Virtue signalling without a cost in academia

"The juvenile sea squirt wanders through the sea searching for a suitable rock or hunk of coral to cling to and make its home for life. For this task, it has a rudimentary nervous system. When it finds its spot and takes root, it doesn't need its brain anymore, so it eats it! It's rather like getting tenure."
— Daniel Dennett, Darwin's Dangerous Idea

Virtue signaling is “an attempt to show other people that you are a good person, for example, by expressing opinions that will be acceptable to them, especially on social media [1].” This definition sounds familiar to anyone working in academia. It also applies at the organizational level: when initiated by a self-proclaimed "visionary" researcher who occupies an administrative role, such signaling can scale up and disproportionately affect early-career researchers.

Why is it so abundant in academia? Because it carries little to no risk while yielding significant benefits for the signaller. Even an inexperienced undergraduate student, after brief interactions with so-called "established researchers," can observe multiple forms of virtue signaling. For example, early-career researchers are often obliged to follow absurd rules that those imposing them never adhered to while building their own careers. For example, 'environmental' policies may be introduced that restrict your conference attendance. While the "visionary" administrator has already built their network through years of global travel, the early career researchers are denied the visibility required to advance their career, all under the guise of institutional sustainability. (These rules are frequently tailored to the academic zeitgeist, promoting virtue signaling rather than facilitating meaningful interpersonal or organizational interactions.) The consequences of such rules are negligible for the virtue signaller at the moment of decision-making, yet costly for those expected to comply.

The motivations behind virtue signaling in academia vary. Based on my experience, two common ones stand out. First, public relations: virtue signallers are often skilled at advertising selected research outputs to secure the next round of funding and extend the lifespan of their research agenda. Second, fear of missing out. When a topic becomes fashionable, it is tempting for virtue signallers to align their group’s research with these trends through practices such as ethics-washing or greenwashing. In doing so, research directions are re-oriented toward funding opportunities rather than measurable impact.

One way I choose to deal with virtue signalers in academia is simple: double the noise they create, return it through the same medium (e.g., e-mail, social media, etc.), and publicly remind them of their own contradictions. When a "visionary" researcher imposes an "environmental" policy that restricts your conference travel, this will pull up the ladder they once climbed, don't just complain. Instead, escalate the situation: publicly request a transparent carbon audit of their own conference travel history. This will force them to live by the policy they impose on others.

References
[1] Virtue signalling (Wikipedia).
Image adapted from Two Cocks Fighting (Wikimedia Commons).