Running a research marathon

Abstract

In the current article, I describe a case of experiential learning that can be used to enhance learning, students’ research skills and motivation in academic institutions. We used the already existing process of hackathons – intense computer programming events – and conducted a social science research marathon. Fifty-two graduate students participated in the event working in seven research teams for 12 straight hours. The teams designed and ran empirical experiments ‘from scratch’ under a specific challenge (the Israeli elections) and then collected data, analysed it and shared their results. Our main goals were: (a) to enhance participants’ research skills and (b) to strengthen their intrinsic motivation through hands-on experiential learning, and finally, (c) to conduct high-quality empirical research that could be the basis of peer-reviewed scholarly articles if further developed. According to a post-event survey, all three goals were fulfilled successfully.

Keywords:

• Experiential learning
• students’ motivation
• innovation in social sciences
• research skills
• hackathons
• Studython

Acknowledgements

The author would like to thank: Prof. Eran Halperin Dean of the Ivcher School of Psychology at IDC, Herzliya; Prof. Mario Mikulincer, IDC’s provost; and Mrs. Eliana Avitzour for their support and assistance with this project.

Notes

1. We did not use Amazon Mturk, the world’s largest platform of online workers, since we needed Israeli participants. Instead, we used the ‘Midgam Project Panel’ (http://www.midgampanel.com/index.asp), which is managed by Dr. Ariel Ayalon. This platform was picked since it was used in the months prior to the elections to conduct election polls by one of Israel’s leading experts in the field, Prof. Camil Fuchs (http://www.math.tau.ac.il/~fuchs/