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Establishing the Flow of Collaborative Research
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by: Jerusha Detweiler-Bedell, PhD, Brian Detweiler-Bedell, PhD,
Nicolia Eldred-Skemp,
Lewis & Clark College
Categories: Promotion of Research
Engaging in faculty-student research is a
uniquely rewarding experience for undergraduates.
Many publications, including
Eye on Psi Chi, have highlighted the advantages of getting
involved in research outside of the classroom, from developing
one-on-one relationships with research mentors to
preparing for graduate school (Grover, 2006; Landrum,
2002; LaRoche, 2004; Silvia, Delaney, & Marcovitch,
2009). An immersive research experience contributes
substantially to a student’s personal and academic development,
and it helps build highly practical, marketable skills
(Hunter, Laursen, & Seymour, 2007; Landrum & Nelsen,
2002). Nevertheless, too many undergraduates miss out
on research opportunities because psychology faculty are
spread thin and can only work with a limited number of
students at a time, so research opportunities come along
sporadically and typically are arranged informally. This
contributes to undergraduate research being organized,
let’s be honest, a bit haphazardly. Here we have a reality in
need of some invention. How do we go about creating the
optimal research experience for as many undergraduates
as possible? As psychologists, we all should jump to meet
this challenge!
Let’s first underscore the status quo, which contributes
to this challenge. When asked to envision the implementation
of undergraduate research in psychology, most college
faculty will respond in one of two ways. Some faculty will
describe a bustling research lab, where the undergraduate
students brush shoulders with post-docs, are mentored
by graduate students, and occasionally interact with the
professor, usually in the context of a larger research lab
meeting. These undergraduates code and enter data and (of
course!) run participants through experimental procedures.
On the other hand, some faculty will describe one-on-one
mentoring of advanced undergraduate students. These
students oft en complete a senior or honors thesis, and
they are likely to contribute substantively to a professor’s
line of research. The experience is immersive and requires
the student to take on many pieces of the empirical puzzle
and, ideally, see a study through from its conception to its
conclusion. Collaboration with the professor, in this case,
will vary in intensity depending on how many students the
faculty member is mentoring. The fewer the students, the
more time the professor can devote to any one mentoring
relationship.
Upon joining the psychology faculty at Lewis & Clark
College over eight years ago, we (the first two authors of
this article) were wary of adopting this “either-or†structure
of undergraduate research. We knew it would be impossible
to duplicate the environment of a research university
at a liberal arts college, and we had no desire to treat
undergraduates primarily as low-level assistants. Instead,
we were attracted to the idea of mentoring undergraduate
researchers more intensely and involving them in the entire
research process more collaboratively. But there are significant downsides to one-on-one mentoring relationships.
Student demand for research opportunities far outweighs
the supply (just ask Nicolia, our student coauthor), and
one-on-one mentoring exacerbates this problem. Moreover,
most research in psychology spans multiple studies, and
by extension, multiple years. Developing a collaborative
relationship with an undergraduate late in his or her college
career doesn’t allow the student to follow a project to
its natural conclusion. And we didn’t want to abandon the
contagious excitement that comes from a bustling research
lab. To replicate that atmosphere, we knew we had to mentor
a relatively large number of students at the same time.
Our solution to these concerns was to leverage the
benefi ts of collaboration as much and as systematically as
possible. Combining the strengths and effi ciencies of a
model more typical of research universities (i.e., involving
a large number of students who have varying degrees of
expertise) with the strengths of a model more typical of
liberal arts institutions (i.e., creating an immersive experience
for each student with frequent interactions with
the professor), we developed a system of mentoring that
organizes undergraduates into hierarchical, three-person
teams, with each student bringing a different level of
expertise to the research lab. A student new to psychology
(our “team assistantâ€) is grouped with a student who has begun to advance in the psychology major
(our “team associateâ€), and both of these
individuals are guided by a student who is
in his or her senior year and who has been
part of our research lab for some time (our
“team leaderâ€). Each three-person team
works together on a particular research
project, and a single professor can mentor
two to three teams throughout the academic
year because of the effi ciencies of the teambased
structure. Our jointly run lab, called
the Behavioral Health and Social (BHS)
Psychology Lab, typically has fi ve teams or
15 students.
