Research Experience -- What to put on my CV

[Dedi]

Okay, I'm having a problem with putting down research experience on my CV that grad schools will look at.

 

Basically, I go to a university where there are no labs to apply to and join. If I want research experience, I'd take research-based classes or happen to have strong connections with professors that have something to offer me (which is true in my case). However, should I even bother putting down any research-based courses taken for credit? The research-based courses that are not one-on-one with a professor? The research-based courses with a lecture component? Research-based courses that do not pertain to what I want to study in the future?

 

I realize that there is a blurred line between what would be helpful on a CV or what is a waste of space.

Most of my research experience (with the exception of two ongoing projects) have projects that are a semester in length, I present a poster at the university's academic conference and am done with it. Do I just briefly describe the two ongoing projects (and hopefully more to come)?

 

I really should ask my advisor for his advice, but we end up talking about other things (even during advising yesterday!). I'm curious as to what this forum has to say, though.

[med latte]

Can you say a bit more about your past and ongoing projects? Will any of your letters come from the professors who signed off on the projects?

[Quant_Liz_Lemon]

You could list a representative set of projects you did.

[drph_2014]

I have a section on mine called "skills," which has become a catch-all for things that don't fit elsewhere or if I want to really emphasize something. Maybe you can put what you've learned from these courses/projects under a heading like that? I wouldn't put courses down if you're using this for grad school, since schools will have access to that info from your transcripts.

 

Others may have different advice! Does your school have a career or writing center? They can usually help.

[Dedi]

My letters of rec will come from two professors that have been mentoring me for the ongoing projects. The third letter of rec will come from a professor that I'm pretty close to and I plan to do an independent study with him next spring (so it won't show up anywhere when I apply to grad school, unless the deadline is in the late winter/early spring).

 

My ongoing projects are:

The physiological and behavioral effects of enriched or barren tanks on zebrafish (I learned how to do behavioral analysis and immunohistofluorescence. I've also made a budget, applied for a mini-grant, received that grant, will present at two conferences, and try to publish in an undergrad journal). This has been going on for almost a year and a half, and plan to continue the theme of the project next spring (again, won't show up anywhere). This project is part of a course called Research in Biology and I have two research mentors to work with me one on one.It is of my own research design.

 

Multiple choice probability learning in rats (I definitely learned how to be flexible in this project! I was given a taste of how single case-design works and how to try to control for extraneous variables instead of trying to "balance them out" via statistics). This project was not for credit (others were supposed to contribute but it seems it's not working that way) but I'm getting a very strong letter of rec from it. We will continue this project with tweaks to the protocol in fall semester in Research Seminar, a research course in psychology. The original protocol was of the research mentor's design. I've been helping with the tweaks, though.

 

My current semester projects:

The effects of mental illness and sex on empathy (This is a vignette based study and probably one of my harder projects because it involves people and shameless advertising.) This is for a required Experimental Psychology course. The idea for the study was my own, but had stringent requirements for the design.

 

The effects of sucrose concentration in the rat: an omission contingency experiment (This one i haven't technically started yet because I need the IRB approval. This is another single-case design.) This project is part of the Research Methods in Behavioral Analysis course. This study is of my own design.

 

Future semester projects:

Summer--I'll be research volunteering at a lab with my top choice POI (I need to find more POIs, to be honest). I'll be studying behavioral epigenetics. It is not part of a course, and not of my own design. This project emphasizes teamwork between other undergrads and graduate students, something that hasn't been addressed based on other projects.

 

A behavioral ecology project with zoo animals. I'm thinking of something along the lines of enrichment, but I'll have to address that to the professor.

 

Research Seminar -- I've already discussed this.

 

Continuation of the zebrafish project -- Again, I've discussed the gist of it.

 

Independent study on psychology -- Rarely does anyone utilize this course, but I only need a couple more credits to graduate with a double-major in psych and animal behavior. I'll be helping a professor with the analysis of results from a project he plans to do this summer. It's basically a social network analysis of the effects of meditation (how does meditation affect the meditator's friends? Friend's friends?) Of course, this study is not of my own design.

