Increasing Student Participation in Undergraduate Research Benefits Students,Faculty,and Department

Abstract

Little information is available about how departments might improve undergraduate students' access to research experience. At a midsized psychology department (550 majors, 21 full-time faculty), we identified 5 barriers in our existing program (lack of student awareness, unequal student access, poor curricular timing, lack of publicity, and uneven access/incentives for faculty) and implemented 5 changes (application procedures, advertisement, assessment and communication with majors, establishment of a departmental newsletter, and restructured faculty teaching assignments). Following implementation, the number of involved students increased from 40 (11-year average) to 87 (Year 1) and to 117 (Year 2) and number of involved faculty increased from 60% to 94%. Our findings suggest that implementing systematic and programmatic changes may help to increase undergraduate involvement in research.

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