Each three-person team functions much
like a first-year graduate student, but with
the added resources of three students’ multifaceted
talents and 30+ total hours per week
of commitment to a project. (We require
8-10 hours of work per week from our
assistants and associates and 12-14 hours
per week from our team leaders; see
Table 1.) Th e hierarchical nature of the
model explicitly shapes students’ development
as they progress in their roles over
time. In the words of one of our graduates,
“The system of assistant, associate, and
leader worked well; it meant that I was able
to start doing research as a freshman even
though I really didn’t have any skills at that
time. I was able to learn from older teammates
and gained the skills that made me
feel competent and confi dent when I became
a team leader myself.â€
We call this approach a laddered teambased
model because we expect most
students to stay with the lab, advancing from
assistant to associate to team leader. Th is
continuity enables projects to move forward
over an extended period of time, and it
allows for an in-depth mentoring experience.
As faculty advisors to these teams, our
goals include promoting each student’s sense
of ownership of the ideas and methods that
drive the research, moving the lab’s activities
forward by setting clear expectations, and
then helping students bring these projects
to fruition through conference presentations
and publications. We provide ongoing
oversight and timely feedback to the teams
primarily through weekly team leader
supervision. Moreover, we foster a larger
sense of community by holding weekly lab
meetings, during which the teams present
the current state of their work (typically via a
formal PowerPoint presentation) and rely on
the resources of the larger lab group to refi ne
and develop study ideas, think through data analyses, and propose directions for future
research. Th e result is a model of mentoring
that optimizes the undergraduate research
experience for our students and that
enables us to produce high-quality research
effi ciently by making the most of the varied
strengths and levels of expertise of a large
number of students.
How we interact with our laddered
teams and individual students has evolved
significantly over the past eight years, and
the work of psychologist and researcher
Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi (2008) has
guided us in this process of refi nement.
Csikszentmihalyi’s well-known studies of
optimal experiences suggest that productive
and rewarding states of “flow†are experienced
when a person is fully immersed in an
activity, engaging in goal-directed challenges
that make the most of his or her abilities
and eff orts. Csikszentmihalyi developed
a coherent model of optimal experiences
after studying individuals who experience
flow on a regular basis, such as surgeons,
artists, and even rock-climbers. So can
undergraduate researchers experience fl ow
through their research collaborations? We
believe so, if careful attention is paid to five
key principles:
1) Ownership: Students need to feel they
share joint ownership of the research they
are doing, even if the research is initiated
and sustained by the faculty member. A
sense of ownership comes in large part
through the development of confi dence
in the student. As students begin to feel
comfortable asking challenging questions,
taking independent steps, and developing
a vision for the future of the research, they
will begin to “own†the experience. From the
perspective of the research mentor, promoting
a sense of ownership requires Socratic
teaching methods that enable students to
participate in the generation of research
ideas, as well as an extension of these teaching
methods to the hands-on development,
refi nement, and scrutiny of research
materials and fi ndings.
2) Energy and imagination: In the spirit of
full disclosure, we have to admit there are
some tasks associated with psychological
research that are mundane, yet necessary,
such as entering data and sending
compensation to participants. But even the
most banal of tasks can be more manageable
with a little creativity. (For example,
one lab member shared that she made the
tedious process of addressing envelopes for
participant compensation more appealing
by sorting each envelope into a pile based on
characteristics such as the address’s distance
from campus, desirability to visit, or uniqueness.)
If students and their research advisors
can tackle even mundane tasks with inventiveness
and vigor, then the more interesting
aspects of the research process will become
all the more engaging.
3) Clearly defined, prioritized goals: First and
foremost, goals should be developed jointly,
shared with all members of the research
team, and prioritized. Th e best formula
for success comes from determining how
to get from one place to the next and then
abiding by the mutually agreed upon steps
to moving forward. Too much choice can be
problematic, so natural constraints should
be put into place and respected. Think, for
example, of the rock-climber. Random,
spontaneous hand-holds can be treacherous.
A flow experience comes from making systematic,
informed choices every step of the
way. Th is is where the research mentor steps
in soft ly but fi rmly, laying out the possible
paths of moving a project forward.
4) Challenges that are just about manageable:
Student researchers must learn to
engage their abilities fully and to develop
and enhance new skills by setting challenges
that require a bit of stretching. Sticking only
to what one is good at is unlikely to lead
to a fl ow experience. Ask shy students to
lead research presentations. Have your best
students teach statistics to new lab members.
Challenge each and every lab member to
become a “mind reader†capable of anticipating
your own remarks and suggestions.
