I was in Denver for the SRCD conference last week. I like academic conferences. It's a great chance to go hear what others are currently dong in the field. You can get a lot of information in a short time. Of course, you're also completely brain-dead by the time it's over. What I don't like though is all the people. I get extremely nervous around people I don't know and have quite a bit of anxiety when I'm in large groups of people. So even though conferences are a great opportunity to network, I find I really prefer to go to the talks and then hide in my hotel room. This year though I made a very concerted effort to talk to some of the big names in my field. And not only am I proud of myself for talking with people I don't know, it seems that the measures we've developed for my research were interesting to others. A lot of people felt that my ideas were relevant and headed the direction that the field needs to go. It's always nice when important people who actually matter think what you're doing and your approach to the field is intersting. Even more exciting was a conversation I had with a researcher at the University of New Orleans who is running a longitudinal study and wants to include our new measures in his upcoming data collection. So not only did he think it was interesting, but actually wants to use what we've spent the last two years developing. Kind of makes it feel worthwhile (both the years and the anxiety of talking to people).
Of course, even though all that was great, I was still glad to get home to Mike and Apollo and friends at home who don't scare me. =)
