ASBHM2019 – A first time attendee’s perspective

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Editor’s note: Maddie North attended ASBHM for the first time in 2019. She was kind enough to contribute this post about her experiences at the conference.

ASBHM 2019 was held in Christchurch this year and what a wonderful environment to have as your first conference presenting experience!   

I knew that this one would be a nice gathering of people with a strong student representation, so it was less intimidating than the previous conferences I have attended.

One thing that is difficult about conferences is making a decision about which talks and streams you attend. My decisions were mainly made up for me as the Misinformation Lab were presenting in a lot of the streams and so obviously supporting everyone in the lab was important.  

Day One

Day one was a nice easy day as in the morning were workshops and then there was a keynote. Jeffrey Braithwaite made a great point about the importance of researching the way that we do things in the field rather than researching the way that we think things are done. Academics are more disconnected from the field than we like to think, and this is something that needs to be considered if we want to make real change. Another key theme from the conference as a whole was the need for interdisciplinary collaboration.

Lab member Anna Jackson presented on day one and killed it at her very first conference. I can’t imagine getting up and presenting my fourth-year research, and she should be very proud of herself for how well she did. [Editor’s note you can see the slides from Anna’s talk here]

One thing that I am a surprising advocate for is attending social events, however I am also an advocate of knowing your limits and not going to things if you absolutely don’t want to. The Wednesday after you landed from America the day before was not an opportune moment for socialising and that is okay. From all accounts the Peers Connect event was a success.

Day Two

Day Two and it was my turn to present. [Editor’s note you can see the slides from Maddie’s talk here]. I have only ever spoken about my research in one other place in front of people and it was to about eight people I knew. Presenting to 20-ish people you don’t know is highly intimidating, alas the world didn’t implode. I learned that even though I think I know absolutely nothing about my topic and area, after 9 months of researching it you do have some things stick in your brain. Also, that people just want to see you do well, at a small conference like this one the people really just want you to succeed.

Everyone else from the lab presented on this day as well, wrapping up all the cool stuff that has been happening over the last year and it was nice to be there to be a part of it.

Of course, there were also from fascinating presentations from non-lab members as well 🙂

The Thursday held the conference dinner and it was nice to interact with everyone in that context. Making friends is easier at these types of things because  you have the opportunity to send so much time together over a short space of time.

Day Three

The last day of the conference was a blur, which ended with a bunch of people at the noodle markets in which I am fairly sure the entirety of Christchurch was also at. 

I saw some fantastic presentations on Day Three

Overall impressions

Overall ASBHM was probably the conference where I have been the most relaxed and held the least feelings of imposter syndrome. Maybe this is because this is my first time actually presenting at a conference I have been to and I felt a bit more like a legitimate researcher.

I think the main thing to remember as a student attending and presenting at these things is that they take an enormous amount of cognitive energy and it is normal to feel drained after them. From interacting with fully fledged academics, this feeling doesn’t appear to go away.

Thank you to all the organisers and everyone who came and presented their research, catch you all in Sydney for 2020!!

Oh and because of open science purposes, let’s have a plug for the ASBHM OSF meeting page. If you presented or want to check out the posters and slides that were there please go to osf.io/view/asbhm2019.  

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