Encouraging students to take on the next
level of challenge and giving them the tools
to conquer each challenge is the best way to
promote their growth.
5) Immediate feedback: A researcher
shouldn’t rely on the acceptance or rejection
of a manuscript as the primary means
of receiving feedback about one’s work.
Immediate feedback is necessary to feel
rewarded, to learn, and to make successes
more likely. As mentors, faculty should
plan to stay on top of their undergraduates’
efforts, providing corrective feedback and
being prepared for setbacks. When setbacks
occur (they are indeed unavoidable), our
motto is “catch, consolidate, and continue.â€
That is, we provide the support necessary
to make the best of even the toughest situations,
and help the students learn from their
experiences and tackle the next challenge
with gusto.
Together, these five principles should
contribute to a flow experience, perhaps not
every day or even every week, but enough of
the time to “hook†students on research. But
don’t just take our word for it. We recently
conducted a survey of our BHS Lab alumni,
and in their open-ended responses we were
able to hear echoes of the principles of fl ow.
For example, one graduate wrote: “I think
that the lab was more work than I expected,
but that is because I was given more responsibility
than I thought I would be given,
which is a good thing! You feel a sense of
personal ownership because the success of
the research and all of the planning etc. falls
on you.†Another alum wrote, “I think that
the lab always provided just a little more of
a challenge than I was expecting because
right when I would feel comfortable with
my responsibility level I would get more
responsibilities.†In terms of faculty mentoring
of the research, a former lab member
notes, “They pushed us to take our projects
further than we thought possible by connecting
us with new skills and resources and
directing us to helpful, more experienced
peers. I appreciated the way lab members
were treated as collaborators with something
to offer, but also supported and never left ‘on
their own’ when it came to difficulties.â€
This organizational model appeals to
students because it provides immersive
research training without being intimidating.
However, an equally important issue
concerns the model’s appeal to faculty.
The fundamental tension between undergraduate
research and faculty research is
confronted head on, and research mentors
must be persuaded that the process of working
with undergraduates will advance their
own research. At liberal arts colleges and
other institutions where undergraduates
are involved in research, professors face a
daunting task. Transforming undergraduates
into productive assistants and collaborators
takes a significant investment of time,
and students oft en graduate just as they
are becoming most productive. These
realities often seem at odds with the faculty
members’ goals of furthering their own
research. As a result, the most common way
of involving undergraduates in research
is a matter of expediency—faculty train
and deploy a crew of research assistants
to conduct a series of studies as the need arises. But, the expedient yet informal model
of involving undergraduates in research
is rarely efficient. Systematically laddered,
team-based research looks quite diff erent.
Once the appropriate groundwork is set (see
Table 2), recruitment of student researchers
can take place (see Table 3), and the professor
can focus on developing a collaborative
research environment that is self-sustaining.
Importantly, the burden of training new
students rests not on the shoulders of the
faculty member alone, but on the research
team as a whole. As a result, faculty can
allot more of their own time and energy to
advancing the key research questions.
So do laddered teams work? From a
faculty perspective, the productivity of our
teams has been impressive. In the past five
years, our undergraduate collaborators
(41 in total) have made 17 presentations
at national and regional conferences, and
they have funded most of their conference
travel through competitive grants from our
college’s student activities board. Eight of
our team leaders have gone on to doctoral
programs in psychology, and an even greater
number have gone on to research-related
graduate programs and careers. To get a
clearer picture of the student perspective, we
recently completed a systematic survey of
BHS Lab alumni. Th irty-fi ve of 38 graduates
completed the survey, which asked them to
refl ect on their experiences in the lab and
to rate their development of a number of
specific skills and abilities (adapted from
Landrum, 2008; Landrum & Nelsen, 2002).
Th ese students rated the quality of their
undergraduate research experience and the
educational value of team-based research
very near the ceiling of a 9-point scale
(Ms = 8.1 and 8.4, respectively). Nearly half
of them (49%) plan to conduct or are currently
conducting research in psychology or
a related field, and 97% believe that the skills
they learned in the BHS Lab will be or have
been useful in their professional pursuits.
