Factors affecting the number and type of student research products for chemistry and physics students at primarily undergraduate institutions: A case study.

Birgit Mellis,Graciela Lacueva,Rasitha Jayasekare,Anne M Wilson,Chrystal D Bruce,Patricia Soto

doi:10.1371/journal.pone.0196338

Abstract

For undergraduate students, involvement in authentic research represents scholarship that is consistent with disciplinary quality standards and provides an integrative learning experience. In conjunction with performing research, the communication of the results via presentations or publications is a measure of the level of scientific engagement. The empirical study presented here uses generalized linear mixed models with hierarchical bootstrapping to examine the factors that impact the means of dissemination of undergraduate research results. Focusing on the research experiences in physics and chemistry of undergraduates at four Primarily Undergraduate Institutions (PUIs) from 2004–2013, statistical analysis indicates that the gender of the student does not impact the number and type of research products. However, in chemistry, the rank of the faculty advisor and the venue of the presentation do impact the number of research products by undergraduate student, whereas in physics, gender match between student and advisor has an effect on the number of undergraduate research products. This study provides a baseline for future studies of discipline-based bibliometrics and factors that affect the number of research products of undergraduate students.

Highlights

The importance of high impact educational practices to strengthen students’ undergraduate experiences has been validated by longitudinal studies, and practices like mentored research are an integral part of the future of undergraduate education [1]
Because faculty research mentors are role models, this study examines the impact of faculty rank and faculty-student gender match on research productivity of both male and female undergraduate research students
Statistical models indicate that student gender or gender match of the student and faculty member had no impact on producing each type of research product (Tables 6 and 7) by undergraduate students at the Primarily Undergraduate Institutions (PUIs) in this study

Summary

Introduction

The importance of high impact educational practices to strengthen students’ undergraduate experiences has been validated by longitudinal studies, and practices like mentored research are an integral part of the future of undergraduate education [1]. Factors affecting chemistry and physics student research products at PUI’s value of undergraduate research as a high impact educational practice, regardless of the type of institution (liberal arts college, PUI, research-intensive, etc.), has been recently and extensively examined in the literature [5,6,7,8,9,10,11,12,13,14,15]. Ranging from retention programs, career promotion programs, research apprenticeships, and research-based learning [5], undergraduate research experiences are an important component in preparing scientists in the STEM fields. According to these studies, undergraduate research deepens the undergraduate experience, is a key indicator for student success, is a measure of a quality program, and is an excellent training ground for early scientists

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Conclusion