Is Field Research< Lab Reasearch??

[MaybeMD]

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I have an opportunity to help out with some field research this summer. I have never done this before, and I am sure that it will be fun. Is there a major difference between doing research in a lab and out in the field? Because I am sure that you have to go into a lab eventually and produce the results that your looking for. And have any of you done any field research? How was it? And finally, will adcoms look at research in the field concerning, for example, frogs at the same level as research that is more related to humans? Not that I would turn the opportunity down if they don't, I would just like to know. Any input is appreciated!

 

[sunflower79]

Hi MaybeMD,

I have never done field research; I only have experience w/clinical research (=field research on humans). But since I majored in a bio dept where lots of ppl did field research, I can tell you what I know.

A field research project is its own entity apart from the lab. You don't have to go back to the lab to produce results. In the field you observe neat things like animal behavior and interaction with its natural environment, things you can't replicate in the lab as well or at all. (I think behavior is still neat if it's in a non-human rather than a human)It's more difficult because you can't control for things in a natural environment, but it's certainly less dry than being in a lab. Hence the data ends up being less "clean," but that's the nature of the work. And if you present your work and publish, those limitations are understood and perfectly acceptable. So at the end of the day you don't go back to the lab (although you can follow up field experiments w/lab ones to further explore your topic), but you just enter your data and crunch the numbers.

IMHO, adcoms will weigh your research equally. Research represents intellectual curiosity no matter the topic, and you will get credit for that. Plus if you are into your research like me, it makes great conversation fodder at interviews. Lab research is also technically on non-human organisms (by far the most common), and clinical research is relatively hard to come by, so if you don't do the latter it won't count against you.

Hope that helps!

cheers,
sunflower79

 

[moops]

i think only research on goat asses is considerred significant

 

[MaybeMD]

^thanks for the insightful response...🙄 !

 

[benzo]

I think that it shouldn't matter (bench vs. field research) to ADCOM's. What does matter is if you've been published. So, if you are doing research with a group try to get your name on the paper. This will indicate several things to ADCOM's (my opinion). For example, it shows that you are able to work well as a member of a team to reach a desired goal. If you make the most of your research experience you can get puplished as well as set the groundwork for receiving a LOR from the PI.

 

[GoodMonkey]

yes because all that matters is in the end, how you look to an adcom member. 🙄 please. do what you love and everything else will be fine. if you want to do field work - do field work, for crying out loud!!

i spent two years doing field work (aquatic ecology) and i never got a publication out of it (just because you don't get a pub does NOT mean that you aren't a valid, contributing, hardworking member of the team... perhaps it just means your work was not accepted into a journal at that stage of the research), BUT ... i got some great experience, learned a helluva lot about statistics (you've got to process that data somehow to make it relevant to anything whatsoever), got nice and muddy, a bit of a tan, camped out at night, learned about science and solidified my belief that medicine, not ecology was the route for me. i've also conducted bench research - in an immuno lab, in a genetics lab, as a biotech research scientist.... in the end, research is research is research - it's scientific process, it's thinking objectively, it's being creative. don't - PLEASE don't - just do research for the sake of getting into med school, and do not choose the subject of your research because you think that it would look "better" to the adcom. no research team nor any supervisor wants this to be the sole motivation of a member of their group. if that were the situation on the team in my case, i would have just sent them out on the lake in a leaky boat. 😉 😛 kidding!

i'm sorry to be snippy about this and i'm not saying that your question is invalid, OP, but it's a touchy subject to me. i can't for the life of me stress enough for you to do what you enjoy and what interests **you** rather than what you think would look good to an adcom.

 

[TroutBum]

Amen, GoodMonkey, amen. You're a good monkey 😛 !

I've had very similar experiences. I did field research and an REU for a summer, in ecology too (studying plant biodiversity for the first, and looking at competition between native and exotic species for the second). I did it because I was interested in ecology, and I'm very very glad I did it because I realized, like GoodMonkey, that my route was going to be medicine, not field science after that experience. I still think it's fascinating work, but I realized I didn't have to temperment to be out in the field every day. I like to get outdoors and hike and camp and such to get away, but I can't deal with making it my office.

Like GoodMonkey, I never got a publication either, although I probably could have if I tried to submit. My desire to push the project through publication just fizzled out after I realized I never wanted to deal with it again.

And I agree, the important thing here is that I did what I was interested in, and I was able to learn a ton from that experience. I don't think that it mattered to adcoms that I did field research instead of lab research, any kind of research shows intellectual curiosity and a working understanding of the scientific process. I think a lot of folks don't fully comprehend what goes into an elegant experiment until they've actually had to try designing the sucker and do it themselves.

And most of the ecologists I worked with didn't do ANY lab work. There was some stuff that had to be done in the lab (like analyzing soil chemistry and stuff like that) but other researchers had designed their experiments so there was no lab component.

So, I second GoodMonkey. Do it if you want to, not because you think it will look good on your app.

 

[kreno]

I agree w/GOodmonkey totally!

I've never done serious lab research, but I did have a lot of "field research" studying healthcare systems abroad critically...comparisons and such. I got into some great places, and I think my unique experiences played a significant role... remember, what DIFFERENTIATES you is what is good.

What they are looking for as far as "research" i think though is your ability and experience with the scientific method.... so, with that in mind, it doesn't matter if you did look at goat ass*s or not!
🙂

kreno