Researching undergraduate social science research

ABSTRACT

The experience(s) of undergraduate research students in the social sciences is under-represented in the literature in comparison to the natural sciences or science, technology, engineering and maths (STEM). The strength of STEM undergraduate research learning environments is understood to be related to an apprenticeship-mode of learning supported by more experienced (post-graduate) peers, often through ongoing research projects. Studies of undergraduate research reveal that this is not typical in the social sciences, and students report facing specific challenges to the development of their identities as researchers that include fear, intellectual confusion and emotional unsettlement. This paper examines how a social science learning environment, designed as a research study itself, fostered beginning researchers communities of practice, realised a distinct mode of apprenticing based on peers’ similarly peripheral community membership, and enabled students to reframe emotional unsettlement. It argues that, effectively mediated, talk can powerfully improve undergraduate social science research students’ experiences.

KEYWORDS:

• Undergraduate research
• social science
• researcher-identities
• communities of practice
• student involvement
• emotion

Acknowledgements

The author would like to thank the participating students, particularly for being prepared to share openly and honestly their personal experiences as researchers, and Professor Matthew Clarke for his helpful comments and suggestions on the draft paper. Similarly, the author is grateful to the journal referees for constructive and developmental feedback.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author.