What exacly is meant by research experience?

Moving to pre-allo

This is a premed topic, but what the hey, brings back memories.

maldini99 said:

When med school adcoms say they would like applicants to have research experience, to what extent do they expect you to have some?

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They don't expect anything. They'll read your application and try to get a coherent picture of you as a person.

Research is nice because it shows intellectual curiosity and initiative. They are acutely aware, however, that some people are more interested in padding their applications than in doing science. They'll be looking to see which category you fall into.

Further, doing research as an elective doesn't have the same quality as doing it independently (less initiative involved). In the same vein, one long stint working on a specific problem is much better than several short stints doing grunt work and never really delving into a topic deeply (if you're genuinely curious, you'll stick around on a project).

Is this sufficient for me to brag to adcoms about having research experience that would aid me in getting accepted?!

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First off, I recommend that you strike "brag" from your vocabulary.

If you get a chance to really answer some problems, then yes. If you get a chance to develop your own questions and/or figure out some of your own solutions, even better. If you're just learning to pipette and cleaning glassware, I might not even put it down on my app, especially if it's an elective course you're receiving credit for.

Like anything on your app, interviewers will want you to speak enthusiastically and deeply about any experiences you choose to bring to their attention. If you don't know what the research is about (hypotheses, rationale behind the methods, potential applications), or you're not participating directly in experiments, it'll flop during the interview.

Alot of what I've seen as "research" are simply Mickey Mouse projects. There's often no real research, just some work in a lab. I guess it can be considered experience, but very few applicants probably impress admission committees, you know?

I'd rank research experience in this way:


11. Housekeeping and supply ordering.

10. Helping others with projects, serving as a research assistant or technician.

9. Animal surgery.

8. Pilot work prior to writing a proposal for a testable hypothesis.

7. Responsibility for testing a hypothesis.

6. Funding of your project (not your PI's funding)

5. Poster presentation at a student event

4. Podium presentation at a student event

3. Poster presentation at a regional or national meeting in your specialty (published abstract)

2. Podium presentation at a regional or national meeting in your specialty (published abstract)

1. Authorship in a peer reviewed, national publication.

maldini99 said:

When med school adcoms say they would like applicants to have research experience, to what extent do they expect you to have some?

for instance, I will be doing a research elective in a Pharmacokinetics department as an elective next semester. I have not done any research before, and what they would expect me to do is to learn some lab techniques and possibly contribute to solving some problems. So it will last for a semester. After that I can do the same thing in a different department, like Medicinal chemistry or pharmacology.

Is this sufficient for me to brag to adcoms about having research experience that would aid me in getting accepted?!

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Not at my school. But CCLCM has significant research experience as a requirement. What is significant, you ask? Most students who apply here have done things like writing a senior honors thesis in college, taking a year or more off after college to do research full time, or even going to grad school for an MS or PhD. Most if not all of us have presented posters or talks at conferences, and a lot of us have published papers. Personally, I think if you have some kind of role in helping to design the project, then it's a significant research experience. In other words, it should be "your" project, even if you're just doing a tiny part of some larger project going on in the lab. Also, you should work in the same lab for at least a year if you're only doing it part time. One semester is barely enough for you to learn where the lab is located and maybe pick up a few skills. Research isn't easy. You aren't going to just waltz into the lab for a semester and come out with a major research experience. The learning curve at the beginning is huge, so what you are going to do will barely scratch the surface. But at least it will give you some idea of whether you like doing research, and if you do, you can work on a real project later.

LizzyM said:

I'd rank research experience in this way:


11. Housekeeping and supply ordering.

10. Helping others with projects, serving as a research assistant or technician.

9. Animal surgery.

8. Pilot work prior to writing a proposal for a testable hypothesis.

7. Responsibility for testing a hypothesis.

6. Funding of your project (not your PI's funding)

5. Poster presentation at a student event

4. Podium presentation at a student event

3. Poster presentation at a regional or national meeting in your specialty (published abstract)

2. Podium presentation at a regional or national meeting in your specialty (published abstract)

1. Authorship in a peer reviewed, national publication.

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Oh. my. God.
I'm sorry for bumping, but that post killed me. My PI wants me as only an assistant and would not give me a project.

I guess I would fall under #10. I recruit subjects for a study, consent them, draw their blood, process it and other biospecimens in the lab. I am helping create a registry/database for a med school's translational medicine project. The work I do will help doctors and PIs prepare for future clinical trials. One of these 11 is better than none of these, correct?

