{"title":"Addressing the Elephant in the Room: Exploring the Impostor Phenomenon in Evaluation","authors":"J. LaVelle, Natalie D. Jones, S. Donaldson","doi":"10.1177/10982140221075243","DOIUrl":null,"url":null,"abstract":"The impostor phenomenon is a psychological construct referring to a range of negative emotions associated with a person's perception of their own \"fraudulent competence\" in a field or of their lack of skills necessary to be successful in that field. Anecdotal evidence suggests that many practicing evaluators have experienced impostor feelings, but lack a framework in which to understand their experiences and the forums in which to discuss them. This paper summarizes the literature on the impostor phenomenon, applies it to the field of evaluation, and describes the results of an empirical, quantitatively focused study which included open-ended qualitative questions exploring impostorism in 323 practicing evaluators. The results suggest that impostor phenomenon in evaluators consists of three constructs: Discount, Luck, and Fake. Qualitative data analysis suggests differential coping strategies for men and women. Thematic analysis guided the development of a set of proposed solutions to help lessen the phenomenon's detrimental effects for evaluators.","PeriodicalId":51449,"journal":{"name":"American Journal of Evaluation","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":1.1000,"publicationDate":"2022-01-31","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":"3","resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":null,"PeriodicalName":"American Journal of Evaluation","FirstCategoryId":"90","ListUrlMain":"https://doi.org/10.1177/10982140221075243","RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"社会学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":null,"EPubDate":"","PubModel":"","JCR":"Q2","JCRName":"SOCIAL SCIENCES, INTERDISCIPLINARY","Score":null,"Total":0}
引用次数: 3
Abstract
The impostor phenomenon is a psychological construct referring to a range of negative emotions associated with a person's perception of their own "fraudulent competence" in a field or of their lack of skills necessary to be successful in that field. Anecdotal evidence suggests that many practicing evaluators have experienced impostor feelings, but lack a framework in which to understand their experiences and the forums in which to discuss them. This paper summarizes the literature on the impostor phenomenon, applies it to the field of evaluation, and describes the results of an empirical, quantitatively focused study which included open-ended qualitative questions exploring impostorism in 323 practicing evaluators. The results suggest that impostor phenomenon in evaluators consists of three constructs: Discount, Luck, and Fake. Qualitative data analysis suggests differential coping strategies for men and women. Thematic analysis guided the development of a set of proposed solutions to help lessen the phenomenon's detrimental effects for evaluators.
期刊介绍:
The American Journal of Evaluation (AJE) publishes original papers about the methods, theory, practice, and findings of evaluation. The general goal of AJE is to present the best work in and about evaluation, in order to improve the knowledge base and practice of its readers. Because the field of evaluation is diverse, with different intellectual traditions, approaches to practice, and domains of application, the papers published in AJE will reflect this diversity. Nevertheless, preference is given to papers that are likely to be of interest to a wide range of evaluators and that are written to be accessible to most readers.