 

--------------

 

The "skills" section might be useful. And yes, we do have a career and writing center. I'll see if I can make an appointment with them sometime this semester or fall semester.

[hikaru1221]

I don't know your field - in my field, it is the research potential that matters, not the subject you researched on, since it is not hard to pick up a new field anyway. The way I see it, it's just a matter of wording, so instead of titling the section "Research experience," how about "Relevant experience"?

 

P.S.: To make it more like a section on experience, don't list each item beginning with "Course XYZ project," which carries little information. Place this detail in the description, as a matter of formality.

[Dedi]

I'm not quite sure about my field, either. Anyone in the neuroscience field know about this?

 

Relevant experience could also work. Would I put in skills from working my on-campus job as a biology lab assistant in that section as well?

[hikaru1221]

I'm not quite sure about my field, either. Anyone in the neuroscience field know about this?

 

Relevant experience could also work. Would I put in skills from working my on-campus job as a biology lab assistant in that section as well?

 

Hi,

 

As said, it's just the matter of wording - and you need to convince yourself and others that those course projects, those work experiences contribute to your sense of doing research, i.e. I would not distinguish them / categorize those experiences in terms of lab work vs coursework, so long as they are all research-oriented projects. You will need to talk at length about some (or all) of them in your SOP.

 

I included one course project in my Research Experience section. Something like this:

_ Title: Analysis on Human X-Mutation

_ Supervisor: Charles Xavier

_ Description:

+ Analyze how humans survive while their genome attains X number of chromosome pairs, where 22 < X < 24 and X is not equal to 23.

+ Propose a systematic method to make human superhuman.

+ BIO9999 course project 

 

Now that's the experience. If you want to show skills, then you may add another section with something like this:

_ Skill: Use neutrino scanner to detect superhuman abilities.

_ Skill: Program computer simulations of how human body structure transforms under the process of X-Mutation

 

Sorry, that's how I imagined the Skill section might be I don't know if skills are important to your field. Anyway I suppose research experience and skills do not overlap too much, right?

 

P.S.: Although I didn't write about the mentioned project in my SOP in the end due to length constraint, it's a nice piece of work that I thought would show my research potential. And so I decided to send the schools the report as a writing sample :-) Well technically you just need to be proud of your work, and so list those you are proud of in your CV.

Edited February 28, 2014 by hikaru1221

[Dedi]

I think skills are pretty important in my field.

 

Thank you so much for your example! I can understand things better visually rather than a description. I'll try that.

 

The SOP is short for the programs I want to attend so far (1 page or less) so I'm probably just going to highlight my ongoing projects and the project I did with the POI (as it is very relevant to what I want to study). With the project I want to do in grad school being so specific (this is why I'm not applying to 6+ schools. I have e-mailed every professor I want to work with to see if they would be interested in doing the project and if they have space), I can't fit every past project in my SOP.

[Dedi]

I actually talked to my advisor and he gave me a document that showed what a psychology CV should look like.It was quite useful. Basically, for the projects, it should be titled "projects underway" and list the most important projects (as defined as producing a paper or a poster at a conference outside the university). So I've eliminated my required Experimental Psych project cause I don't see it going far. The rest of the current projects have potential. The main concern is padding--the effect that someone says "Why are they putting so much in here?" Of course a lot of projects is good, but with no publications it's all tell and no show (which is true, at least for now).

 

I thought I'd put the update here!

[hikaru1221]

That sounds like a good plan except for this:

 

The main concern is padding--the effect that someone says "Why are they putting so much in here?" Of course a lot of projects is good, but with no publications it's all tell and no show (which is true, at least for now).

 

There are 2 things you may want to note:

 

1/ Having publications is a great indicator of one's research potential, but not the sole one. Wonder how adcoms/ professors look at publications? My experience was something like this:

_ Prof: So tell me about your past research.

_ Me: Well, I explored X for the first 2 years, which led to a paper, but I'm not so proud of it. Then I moved on with Y. I found a lot of interesting things here. I did this, and that, and here, and there...