The most important skills imparted by an
undergraduate research program in psychology,
according to our alumni, include the
ability to ask effective research questions,
develop clear research ideas, and analyze
and interpret data. Th e goals they feel were
most fully achieved include developing a
one-to-one relationship with a professor,
practicing oral presentations, and gaining
enthusiasm for the research process. Overall,
students characterized their experiences as
members of our research lab to be perfectly
balanced between faculty-guided and
student-guided (M = 3.51 on a 7-point scale)
and to be highly collaborative (rather than
competitive). As a whole, then, the responses
of BHS Lab alumni supported our hope
that a laddered, team-based model creates a
community of colleagues who are engaged
in an immersive research experience. As one
student described the experience, “I feel that
I learned about research in the most ideal
setting. It was supportive, collaborative, and
intellectually challenging. I did not expect to
spend such a huge amount of time dedicated
to the lab, but I gladly did and would have
done more. It was the defining undergraduate
experience for me.â€
We strongly believe this experience can
be replicated in any number of academic
settings; it is not unique to our lab or our
mentoring style. Instead, it comes from
getting into the flow of research by trusting
that undergraduates are capable of learning
through and with one another while
furthering a faculty member’s research
agenda. Tenure-track and visiting faculty,
post-docs, and graduate students can engage
in collaborative research with undergraduates
across a wide array of institutions (e.g.,
community colleges, masters-level universities),
with the goal of moving their own
research forward while enhancing their
undergraduates’ exposure to the research
process. A well-structured undergraduate
research experience, such as the one we have
described, maximizes the skills and contributions
of undergraduates as they take on
tasks such as generating hypotheses, recruiting
participants, designing and piloting
studies, conducting experiments, and presenting
research fi ndings. Indeed, engaging
undergraduates in the science of psychology
and involving them in the dissemination
of research fi ndings are key elements of
the experience that generalize outside the
research lab and well beyond college. Th e
total eff ect of this immersive experience is a
vibrant atmosphere of collaboration between
undergraduates and the research mentor
and an effi cient mechanism for producing
high-quality research. It’s a system that
enables students to make the most of their
undergraduate education.
Jerusha Detweiler-Bedell is associate professor of psychology at Lewis & Clark College in Portland, Oregon. She received her BA in psychology from Stanford University (CA) and her PhD in clinical psychology from Yale University (CT). Her program of research brings together investigations of human decision-making, health psychology, and clinical psychology, with the goal of promoting health behaviors by understanding better why people fail to do ÔwhatÕs bestÕ for their physical and mental well-being. She codirects the Behavioral Health and Social Psychology laboratory, where she conducts research with numerous undergraduate student collaborators. She is the author of a number of journal articles and one book: Treatment Planning in Psychotherapy: Taking the Guesswork Out of Clinical Care. In 2008, Dr. Detweiler-Bedell was named the United States Professor of the Year for Baccalaureate Colleges by the Council for Advancement and Support of Education (CASE) and the Carnegie Foundation for the Advancement of Teaching.
Brian Detweiler-Bedell is associate professor of psychology at Lewis & Clark College in Portland, Oregon. He received his BA in psychology from Stanford University and his PhD in social psychology from Yale University. His principal area of research examines the influence of emotion on social judgment and decision-making. Together with his wife, Dr. Detweiler-Bedell, he directs the Behavioral Health and Social Psychology laboratory, which provides an immersive research experience to over a dozen undergraduate student collaborators each year. Dr. Detweiler-Bedell has authored a number of journal articles on emotion and decision-making, and he is the incoming director of Lewis & Clark CollegeÕs Howard Hughes Medical Institute undergraduate science education grant, Collaborative Approaches to Undergraduate Science Education (CAUSE). He and his wife are currently writing a book for undergraduate research collaborators called, Doing Collaborative Research: A Team-Based Guide, which will be published by SAGE Publications in 2012.
Nicolia Eldred-Skemp graduated from Lewis & Clark College with a BA in psychology in 2008. She joined the Detweiler-BedellsÕ Behavioral Health & Social Psychology Lab as a sophomore with nothing more than a strong enthusiasm for the idea of research, and she collaborated on research studies investigating persuasive health messages throughout her time as an undergraduate. Since graduation, she has assisted Drs. Detweiler-Bedells with writing projects associated with the dissemination of their team-based research model, supported by the Detweiler-BedellsÕ grant from the National Science Foundation, Using Laddered Teams to Promote a Research Supportive Curriculum. She plans to pursue a graduate degree in public health and currently works as a research assistant at the Child and Adolescent Health Measurement Initiative (CAHMI), housed at Oregon Health & Science University.
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