Directed Readings/ Research courses

[Azure1]

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Hello,

Does anyone have any experience with these courses (at undergrad level)?

That is, are they worthwhile doing if one were to do a honor's thesis alongside them?

Given that there is no structured "class" per se, is it viewed badly upon (in terms of admissions)?

 

[wigflip]

Hello,

Does anyone have any experience with these courses (at undergrad level)?

That is, are they worthwhile doing if one were to do a honor's thesis alongside them?

Given that there is no structured "class" per se, is it viewed badly upon (in terms of admissions)?

I did something similar as an UG and found it beneficial. I would think it would be most productive if you are actually receiving quality time and mentorship from a tenured professor with shared research interests, and if there is some kind of end product that you could use in the future as a writing sample (or even submit for publication as a review paper or similar).

 

[mewtoo]

Are you talking about independent research for course credit?

If so, I did one last semester and am doing another this coming Fall. I think they are definitely worthwhile as last semester I conducted an experiment that I designed and now have at least a few poster's worth of material and will be submitting to national conferences. This fall it's more of just a way to make sure I have enough time (not overloaded with classes) for writing a manuscript with my main mentor that we are submitting to journals in November-ish.

My professors have told me that they think it would be viewed very well because it isn't structured- that is if you actually produce good research out of it. They said it shows initiative and that you are self-driven and aren't "just doing it for my degree." You also have to ask professors and have to have the proposal completed before the semester starts so they said it shows that you are able to form relationships with your professors and defend your research.

If you complete a study in this class AND do a thesis I imagine you would be a very great candidate for admissions. However I must say, if you are the only investigator (you are your own RA) then it will be very hard to complete 2 empirical experiments at the same time in the span of a semester. For my study last semester I had to have 140 participants and set time to run participants for about 4 hours a day at a minimum (so 20 hours a week conservatively) and it took me almost the whole semester to get all of them. Of course your participant recruitment may be better than my school's so it may not be as hard, but I just wanted to throw that out there in case you've never completed a whole experiment by yourself and, most likely, underestimate the time it would take for such an endeavor (such as I did).

 

[Azure1]

Thanks for your replies, I appreciate it.

Yes, in my school it's a semester long class.

In the fall they have "independent research" and in the winter they have "directed readings."

I was wondering what exactly could be accomplished in only a semesters work in terms of the independent research?

My interests lie in neurobiology so in terms of subjects it will not be too hard (we use rats).

The directed readings interested me more as it gives me the possibility of reading a specific subgenre of research that i'm interested in - however, i assume that the professor must be "an expert" in the field. Can anyone confirm ?

 

[mewtoo]

I have no clue about the directed readings as my school doesn't have anything like that, but I don't know why they would have to be an expert, really. But if you get to write a lit review (that could be possibly published) and you have the opportunity you should seriously consider taking advantage of both these opportunities. The results of these opportunities would look really good as a writing sample or possible publication/ poster on your CV. If they had such a thing at my school I'd be all over it.

I wrote my manuscript/proposal the previous semester during my research design course and conducted it during my independent research the next semester. Having the majority of the manuscript written was pretty much a must. During the first to third week (at my school at least) you send the IRB application, that takes a few weeks, then you start collecting data. Since you can use rats and thus have an easier time gathering enough data I imagine it would not take you until the end of the semester to start analyses and finishing your manuscript. For me 2 weeks before finals we ran the analyses and I turned in my completed (and mostly revised by my professor) manuscript on the very last day of the semester. My manuscript is definitely worth the time commitment as I could make multiple poster presentations out of it and a publication if I so wanted. Not to mention how awesome something like this looks on your CV.

I would ask the professor you would be working with how long it would take you to gather the data for the experiment you have in mind. If it won't take long (and your school will allow this) you could write the proposal, conduct the experiment, run the analyses, and finish the manuscript in a semester if you hustle. Otherwise it is almost mandatory that you complete your proposal beforehand (i.e., during the summer). I don't know if you've written anything like a manuscript before but in case you haven't you should realize it could take a good month of straight writing and revision to get it to a presentable level. I would send my sections to my professor who would edit it and then I would edit it again. My manuscript (minus the pages of measures) is a full 26 pages. I'm sure you can imagine how long that took considering the process my professor and I used. And that, I believe, is short for a manuscript.

Overall, I do believe that a semester is long enough to produce a quality manuscript. If your up to such a challenge its totally worth it. That's my dos pennies. 🙂