LizzyM said:

I'd rank research experience in this way:


11. Housekeeping and supply ordering.

10. Helping others with projects, serving as a research assistant or technician.

9. Animal surgery.

8. Pilot work prior to writing a proposal for a testable hypothesis.

7. Responsibility for testing a hypothesis.

6. Funding of your project (not your PI's funding)

5. Poster presentation at a student event

4. Podium presentation at a student event

3. Poster presentation at a regional or national meeting in your specialty (published abstract)

2. Podium presentation at a regional or national meeting in your specialty (published abstract)

1. Authorship in a peer reviewed, national publication.

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We are doomed. It's all over.

EphemeralRose3 said:

Oh. my. God.
I'm sorry for bumping, but that post killed me. My PI wants me as only an assistant and would not give me a project.

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postbacpremed87 said:

We are doomed. It's all over.

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YUP! I actually was happy that I get to be a research assistant, and I was like "OMG I'm hitting to birds with one stone - i love volunteering here and it's great thing to have on your app." Then I saw that ranking system and I'm like ... "I'm only a 10! There are 9 higher levels?!"

postbacpremed87 said:

I guess I would fall under #10. I recruit subjects for a study, consent them, draw their blood, process it and other biospecimens in the lab. I am helping create a registry/database for a med school's translational medicine project. The work I do will help doctors and PIs prepare for future clinical trials. One of these 11 is better than none of these, correct?

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Well, a 10 is definitely better than an 11.

You really have to be specific when you find PIs... It's better to be clear at the first meeting and ask for your own independent project than to kind of wait around until you're too invested to just quit.

ponyo said:

You really have to be specific when you find PIs... It's better to be clear at the first meeting and ask for your own independent project than to kind of wait around until you're too invested to just quit.

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The first day I met him, I said I wanted my own project. He told me, "Oh, we will see about that. You have to first establish the basics, i.e. how to run a Southern blot, do a PCR, extract DNA from mice, etc." So, I said, "Oh okay. That's fine." I think I've established the basics- I've been going every weekday for the past two months. Still no answer. I'm gonna look for another research position along side this.

I think the followup question to that list would then be, how common are the higher-ranked numbers? It seems like you'd have most people around #11 or #10, with a few who crack that top 5..?

Soulstice said:

I think the followup question to that list would then be, how common are the higher-ranked numbers? It seems like you'd have most people around #11 or #10, with a few who crack that top 5..?

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I think the people who crack the top 5 are PhDs who are able to conduct their own research without much supervision and decide to go to medical school later on. Either that or MD/PhD candidates, which I'm not.

EphemeralRose3 said:

I think the people who crack the top 5 are PhDs who are able to conduct their own research without much supervision and decide to go to medical school later on. Either that or MD/PhD candidates, which I'm not.

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Actually not true... I know quite a few undergrads who have done top 5. But then again they all went to ridiculous, research-intensive med schools to which I'm probably not even going to bother apply

ponyo said:

Actually not true... I know quite a few undergrads who have done top 5. But then again they all went to ridiculous, research-intensive med schools to which I'm probably not even going to bother apply

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Ok, then I'm screwed.

+1. I'd like to know too...also if #10 is good enough to be considered research.

cge0 said:

Here's a good follow up question, LizzyM. What is the ballpark percentile break down for each category?

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LizzyM said:

I'd rank research experience in this way:


11. Housekeeping and supply ordering.

10. Helping others with projects, serving as a research assistant or technician.

9. Animal surgery.

8. Pilot work prior to writing a proposal for a testable hypothesis.

7. Responsibility for testing a hypothesis.

6. Funding of your project (not your PI's funding)

5. Poster presentation at a student event

4. Podium presentation at a student event

3. Poster presentation at a regional or national meeting in your specialty (published abstract)

2. Podium presentation at a regional or national meeting in your specialty (published abstract)

1. Authorship in a peer reviewed, national publication.

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Insightful.

I think animal surgery would be pretty cool to perform -- more fun than the majority of those at least.

LizzyM said:

Having a publication accepted for publication or published is a +4 at one top tier school. Having been funded for a project is a +3, having done a summer program or a couple of semesters is a +2, and having been a research assistant is a +1. (You get categorized into one of these groups or 0 for "no research").

Impact factor is not taken into account. Position in the list of authors (particularly second rather than first) is not taken into account.

A case report (asked earlier) might not be counted because it is not related to a research endeavor. Basically, a research publication is used as a measure that the research came to its intended end which is to advance the field through the development or contribution of new knowledge. However, a case report does contrbute to new clinical knowledge so maybe some would give you brownie points for a case report. It couldn't hurt.

