The impostor phenomenon (also popularly termed ‘impostor syndrome’) is described as a feeling of fraudulence. In academic spaces, it can contribute to a low sense of belonging, low self-worth and anxiety in part as a consequence of living with the fear of being ‘found out’ as a phoney and not being as capable as people think. These feelings often persist despite evidence to the contrary. This project will map the prevalence, causes and contexts of the impostor phenomenon among students in UK higher education using a rigorous and transparent scoping review methodology established by the Joanna Briggs Institute (JBI) for systematic reviews. The work will explore whether there is a relationship between feelings of impostorism and the degree-award gap (DAG), which particularly highlights students with racially-minoritised identities. The DAG is primarily the difference in awarding a ‘good’ degree (a first or 2:1 classification) between White and racially-minoritised students. The gap is more marked between White and Black students. We will use the scoping review to systematically and critically pull together the literature on impostorism, perceptions of belonging, graduate outcomes, and interventions for these students. This review will support a more comprehensive investigation of the impostor phenomenon, which includes cross-cultural studies conducted on Black female students in the UK and US, and a current collaborative study investigating the impostor phenomenon in South Asian students in the UK and US.
Funding body
The project is funded by a Society for Research into Higher Education Scoping Award and runs from March 2025-March 2026.
Investigators
- Dr Okun Yetkili, Co-Principal Investigator (University of Westminster)
- Dr Deborah Husbands, Co-Principal Investigator (University of Westminster)