t an academic?<\/strong><\/p>\n

Before being an academic I was in investment banking. It was fun and stimulating, but I did not find clear purpose, and it was too monotonous.<\/p>\n

In academia, there\u2019s much more freedom, and there\u2019s space to think. Yes, we\u2019re pressurised to publish and we have teaching responsibilities, but we can also find purpose through other things like public engagement, writing books, doing interdisciplinary research.<\/p>\n

It\u2019s a pity that sometimes, due to organisational pressures, we forget what a huge luxury it is to do this job. We get to interact with great minds who then influence you for the rest of your life. I couldn\u2019t do any other job \u2013 nothing else would offer so much freedom to think.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

You're one of our top thinklisters<\/a> - is social media still an important part of your work as an academic? <\/strong><\/p>\n

Yes, I still do a huge amount. Over the last couple of years I\u2019d say I\u2019ve seen more of the negative aspects of it. But I still really enjoy it \u2013 it bridges gaps between fields, helps me to make connections I otherwise couldn\u2019t make. It\u2019s great for procrastination, for sparking off new ideas to pursue.<\/p>\n

I think we should all be engaged academics. A lot of people are shy and don\u2019t want to engage \u2013 they\u2019re afraid that they don\u2019t have anything to say. But it\u2019s not about having strong opinions, it\u2019s just about engaging in a dialogue. You just need to be willing to connect with others.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

He used the \"Spiral of Silence\" to predict Trump's election, and is now speaking out about imposter syndrome in management academia. In the second of our \"Researcher in the Spotlight\" series, we talk to Thomas Roulet about his research, the...<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":943,"featured_media":614,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[100,3,66],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-612","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-thinklist","category-business-and-society","category-research"],"acf":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/blogs.bath.ac.uk\/business-and-society\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/133\/2019\/06\/Tom_Roulet_blog.jpg","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/pd4Pj1-9S","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.bath.ac.uk\/business-and-society\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/612","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.bath.ac.uk\/business-and-society\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.bath.ac.uk\/business-and-society\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.bath.ac.uk\/business-and-society\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/943"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.bath.ac.uk\/business-and-society\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=612"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.bath.ac.uk\/business-and-society\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/612\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.bath.ac.uk\/business-and-society\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/614"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.bath.ac.uk\/business-and-society\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=612"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.bath.ac.uk\/business-and-society\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=612"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.bath.ac.uk\/business-and-society\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=612"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}