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LizzyM said:

Adcoms for medical school may be interested in whether or not an applicant has had some research experience as they believe that it is a predictor of participation in research in medical school/residency/career (in academic medicine). Basically, we ask, "Have they had a taste & do they like it?"

Any publication puts the applicant in the top 10% of the applicants I see with regard to research experience. We really don't need to distringuish among the applicants within that top 10%; it isn't worth the effort for what we are trying to assess.

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LizzyM said:

If you have some responsibility for the scinece, keeping a lab notebook, troubleshooting, consulting with the principal investigator, etc, then you'd be at 2 points. I don't recall if having a research grant that provides you with a stipend is a 2 or a 3, having done a poster or a presentation anywhere is a 3 and a publication in a peer-reviewed journal is a 4. This is a quick & dirty way to classify appliants according to the level of involvement they've had in research. An adcom might do the same in classifying leadership, clinical exposure, community service, etc depending on what they value in an applicant.

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I found these posts to be informative about research experience. LizzyM's school may have changed their policy, but this is another classification system that she has posted. They are all from the same thread, so if you click on the link, you can read the whole conversation which has more information

So when you look in the MSAR and see the stat where 91% of the matriculants have research experiences, then it could run the gambit from folks with 4 points to folks with 1 point?

sector9 said:

I found these posts to be informative about research experience. LizzyM's school may have changed their policy, but this is another classification system that she has posted. They are all from the same thread, so if you click on the link, you can read the whole conversation which has more information

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postbacpremed87 said:

So when you look in the MSAR and see the stat where 91% of the matriculants have research experiences, then it could run the gambit from folks with 4 points to folks with 1 point?

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Correct. Some schools post the number of publications from their incoming class in a class profile on their website, which can give an indication of the quality of research

But we can both agree that having that one seemingly measily point will work to your advantage over an applicant with 0 points. Other things held constant (sorry I was an undergrad Econ major - I love using this), if both applicants had the same stats except that Candidate A had a +1 and Candidate B had 0, how much more is admission likely (in terms of percentage) for Candidate A?

sector9 said:

Correct. Some schools post the number of publications from their incoming class in a class profile on their website, which can give an indication of the quality of research

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postbacpremed87 said:

But we can both agree that having that one seemingly measily point will work to your advantage over an applicant with 0 points. Other things held constant (sorry I was an undergrad Econ major - I love using this), if both applicants had the same stats except that Candidate A had a +1 and Candidate B had 0, how much more is admission likely (in terms of percentage) for Candidate A?

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I agree that 1 point is better than 0! I don't know how much it would bump you up in the admissions percentage, maybe LizzyM or another admissions committee member can give an opinion. I have a feeling that there isn't a clean cut answer though

The points aren't summed! We could use words as labels and classify research experience as:
None, OK, Pretty good, Impressive and Exceptional.

You want to have as few in the None column as possible and at least a few "exceptionals" in the assessment of your application (clinical exposure, altruism, academic rigor, etc.

We are trying to distinguish the exceptional from the average and the substandard.

LizzyM said:

The points aren't summed! We could use words as labels and classify research experience as:
None, OK, Pretty good, Impressive and Exceptional.

You want to have as few in the None column as possible and at least a few "exceptionals" in the assessment of your application (clinical exposure, altruism, academic rigor, etc.

We are trying to distinguish the exceptional from the average and the substandard.

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Just to be clear-- You're saying that the points in the research, clinical exposure, altruism, etc are NOT summed to give an overall score? You give scores in the various sections, then look at the overall application from that viewpoint?

Damn.. Is that how ADCOMs look at it?

I put down my position as Research Assistant coz that is my title at the lab but I have done independent work and have publications in a peer reviewed national publication. Hopefully, I made it clear in my description that I did independent work...

cge0 said:

Does it really matter? I really doubt anyone is so blind that they treat all experiences as transmutable and able to supplement for one another. Each experience is unique. You're over analyzing the situation. "Did this person volunteer, oh but he did this research, therefore equivocal" is a sort of a pointless exercise, do you not think so?

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Sorry for asking a follow-up question. Sheesh

cge0 said:

Giving you life advice, brah.

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All I asked was if they add up the scores for the individual sections to give an applicant a total score for his or her EC's. It sounds like they don't. I wasn't arguing with LizzyM or anything. It's not like I said "Wow I can't believe your school doesn't total the points, that's ridiculous." You totally didn't understand what I wrote. I was just trying to get a better feel for the admissions process at her school. And you decided to jump in and give me some "life advice" BS?

cge0 said:

Yes.