_ Prof: Okay, so tell me the exact formulation of Y.

_ Me: It is like this...

_ Prof: I see. Well, what I'm doing is like this. Imagine you twist Y, blah blah blah.

_ Me: Oh thanks, I can now relate better to your research.

_ Prof: That's good to know.

 

So basically they don't care what the paper is about. I would not say it's a bad paper - in fact, it's published in a well respected journal, and I was the first author. They possibly won't read the paper anyway, meaning they won't know whether it's a good or bad paper. The main thing they would want to find out is whether the applicant is capable of doing their research or not. Having published simply implies having experienced research for quite some time.

 

If you worry about the show-don't-tell problem, here are places where you can show:

_ SOP: passion for research (many professors may overlook SOP's though)

_ LOR: nothing is better than a third person's evaluation

_ Interviews: the personal touch

 

2/ I believe one should be strategic with the application. Padding means zero strategy. Highlight what you think should be catchy to professors in the CV, and leave out others.

 

I can't be sure about your field, however.

[CulturalAnth]

If your class research led to a poster or presentation, include it, for sure! I presented 3 times on a course's final paper, and it's on my CV  

[Dedi]

hikaru:

 

You're right in saying that the capacity to do research is more important than the product. I'm just saying what the document my advisor gave to me said (which could be more for grad students anyways). It's just another's opinion on how a CV should be written. My advisor is reviewing my vita, but I might send it to some other professors and the writing center to get their feedback.

 

I still don't think my experimental psych project (which has human participants) has a place within all the animal studies. The network analysis project doesn't either, but that is something I would be probably working with after grad school, so I'm keeping it.

 

Cultural:

 

Definitely! I don't count what I've presented at the university's academic conference, but I've put down projects that I've presented at other conferences.

[Crucial BBQ]

I took two "research courses" as an undergrad for credit.  Both involved working with a professor on his own project.  To be frank, both courses were the EXACT same thing as I did when I worked for a professor and her lab as a research assistant.  Actually, no, they were not.  Those research courses were graded on a final paper based on the research, a poster, and a poster presentation (public).  You better believe I counted those both as research.  

Edited March 3, 2014 by Crucial BBQ

[Crucial BBQ]

My letters of rec will come from two professors that have been mentoring me for the ongoing projects. The third letter of rec will come from a professor that I'm pretty close to and I plan to do an independent study with him next spring (so it won't show up anywhere when I apply to grad school, unless the deadline is in the late winter/early spring).

 

My ongoing projects are:

The physiological and behavioral effects of enriched or barren tanks on zebrafish (I learned how to do behavioral analysis and immunohistofluorescence. I've also made a budget, applied for a mini-grant, received that grant, will present at two conferences, and try to publish in an undergrad journal). This has been going on for almost a year and a half, and plan to continue the theme of the project next spring (again, won't show up anywhere). This project is part of a course called Research in Biology and I have two research mentors to work with me one on one.It is of my own research design.

 

Designing your own research project is a huge plus for you, same with applying for and receiving a grant...no matter how small.  Both will look really good on your applications. Publishing would be great, but I do not know of any graduate program who actually expects an undergrad to publish.  Sure, some undergrads do publish but it is far from the norm. 

 

Multiple choice probability learning in rats (I definitely learned how to be flexible in this project! I was given a taste of how single case-design works and how to try to control for extraneous variables instead of trying to "balance them out" via statistics). This project was not for credit (others were supposed to contribute but it seems it's not working that way) but I'm getting a very strong letter of rec from it. We will continue this project with tweaks to the protocol in fall semester in Research Seminar, a research course in psychology. The original protocol was of the research mentor's design. I've been helping with the tweaks, though.

 

This would be worth mentioning in your applications for sure, but, I would focus on the "what I learned from this" instead of trying to present it as straight-up research...even if it is. Also, definitely mention your input into this project and how you contributed with the "tweaks". 

