Advanced biology students' individual conceptions of scientific researchers after participating in biomedically relevant CRE.

Abstract

While undergraduate research has been shown to be a high-impact educational practice, it is logistically impossible for all undergraduate biology majors to have long-term faculty-mentored research experience. Therefore, biology educators and researchers must devise opportunities to engage more students in undergraduate research outside of working directly in their labs. Course-Based Research Experiences (CREs), structured as authentic research experiences, are one such opportunity. In this work, we describe the effects of a CRE with biomedical relevance on students' research skills, attitudes toward science, and perceptions of scientific research and scientific researchers. Results demonstrate that students gained experience in independent research skills including designing their own research project, being accountable for part of a project, and writing a research proposal. Students' perceptions of scientific research and researchers, assessed by the Draw-A-Researcher Task, did not show changes among the whole group, but individual analysis yielded meaningful results related to students' personal changes in how they perceived research and researchers, including their perception of themselves as researchers. This work demonstrates the substantial impact of CREs on upper-level biology undergraduate and graduate students.