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Thanks "brah"

The buzz word these days in admissions is "holistic evaluation". Is the applicant exceptional in some way? more than one way? Are their deficiencies? On the whole is the applicant "very strong", "strong", "admissable", "maybe ok but I'd be worried", or "no way in hell". In many ways it is a qualitative assessment and not a quantitative assessment with numbers and sums.

Frazier said:

Insightful.

I think animal surgery would be pretty cool to perform -- more fun than the majority of those at least.

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Animal surgery on rodents and all looks really cool, but they are a pain to work with. Animal research generally takes a relatively long time to get reproducible results cuz those bastards have to grow larger, the colony size needs to increase before you start picking them out, or you have to wait long periods of time between treatments and isolating tissues or whatever you plan on doing with them.

A wiser bet is working with cells or better yet, just stick with something in the chemistry department. You will publish more papers and have to know far less. You will likely never publish any papers in biology, but you can have first author papers in chemistry. Biology papers can also be dozens of graphs/figures and many pages long, while chemistry papers are like 3 pages long. If you really want to get published before medical school, stick with something in chemistry.

Medicine4Bruhs said:

Animal surgery on rodents and all looks really cool, but they are a pain to work with. Animal research generally takes a relatively long time to get reproducible results cuz those bastards have to grow larger, the colony size needs to increase before you start picking them out, or you have to wait long periods of time between treatments and isolating tissues or whatever you plan on doing with them.

A wiser bet is working with cells or better yet, just stick with something in the chemistry department. You will publish more papers and have to know far less. You will likely never publish any papers in biology, but you can have first author papers in chemistry. Biology papers can also be dozens of graphs/figures and many pages long, while chemistry papers are like 3 pages long. If you really want to get published before medical school, stick with something in chemistry.

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Yea, I have a biology and a chemistry pub - I agree, chem papers have the potential to be rather short... But I'm just saying performing animal surgery sounds like it would have been "action packed" in comparison to what I did.

That helps a lot. Thanks!

Frazier said:

Yea, I have a biology and a chemistry pub - I agree, chem papers have the potential to be rather short... But I'm just saying performing animal surgery sounds like it would have been "action packed" in comparison to what I did.

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It's really impressive that you have papers in both fields. If I could do it over again, I would rather choose the boring work and been published more than do a bunch of cool animal surgeries and be published less. Just my personal opinion. It is extremely frustrating to spend days on a bunch of assays and blots just for them not to work out in the end.

Edit: nvm, I lost my train of thought.

I just plan on getting a series of pubs in undergrad publications and posters at undergrad/regional presentations. As long as it demonstrates that I was on my own project, that's technically cracking those top numbers right?

LizzyM said:

I'd rank research experience in this way:


11. Housekeeping and supply ordering.

10. Helping others with projects, serving as a research assistant or technician.

9. Animal surgery.

8. Pilot work prior to writing a proposal for a testable hypothesis.

7. Responsibility for testing a hypothesis.

6. Funding of your project (not your PI's funding)

5. Poster presentation at a student event

4. Podium presentation at a student event

3. Poster presentation at a regional or national meeting in your specialty (published abstract)

2. Podium presentation at a regional or national meeting in your specialty (published abstract)

1. Authorship in a peer reviewed, national publication.

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Can you differentiate these two? Being "assisting others on projects" do you mean more along the lines of running experiments that you had minimal creative contribution to, or do you mean doing immunohistology/PCR/making up growth media type work?

Would running an experiment from start to finish, excluding data analysis, that test's your PI's hypothesis (as opposed to your own) be considered #7 or #10?

Soulstice said:

I just plan on getting a series of pubs in undergrad publications and posters at undergrad/regional presentations. As long as it demonstrates that I was on my own project, that's technically cracking those top numbers right?

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Of course -it's more than most applicants have accomplished.
Naturally the big time journals may impress to a higher degree, but, whatever, do yo thang.

I am confused about the top numbers, wouldn't you have to be in graduate school to actually get access to poster and paper level research? Does not seem like stuff that you would be able to do while you ate still in taking classes in undergrad.

MeowMeowCAT said:

I am confused about the top numbers, wouldn't you have to be in graduate school to actually get access to poster and paper level research? Does not seem like stuff that you would be able to do while you ate still in taking classes in undergrad.

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Certainly not.

A couple years ago, I cold called the director of the public health dept of my university hospital. I expressed my interest and he took me in. Over the course of the subsequent 2 years, we knocked out two publications and a national conference presentation.

While I was not an undergrad (per se) at the time, I was doing my post-bacc undergrad courses.

My chem PI pointed/recommended me towards a national conference presentation; however, there was a time conflict - wasn't able to go.

