Undergraduate Students’ Recognition and Development as Researchers

The purpose of this work is to investigate how undergraduate engineering students perceive being recognized as researchers and what they identify to influence their development as researchers. Student responses (n=21) to open-ended survey items were analyzed using qualitative content analysis. The students who participated in this study were from bioengineering and material science and engineering departments with varying amounts of research experience (one to five years) and at varying stages in their undergraduate careers (sophomore to senior). All of the students in the study self-identified as researchers. Most of the students perceived being recognized as researchers. They explained that they were recognized as researchers when they were working on an independent project, presenting their work, receiving acknowledgements from research mentors, and talking about their research to people outside their field. Students identified their fellow lab members, family members, college classes, and research experiences as influencing their development as researchers. Results from this work can inform undergraduate research experiences that foster the development of students’ researcher identities. These results can also be extended to inform the development of other programs that seek to develop student’s problem solving and communication skills in similar ways as research experiences. Introduction Recent calls to improve science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) education seek to produce graduates that are capable of adapting to rapidly advancing, multi-disciplinary challenges . In order to be able to approach these challenges, students need to be able to think critically, communicate effectively, and solve complex problems . Many of these skills can be developed in a classroom environment; however, deeper learning has been seen when students participate in learning communities like undergraduate research experiences . Authentic research experiences have the opportunity to help students develop critical skills that will be required of them in the workplace and/or future academic studies. Undergraduate research experiences (UREs) provide students with the opportunity to conduct authentic research in collaboration with graduate student and faculty mentors and make intellectual contributions to their discipline . There have been a number of studies that have investigated the benefits of research experiences for undergraduate students; however, a limited number of studies have investigated students’ integration into a research community of practice and development of an identity as a researcher (reviewed in ). This area of investigation is important because it has been shown that student perceptions of their research abilities and confidence in conducting research is an integral link between the acquisition and application of research skills . This study builds on a previous study that revealed that students see themselves as researchers because of personal character traits, interest in research, competence in completing research activities, and experience doing research . The purpose of this work is to continue investigating undergraduate bioengineering (BioE) and material science and engineering (MSE) students’ identification with research by focusing on how students perceive being recognized as researchers and what they identify to influence their development as researchers. Theoretical Frameworks Identity Identity is defined as “the ‘kind of person’ one is seeking to be and enact in the here and now”. Identity has been studied in a number of areas including, science, physics, mathematics, and engineering . However, there have been a limited number of studies that have investigated engineering students’ identification with research during UREs. Students participating in UREs join a community of practice that encourages professional and intellectual development, as such it would be expected that these students develop an identity within this community through legitimate peripheral participation. Using a social constructivist lens, Hunter et al. 16 studied students’ gains while participating in an apprenticeship style research program. Students reported gains in thinking and working like a scientist; clarification, confirmation, and refinement of goals; working independently; and confidence in doing science. Many of the faculty working with these students recognized that during the experience students were becoming scientists, noting that their participation went from peripheral participation towards a centralized role in the community ; however, students did not identify their gains as being connected with their development as a researcher. This study builds on the work of Hunter et al. and our previous study investigating how undergraduate engineering students see themselves as researchers 10 to understand what students believe helps them develop as researchers. Recognition The conceptualization of identity that guided the development of our open-ended survey questions includes four key elements: competence, performance, recognition, and interest . In our previous work, interest and competence along with character traits and experiences emerged as themes that influence undergraduate engineering students’ identification as a researcher . Previous work in other areas has shown that recognition by others plays a key role in one’s development of a science identity . Consistent recognition by established members of a community can help a newer member develop a stronger identification with that community . Additionally, family members’ perceptions and expectations about a students’ mathematics and science abilities has been shown to influence the student’s self-beliefs . To further develop our theory on undergraduate engineering students’ identification with research, in this study we sought to investigate how undergraduate engineering students’ perceive being recognized as researchers. Methods Participants and Open-Ended Survey Undergraduate BioE and MSE students with research experience were invited to complete three open-ended surveys at the end of the Spring 2014 semester. The students who participated in the study had varying amounts of research experience (one to five years) and were at different stages in their undergraduate careers (sophomore through senior). Each open-ended survey took approximately 15 minutes to complete and included questions to further understand students’ perception of research, experiences with research, and views of themselves as researchers. The range of items in the open-ended surveys was informed by the science identity framework proposed by Hazari et al. 14 and developed in collaboration with experts on engineering and science identity. These open-ended surveys were developed iteratively to ensure that the desired depth of data was collected. For example, in the first survey students were asked, “Do you feel like a researcher? ” and all of the students responded with a “yes”. In the second survey, this idea was further investigated through two questions aimed at getting more detailed responses from students, 1) “Do you see yourself as a researcher? ” with a 7-point anchored scale from “no, not at all” to “yes, very much” and 2) “Please describe three ways in which you see yourself as a researcher. ”. Students were also asked for general information including the number of years they had been enrolled, their majors, and their university usernames. The students were asked to provide their usernames so that surveys from the same students could be matched. These general information questions were included at the end of each survey. Students were entered into a drawing for a $25 gift card for completing each survey, and students who completed all three surveys were given a $15 gift card. For this particular study, we focused on student responses to the items, “Describe a scenario/experience in which you felt recognized as a researcher. ” and “Please describe the 3 most crucial influences (people, experiences, school-related subjects, etc.) on your development as a researcher in order of most to least important. ”. These items were all on the second survey administered to students, so we analyzed all of the responses we collected for survey two (n=21). Analysis Students’ responses (n=21) to the open-ended survey items were analyzed using conventional qualitative content analysis . This approach was selected because it allows for codes and categories to emerge from the data by avoiding the use of predefined codes. This method is useful when existing theories and/or literature are insufficient. In this case of this study, we sought to investigate undergraduate engineering students’ identification with research, an area in which current identity theories have not been extensively applied. While the open-ended questions in our surveys were informed by Hazari et al’s science identity framework, we did not develop and use a priori codes based on this framework because we wanted to remain open to the themes emerging from the data given the difference in context. Initially, a general understanding of the data was obtained by reading the responses multiple times prior to starting the coding process. Next, phrases in the text were identified and codes were developed to represent key concepts. The codes were then sorted into categories based on similarities to other codes. These groupings were then used to inform how students perceive to be recognized as researchers and what they identify as influencing their development as a researcher. Results All of the students surveyed in the study identified themselves as researchers. Previous work revealed that these students felt like researchers because of specific character traits, competence with research tasks, interest in research, and experience doing research . The purpose of this particular study was to further understand students’ identificat