Virtually the same? Evaluating the effectiveness of remote undergraduate research experiences

In-person undergraduate research experiences (UREs) promote students' integration into careers in life science research. In 2020, the COVID-19 pandemic prompted institutions hosting summer URE programs to offer them remotely, raising questions about whether undergraduates who participate in remote research can experience scientific integration. To address this, we investigated indicators of scientific integration for students who participated in remote life science URE programs in summer 2020. We found that these students experienced gains in their scientific self-efficacy and scientific identity similar to results reported for in-person UREs. We also found that these students perceived high benefits and low costs of doing research at the outset of their programs, and their perceptions did not change despite the remote circumstances. Yet, their perceptions differed by program, indicating that programs differentially affected students' perceptions of the costs of doing research. Finally, we observed that students with prior research experience made greater gains in self-efficacy and identity, as well as in their perceptions of the alignment of their values with those of the scientific community, in comparison to students with no prior research experience. This finding suggests that additional programming may be needed for undergraduates with no prior experience to benefit from remote research.

Scientific Medicine in the Time of Cholera: the Johns Hopkins Ethos and US Friendly Power in North China, 1919

Vashti Bartlett, a Johns Hopkins nurse and member of the American Red Cross Commission to Siberia, was part of a global expansion of United States (US) influence before and after World War I. Through close examination of Bartlett’s extensive personal archives and her experiences during a 1919 cholera epidemic in Harbin, North China, we show how an individual could embody a “friendly” or “capillary” form of imperialist US power. Significantly, we identify in Bartlett yet another form that US friendly power could take: scientific medicine. White, wealthy, female, and American, in the context of her international nursing activities Bartlett identified principally as a scientific practitioner trained at Johns Hopkins where she internalized a set of scientific ideals that we associate with a particular “Hopkins ethos.” Her overriding scientific identity rendered her a useful and conscientious agent of US friendship policies in China in 1919.

Homeopathy Deserves Its Own Scientific Identity

Ooit werd aangenomen dat wetenschappelijk onderzoek, met name het gerandomiseerde gecontroleerde onderzoek, erkenning zou geven aan de homeopathie. Het tegendeel gebeurde echter: ondanks bewijs, dat niet onderdoet voor conventioneel bewijs, is de oppositie nog nooit zo sterk geweest. De filosoof Kuhn voorspelde dit al: wetenschappelijke autoriteiten kunnen geen informatie accepteren die tegen hun basisovertuigingen (paradigma) indruist, omdat hun autoriteit juist van dat paradigma afhangt. Aan de andere kant ontdekken veel patiënten dat het conventionele medische paradigma onvolledig is en dat homeopathie het aanvult. Verwacht wordt dat de problemen met het huidige paradigma zullen toenemen, vooral vanwege antimicrobiële resistentie met betrekking tot infecties van de luchtwegen. Homeopathie kan in dit opzicht van grote waarde zijn. Er is ook een groeiend besef dat er geen tweedeling bestaat tussen doeltreffende en niet doeltreffende geneesmiddelen. De werking van een geneesmiddel is een waarschijnlijkheid die afhangt van meerdere variabelen. Tot nu toe is het verbeteren van de homeopathische manier van genezen in samenhang met wetenschappelijk onderzoek ondergewaardeerd. De toenemende belangstelling van de conventionele geneeskunde voor gepersonaliseerde geneeskunde en onderzoek naar prognostische factoren (PFR) is een uitstekende gelegenheid om het homeopathisch onderzoek te heroriënteren naar PFR.

Scientist or Entrepreneur? Identity centrality, university entrepreneurial mission, and academic entrepreneurial intention

The purpose of this study is to examine the relationship between identity centrality and entrepreneurial intention. Based on a survey of 275 academic scientists from 14 Chinese universities, the results show that entrepreneurial identity centrality positively influences the intention to engage in research commercialisation activities, such as spin-off creation, patenting and licensing, contracting research and consulting. We also found that the conflict between entrepreneurial and scientific identity centrality is less problematic than expected in the literature. In fact, the interaction between both identity centralities strengthens academics scientists’ intention to involve in academic entrepreneurship. Concerning the influence of institutional factor on academic entrepreneurship, the finding confirms that university entrepreneurial mission moderates the relationship between both identity centralities and the intention to establish spin-offs. Finally, this paper provides insights for academic entrepreneurship in China and practical recommendation for policy makers.

Performing Science in Public: Science Communication and Scientific Identity

This chapter examines the identity work that takes place within public communication of science. Using a conceptualisation of identity as performance – and thus as something that may be done differently within different contexts – it uses the case of a large science festival, Science in the City, which took place in Copenhagen in 2014, to examine how scientific identities can be enacted in science communication. The key argument is that such communication supports multiple and flexible identity performances. Scientific identities are intertwined with other ways of performing the self, and both audiences and communicators are heterogeneous communities, which do not neatly sit in categories of ‘scientists’ or ‘the public’. Ultimately, it appears that science communication is used by scientists (and others) for many different identity-building purposes, in many different ways.

PENSAMENTO ESPACIAL E PENSAMENTO GEOGRÁFICO:

Este artigo tem como centralidade a discussão do ensino de Geografia e da função ou prática social que daí se objetiva. Destarte, exploramos que tal prática social resulta de um processo de ensino-aprendizagem que tem o pensamento espacial e o pensamento geográfico como entes distintos mas interligados. Asseguradas as distinções entre ambos, tomamos a ordem constitutiva desses pensamentos como uma associação elementar entre o desenvolvimento intelectual e a prática social geográfica. Com base na psicologia histórico-cultural e na dialética materialista-histórica, exploramos como a leitura geográfica guarda na formação conceitual sobre as espacialidades a ensinagem de sua identidade científica, assim como a possibilidade de transformação da realidade analisada por parte dos sujeitos-alunos. PALAVRAS-CHAVE Pensamento espacial, Pensamento geográfico, Espacialidade, Formação de conceitos, Ensino de geografia. SPATIAL THINKING AND GEOGRAPHICAL THINKING: from concept learning to geographical social practice ABSTRACT This paper argues about Geography teaching and the perspective of a social practice or social purpose related to it. Thus, such practice is explored as stemming from a teaching process in which spatial thinking and geographical thinking are conceived as distinct but intertwined entities. Therefore, the constitutive order of these thoughts is comprehended by the relation between intelectual development and the geographical-social practice. Based on cultural-historical psychology and dialectical and historical materialism, we ensue to explore how the geographical analysis observes in concept learning of spatiality its own scientific identity just as the possibility of transformation of analyzed reality by the schooler-subjects. KEYWORDS Spatial thinking, Geographical thinking, Spatiality, Concept learning, Geography teaching.

Understanding Who Stays in a STEM Scholar Program for Underrepresented Students: High-Achieving Scholars and Short-Term Program Retention

This study highlights program retention among Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics (STEM) students in a STEM Intervention Program (SIP) aimed at increasing the representation of underrepresented students in STEM fields. We applied London et al.’s STEM Engagement Framework to determine factors that distinguish who stays in a SIP and who leaves within the first two years of the program. Our sample was comprised of 129 high-achieving students enrolled in a multicomponent program at a large, research-intensive university in the mid-Atlantic. Our results suggest that identifying as a woman or gender non-conforming scholar, having a strong scientific identity, or reporting lower depressive symptoms, increase the likelihood of remaining in the SIP.