Undergrads Share Their Summer Research Experiences

The research process can be particularly arduous when it comes to participant recruitment, data collection, and data management. Accomplishing these stages of a project often requires contributions from a team of people and many labs wouldn’t be able to function without dedicated research assistants that help facilitate the process.

While many undergrads work or volunteer as research assistants during the school year, summer can be a great time to work in a different lab and enhance the research experience. We turn the spotlight this month and next month in part two of this series on some potential future psychologists who are doing this and ask them to share their experiences!  

Mackenzie DeLoatch

Mackenzie DeLoatch is an undergraduate (2020) majoring in psychology at Duke University. This summer she is taking part in Duke’s Vertical Integration Program (VIP) for summer research and working in Dr. Sarah Gaither’s Identity and Diversity Lab.

Why did you want to work as a research assistant this summer?

I wanted to be in VIP because although I have enjoyed my time working as a research assistant throughout the school year, this program is allowing me to gain a deeper knowledge of the research field. During the school year, most of my work consisted of more simple, basic tasks. This summer, however, I am able to do my own research and learn all about what doing research entails.

What drew you to working in your current lab?

I wanted to work in the Identity and Diversity Lab because I have always had an interest in issues of race, gender, and other identities. Working in this lab has allowed me the opportunity to assist with valuable research that can help improve our knowledge of social perceptions and how they affect the world we live in.

What kind of work are you doing this summer?

I have helped recruit participants for our various studies, conduct these studies, and code participants’ nonverbal behavior. In the upcoming weeks, I will be analyzing data from a study regarding cross-race interactions in order to present my findings as part of a poster presentation.

What have you learned so far from your summer experience? What else do you hope to learn?

I’ve learned how much collaboration goes into research. For the longest time, I assumed that researchers worked primarily on their own, but this summer, I have seen how much researchers work together to help improve each other’s work. No one works alone, and everyone from students to professors bounce ideas off each other in order to create the best possible results. I hope to learn how to develop my own research question and be able to effectively present my work to an audience.

Has your summer RA experience contributed to your interest in psychology research?

It definitely has! I have a much better understanding of the research process and what turns an idea into a full-fledged project.

Felix Wu

Felix Wu is an undergraduate (2019) majoring in psychology and art history at Rice University. He also works in Dr. Mikki Hebl’s Diversity and Discrimination Lab. This summer, he is working in Dr. Sarah Gaither’s Identity and Diversity Lab through SPUR (SPSP’s Summer Program for Undergraduate Research).

Why did you want to work as a research assistant this summer?

I wanted to gain more experience in research and learn what kind of work is done in other labs. I wanted to diversify my experiences and perhaps be involved in tasks different from the lab at my home university.

What drew you to working in your current lab?

I was drawn to the Duke Identity and Diversity Lab because I was interested in how identity affects the different types of intergroup behaviors. Furthermore, I was interested in how intersectionality affects these behaviors and overall identity as well.

What kind of work are you doing this summer?

I have coded data from video interactions and qualitative responses to stories. I also helped clean data to narrow down categories for a large data set collected by students at various universities. I created faces in FaceGen to serve as stimuli. Finally, I helped generate a coding scheme of responses about gender. Next, I will be working on a poster to be presented at a Duke University poster session. 

What have you learned so far from your summer experience? What else do you hope to learn?

I learned a lot about biracial identities and how to create faces on the FaceGen program. I hope to gain more experience with psychology research in general and to be more refined in my research skills.

Has your summer RA experience contributed to your interest in psychology research?

Yes, it has. I was already interested in research and my experience has contributed more to it.

Celia Kohler

Celia Kohler is an undergraduate (2019) majoring in psychology and minoring in Spanish and chemistry at Duke University. This summer, she is taking part in Duke’s Vertical Integration Program (VIP) and working in Dr. Rita Svetlova’s Empathy Development Lab.

Why did you want to work as a research assistant this summer?

I wanted to be able to get a head start on my personal project, as I would love to do a senior thesis. I love my lab, and the other people who are staying over the summer are fantastic.

What drew you to working in your current lab?

Dr. Svetlova is new to Duke and her lab is fairly small, so I loved the idea of being able to ask questions about empathy and prosocial behavior in a small, team-based setting with a lot of PI contact. I’ve been interested in empathy since my freshman year after taking Dr. Bob Thompson’s introductory class on empathy and identity, so this lab seemed (and is) a great fit for my interests.

What kind of work are you doing this summer?

I’ve been working on getting my study off the ground. I’m interested in how different parenting styles affect self-regulation in children, with a specific concentration in cooperative self-regulation. I’ve received IRB approval and have started piloting, which is super exciting!

What have you learned so far from your summer experience? What else do you hope to learn?

Getting IRB approval isn’t easy. There are a lot of little things that you’ll need to fix. Also, your methods and procedures may change as you pilot, and that’s okay! It’s a lot of work to develop a procedure and tasks that measure what you want to measure (in terms of validity and reliability), but it’s extremely rewarding. Also, you learn so much as you pilot and things start to take shape, and you need to make edits to your tasks and procedure. I hope to learn how to take charge of a study and run it from start to finish (from IRB approval, to piloting, to data collection, to data analyses, to actually writing it all up).

Has your summer RA experience contributed to your interest in psychology research?

Yes! This lab position has really helped bolster my passion for psychology research and has helped me start to more fully understand different aspects of child development – specifically friendship formation, attachment, empathy, in- and out- group behaviors, and self-regulation.

Brian Penn

Brian Penn is an undergraduate (2019) majoring in psychology and minoring in Spanish at Oakwood University. This summer, he is working as a research assistant in Dr. Makeba Wilbourn’s Infant Lab at Duke University.

Why did you want to work as a research assistant this summer?

I wanted to work as a research assistant because I’m always eager to learn how to answer important questions. I’m always seeking to improve the lives of others and working in a lab gives me the tools to pursue my passion of helping people.

What drew you to working in your current lab?

After graduation, I hope to begin studying to become a child psychologist. Not only is Duke a prestigious institution, but the Wilbourn Lab does great work in studying language development in children. Dr. Wilbourn is also a great influence and I was eager to work under her and absorb all of the knowledge she was willing to give.

What kind of work are you doing this summer?

This summer, I’ve been conducting research on language development in children. This involves performing studies with mothers and their children and seeing how they interact as well as analyzing compiled data and using it to form my own theories and hypotheses. Our lab is gaining information on these interactions to learn how these mother and child interactions influence a child’s language development. I’ve also met and spoke with some very influential people, including Dr. Elan Hope and Dr. Gary Bennett. They have given me great advice on how to pursue my passions and reach my goals and aspirations.

What have you learned so far from your summer experience? What else do you hope to learn?

One thing I’ve learned is that you must be open to change in regard to your passion. While I arrived at the Wilbourn lab eager to learn more about children, speaking with different professionals in the field has helped me uncover new interests, such as the effects of racism and stress on the mental health of African Americans. I am now more open to different topics and am willing to listen and learn about different subjects.

I hope to gain more experience working with children and to gain more knowledge about graduate school. I also hope to learn more about myself and my interests during my time at Duke.

Has your summer RA experience contributed to your interest in psychology research?

Working in the Wilbourn Infant Lab has increased my desire to pursue a career in psychology. Spending the summer with like-minded individuals who enjoy the field as much as I do has definitely strengthened my love for psychology. I have met many people with views that differ from mine, and this has helped my views become more well-rounded. I have never been more eager to pursue a career in psychology.