 

My current semester projects:

The effects of mental illness and sex on empathy (This is a vignette based study and probably one of my harder projects because it involves people and shameless advertising.) This is for a required Experimental Psychology course. The idea for the study was my own, but had stringent requirements for the design.

 

Okay, it is great to experience two or three different projects to gain a little research breadth, but you are starting to jump the gun a little. It is most important to gain experience and understanding of how to do research and the ins-and-outs of doing research.  Believe it or not, but many Ph.D. students drop out because they realize they hate doing research.  The whole point of doing research as an undergrad is to give you a heads-up of not only what to expect in grad school, but that hey, it turns out you actually love doing research.  

 

The effects of sucrose concentration in the rat: an omission contingency experiment (This one i haven't technically started yet because I need the IRB approval. This is another single-case design.) This project is part of the Research Methods in Behavioral Analysis course. This study is of my own design.

 

​Is this actual research or just a class project?  It would be worth mentioning as something that has strengthened your desire for grad school/research, but I do not think this counts as actual research. 

 

Future semester projects:

Summer--I'll be research volunteering at a lab with my top choice POI (I need to find more POIs, to be honest). I'll be studying behavioral epigenetics. It is not part of a course, and not of my own design. This project emphasizes teamwork between other undergrads and graduate students, something that hasn't been addressed based on other projects.

 

Teamwork and collaboration are great, but so is the ability to work alone.  Having one solid POI is better than having a bunch of so-so POIs.  You want to show passion...not that you are "gaming" admissions. 

 

A behavioral ecology project with zoo animals. I'm thinking of something along the lines of enrichment, but I'll have to address that to the professor.

 

Research Seminar -- I've already discussed this.

 

Continuation of the zebrafish project -- Again, I've discussed the gist of it.

 

 You are busy.  Is there a need to continue the zebrafish project?  If not, then don't do it.  Have some fun for a change 

 

Independent study on psychology -- Rarely does anyone utilize this course, but I only need a couple more credits to graduate with a double-major in psych and animal behavior. I'll be helping a professor with the analysis of results from a project he plans to do this summer. It's basically a social network analysis of the effects of meditation (how does meditation affect the meditator's friends? Friend's friends?) Of course, this study is not of my own design.

 

--------------

 

The "skills" section might be useful. And yes, we do have a career and writing center. I'll see if I can make an appointment with them sometime this semester or fall semester.

Comments in bold.  

 

I know of two people who were admitted into Ph.D. programs for neuroscience.  Both went straight from BSN programs and had less than half of your "experience".  As I wrote, it is good to show passion, but you do not want to come across as being one-dimensional. 

[Dedi]

Thanks for the advice! The omission contingency project, as I see it, is a class project that can transform into something more provided that there are interesting results (I include it because I might do something more with it). But the whole course focuses on that one project.

 

I am doing most of these projects alone. That is why I mention the teamwork in the POI's lab. My main reason for doing work in the POI's lab is because I am interested in behavioral epigenetics, but I have no experience in the process. I want to be sure that it's the right fit for me.

 

And, you're right! I don't want to come across as one-dimensional. How could I combat that aspect?

[Crucial BBQ]

How could I combat that aspect?

I dunno.  It is really up to you to decide.  The irony is that there is no set formulae.  But, if you select programs/labs/PIs based on fit, then you should "know" how to present yourself. 

[Dedi]

Kay, thank you.

[knightrunner]

One of my research partners presented research in a national conference (not me), so I am wondering if it would be okay to cite in the published abstract section of my CV since I am listed as a co-author in the abstract books?

[themmases]

One of my research partners presented research in a national conference (not me), so I am wondering if it would be okay to cite in the published abstract section of my CV since I am listed as a co-author in the abstract books?

 

I think so; I certainly do. If you are listed as an author you are entitled to include the piece in your CV (unlike for an acknowledgement only IMO). In contrast, if I helped with something but not at an author level of contribution I would just mention it in the description of the position I held. E.g. "Research assistant: assisted with data collection and subject recruitment in (Topic A) and (Topic B)"