The Lab Family: Benefit or Cause-a-fit?

Anyone who’s ever been to a wedding or listened to an oldies radio station for more than five minutes recognizes the lyrics to the Sister Sledge classic We are Family.  “We are family / I got all my sisters with me / We are family / Get up ev’rybody and sing.”  It’s probably unlikely that we’ve ever huddled around with our labmates to sing the words “We are the ___ Lab / I got all my labmates with me / We are the ___ Lab / Get up ev’rybody and work”… but should we?

Family plays a very important role in our lives both in and out of the lab.  They provide the support and love we need to make it through the tough times, while also helping us celebrate the good ones.  However, like most professions, in research we spend most of our waking lives at the bench, with a group of people who may or may not be as close-knit.  In some groups, labmates eat lunch together, do experiments together and hang out after work together.  In other groups, labmates have no interest in the people or projects around them – seeing research as an individual pursuit or competition that is best carried out alone.  While we can see the benefit of having a supportive family-like environment in the lab, we can also imagine the misery of working with that crazy uncle we’d prefer to keep to a once-a-year visitation schedule…

So can we say one of these approaches will generate more successful scientists than the other?  Should PIs be actively fostering an atmosphere that is more individually- or family-oriented?

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