Diverging Pipelines: Examining Identity of Neurodivergent Physicists Left Behind by Academia

Education, including physics education, is in the midst of an exciting paradigm shift. Scholars are beginning to question how we conceptualize cognitive and sensory disability. Specifically, we are shifting towards a new Neurodiversity Paradigm, in which we understand our neurodivergent (autistic, ADHD, OCD, dyslexic, PTSD, etc.) students as not having deficits, but experiencing differences in how their mind works which can be unaligned with how the classroom and the broader physics culture we live in operates. Because of this and numerous other reasons, many neurodivergent physicists leave the field. Very little research examines why neurodivergent physicists leave the field, and even less examines what keeps these physicists identifying as physicists despite leaving. In this talk, I will present and discuss my preliminary findings based on interviews with neurodivergent physicists who leave the field, and discuss what role we, as in-field physicists can play in encouraging these neurodivergent physicists.