The age group I’ve chosen for my stakeholders is 18-27, and I realised that I’ve never explained my reasoning behind this. At 18, you’re potentially away from home for the first time, studying in an unfamiliar environment. At 27, you’re considered a mature student. You’ve probably done your BA, left education to work and then come back to university to continue studying or you’re in higher education for the first time after working for a few years. There are different factors that could make students feel like an imposter at each age.

But is imposter syndrome something that can be grown out of?

Author Valerie Young, who is an expert on imposter syndrome says, “people can still have an imposter moment, but not an imposter life.” https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC8028514/

I like this quote that I came across whilst reading an article by Sumina Mainali because to me it implies that imposter syndrome doesn’t have to take over your whole life and it doesn’t have to be a permanent condition.

“In the long run, many of us have grown out of the imposter syndrome and into our own
knowledge and skills—and humility. We embrace what we know and all that we do not know.” I saw this quote in the blurb for an article in Nurse Leader, 2011. Sadly the full article was hidden behind a paywall and I couldn’t access it. However I find this small tidbit very helpful, and connects with conversations I’ve had about imposter syndrome, where I’ve been told that people think imposter syndrome is something we grow out of because that’s what their parents have told them. This quote almost implies that once people embrace the things that they do know and make the most of their knowledge and skills, the feelings of being an imposter will become less significant.