In other words, graduate school is not necessary, but initiative is.

One undergrad in my lab first-authored an abstract (no big deal) and was selected for a symposium presentation at a national conference (big deal). He was introduced as "doctor so-and-so", and the ugrad had to correct the moderator and say he didn't even have his BS yet.

BiopsychStudent said:

Can you differentiate these two? Being "assisting others on projects" do you mean more along the lines of running experiments that you had minimal creative contribution to, or do you mean doing immunohistology/PCR/making up growth media type work?

Would running an experiment from start to finish, excluding data analysis, that test's your PI's hypothesis (as opposed to your own) be considered #7 or #10?

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Who generated the hypothesis and figured out what to do to test it? My kid came up with a testable hypothsis is grade school for a science fair: which solution keeps roses freshest the longest? ( I was the funding agency. ) I'd call the kid's work a #7. (and a 5 for presenting a poster at the school science fair)

Doing an experiment designed by someone else (like a book of science fair projects) is more like #10

Would you classify the following as "exceptional" for clinical exposure?

2 years Hospice patient volunteer - managed patient load of 1-4 pts concurrently (visited weekly averaged 1 hour per patient) - approx 300 volunteer hours.

Phlebotomy experience from research internship (3 months - 30 hrs per week)

Shadowing: approx 500 hours over 6 specialties.

postbacpremed87 said:

Would you classify the following as "exceptional" for clinical exposure?

2 years Hospice patient volunteer - managed patient load of 1-4 pts concurrently (visited weekly averaged 1 hour per patient) - approx 300 volunteer hours.

Phlebotomy experience from research internship (3 months - 30 hrs per week)

Shadowing: approx 500 hours over 6 specialties.

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Too much like my day job .... I'm not here to evaluate individual applications. Plus, I'm only one member of one adcom. YMMV anywhere else or with anyone else.

Okay

LizzyM said:

Too much like my day job .... I'm not here to evaluate individual applications. Plus, I'm only one member of one adcom. YMMV anywhere else or with anyone else.

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LizzyM said:

I'm not here to evaluate individual applications.

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But you should. It will help people save a tons of money in application fees if they know ahead of time that there application is a waste.

What is the worst that would happen, adcoms start losing profits?

Come to think of it, why is there no such third-party thing, website or something, where applications can anonymously be reviewed by bored actual adcom members? Seems like a very neat way of getting the upperhand over the actual application process.

EphemeralRose3 said:

The first day I met him, I said I wanted my own project. He told me, "Oh, we will see about that. You have to first establish the basics, i.e. how to run a Southern blot, do a PCR, extract DNA from mice, etc." So, I said, "Oh okay. That's fine." I think I've established the basics- I've been going every weekday for the past two months. Still no answer. I'm gonna look for another research position along side this.

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At the end of my initial interview with my PI, he showed me the pathway the lab works on and remarked that there was this one gene that was pulled out in an initial screen as a potential part of the pathway that they hadn't gotten a chance to look at yet. I could work on that guy and oh, ask the grad student or post docs if I had any questions. A blank stare and two years later, I had a poster and defended a thesis on one very stubborn protein.

MeowMeowCAT said:

But you should. It will help people save a tons of money in application fees if they know ahead of time that there application is a waste.

What is the worst that would happen, adcoms start losing profits?

Come to think of it, why is there no such third-party thing, website or something, where applications can anonymously be reviewed by bored actual adcom members? Seems like a very neat way of getting the upperhand over the actual application process.

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I named and promoted what is now known as the LizzyM score. It is my contribution to pre-meds everywhere.

EphemeralRose3 said:

The first day I met him, I said I wanted my own project. He told me, "Oh, we will see about that. You have to first establish the basics, i.e. how to run a Southern blot, do a PCR, extract DNA from mice, etc." So, I said, "Oh okay. That's fine." I think I've established the basics- I've been going every weekday for the past two months. Still no answer. I'm gonna look for another research position along side this.

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I'm sure this varies from lab to lab and PI to PI, but to give a little perspective I've been in the same lab for two years now. It took almost a full year for me to get my own project, but now I have two of my own. It's managed to get me two abstract pubs (one as a first author) and an upcoming poster presentation at a national conference.

It's going to take time for you to master certain skills and be trained at a level where the PI is confident you can handle your own project. Once you put in the time and do this though, you'll likely have your own project and be capable of presenting it well.

Unfortunately, I also know a few people that have put in a lot less effort than me and piggybacked others' work for a paper pub, which is much better than an abstract . At the same time, I talk to these people and they can barely tell me what the research was on. Sometimes I wonder which situation I'd rather be in