Is research-based learning effective? Evidence from a pre–post analysis in the social sciences

ABSTRACT

Research-based learning (RBL) is regarded as a panacea when it comes to effective instructional formats in higher education settings. It is said to improve a wide set of research-related skills and is a recommended learning experience for students. However, whether RBL in the social sciences is indeed as effective as has been postulated for other disciplines has not yet been systematically examined. We thus administered a pre–post-test study to N = 952 students enrolled in 70 RBL courses at 10 German universities and examined potential changes in cognitive and affective-motivational research dispositions. Latent change score modelling indicated that students increased their cognitive research dispositions, whereas most affective-motivational research dispositions decreased. The instructors’ interest in the students’ work served as a significant predictor of changes in research interest and joy. Practical implications for designing RBL environments can be inferred from the results.

KEYWORDS:

• Research-based learning
• research knowledge
• research literacy
• affective-motivational research dispositions
• social sciences didactics

Acknowledgements

We would like to thank Christoph Geiger, Frederic Lenz and Luise Behm for their valuable help in conducting this study. We acknowledge support by the Open Access Publication Fund of Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Notes

1 What we call RBL has different names elsewhere, e.g. ‘undergraduate research experiences’ (URE), ‘summer undergraduate research experiences’ (SURE) or ‘course-based undergraduate research experiences’ (CURE). Most of these terms describe the context (‘during the summer’) or the type of students (‘undergraduates’) rather than the instructional set-up per se. We chose the term ‘RBL’ to denote a specific instructional approach independent of the exact duration or the participating students. We do, however, use evidence from studies examining ‘CURE’ or ‘URE’. We carefully checked that the students’ research experiences aligned with our notion of RBL.

Additional information

Funding

This research was supported by the German Federal Ministry of Education and Research [grant number 01PB14004B].