ISSBD runs the Early Career Scholars (ECS) programme for its membership in their early career stage. ISSBD defines an ECS as scholar of human development who is either working towards a PhD or whose PhD has been awarded less than 7 years ago. Thus, most early career scholars are in the early stage of their careers with a hunger for professional development.
For many years, ISSBD has been committed to ECS’s development for at least three main reasons:
The ECS Committee is highly engaged and actively working toward the overall plan of networking, facilitating activities, and giving a body and structure to the ECS Community.
The ISSBD Early Career Scholars Committee works in line with the vision and goal of creating cohesion and strengthening the network of relationships among the Society’s young members. In the past years, these intentions have been translated and concretized into several initiatives that have been welcomed by ECSs.
May 2022: the lecture was thought in view of the Biennial. The webinar covered how to deliver an effective oral presentation in English. The lecture was given by Pierfranca Forchini, Professor of English language and Linguistics at Università Cattolica, Milan (Italy). In particular, given the need to be effective and convincing while communicating, detailed suggestions on how to outline an effective presentation and connect with the audience were offered. Special considerations were given to cultural, linguistic and psychological components involved in international communication.
Sep 2022: Prof. Semira Tagliabue, the Università Cattolica del Sacro Cuore (Italy). She teaches Research Methods at bachelor, master and PhD level. The keynote topic was about “measurement invariance: different kinds of comparisons in complex research designs”. The topic was selected because in line with the idea of supporting a methodological training path that allows to deepen knowledge related to psychology and development, with an eye to international partnerships.
Apr 2021: Prof. Qi Wang, Cornell University. Scholars were lectured about methodological issues associated with carrying out international projects.
Dec 2020: call for applications to the Jacobs Foundation Research Fellowship Program 2021. The meeting was organized and involved the participation of Dr. Anne Petersen and Pamela Adende, who provided suggestions regarding best practices for joining and participating in the call.
May/June 2020: Due to the pandemic, the in-person meeting could not be held. The Early Career Scholars Committee organized three special lectures dedicated to ECSs. One of these lectures was online (Prof. William Bukowski, Concordia University, Canada). The other (Prof. Antonella Marchetti, Università Cattolica, Milan) was recorded and made available in streaming. The event was promoted online via the ISSBD newsletter and e-mail.
In 2020, travel grants were assigned to enable resource constrained ECS to attend conferences and participate in the pre-conference. For the pre-biennial meeting, application from the ECS had been accepted based on research interests and, during the meeting, a networking had been established which included a face to face community meeting, ECS reception, and lunch or dinner with the mentors to facilitate opportunity for knowing each other and exchanges within an informal context.
The 2020 Biennial meeting was cancelled due to the Covid-19 pandemic. However, some events were soon reinstated in an online version – see the May-June 2020 conferences and webinars.
Other planned activities were further resumed and made effective for the 2022 Biennial meeting.