Interview with Dr. Amanda Diekman

This month we interviewed Dr. Amanda Diekman for some advice on writing!

Dr. Diekman’s research focuses on gender roles, social change, and stereotyping. Additionally, she is dedicated to promoting and practicing better writing habits and works to foster this within her lab. Dr. Diekman will be joining Indiana University as a professor of psychological and brain sciences in August 2018.

Were you always an advocate for developing and building better writing skills and practices?

I have always been a big reader and I was an English major before I was a psychology major. The process and products of writing have always been fascinating to me, and one of the things I loved about psychology is that I could work on understanding the human condition and use data and words to form the narrative.

Do you have any general "good writing practices" that you follow and promote?

I write every work day for at least 20-30 minutes—words on a page, not data analysis or reading or looking things up. Building this habit did not come easily to me but is so rewarding. I do not wait for when I feel like writing or when I feel motivated—the motivation comes once I am in it. (And I take time away, which is also essential for coming back with fresh eyes.)

How do you promote these good practices within your lab?

We went back to behaviorist basics and made sticker charts for ourselves! The goals are set individually but are shared within the lab. Once we built the habit, we didn’t need the stickers anymore, but we still have them in case we need a boost.

Do you think there are any common misconceptions people have about the writing process?

I think the biggest one is that you need big blocks of time or you need to feel inspired. I have a post-it near my monitor with a Picasso quote: “Inspiration exists, but it has to find you working.” And that the piece has to be perfect—that is a hurdle that is still a big challenge for me, but I’m working on getting pieces to the best place I can and then getting them out for others to improve or integrate in their work or think about.

What is the best writing advice you ever received?

I think a lot about Anne Lamott’s advice she received from her father when she was struggling through a school project on birds and he told her to just work “bird by bird” [check out Bird by Bird: Some Instructions on Writing and Life by Anne Lamott].

Greg Walton [associate professor of psychology at Stanford University] commented that a lot of students think they have failed because their first draft is entirely revised by their advisor, but instead we need to recognize that the advisor couldn’t have done that revision without that first essential step of going from blank page (which in my experience is always the hardest part).

Any additional comments/advice for grad students and fellow social psychologists?

Writing is always something you can get better at, and that is both the challenge and the joy. I recently wrote a chapter with Peter Glick [professor of psychology and Henry Merritt Wriston Professor of the Social Sciences at Lawrence University] not only because I thought he’s an expert and smart and fun to work with, but also because I thought I’d learn something about writing from him. And I did!

And even the writers who seem to write with the most ease are probably ready to pull their hair out a lot. Writing involves a LOT of rewriting and rethinking - that is just the process. The only way out is through.