Enhancing research on the undergraduate psychology curriculum through student-teacher partnership. Reflections from an undergraduate student co-researcher and academic lecturer co-researcher

Abstract

This article draws on the perspectives of an undergraduate student co-researcher and a psychology lecturer who worked in partnership on a small qualitative research project. The project explored the experiences of undergraduate students on a second-year psychology research methods module at a university in the United Kingdom. Reflecting on our experience of working in partnership on this research we explore the meaning of student-teacher partnership, drawing on theory and literature around student-teacher partnerships in learning and teaching to contextualise our reflections. We reflect on the ethical and practical implications of staff-student partnership in the process and product of the research and explain how the student-teacher partnership enhanced the study design, interpretation of research findings and dissemination of the research. We explore what we perceived the benefits and challenges of the student-teacher dyad to be through reflective accounts of our own experiences during the project. We will explain how working in collaboration helped generate a more rounded perspective of student experience and provided concrete, meaningful practical implications for the curriculum and a reflective aid for future student co-researchers within the school of Psychology. The article will conclude with consideration of the broader implications of our experiences and how what we learned through this process can be applied in other contexts where educators are considering how to involve students in research which is for and about their learning.