2025 ASEE Annual Conference & Exposition

"It allowed me to see a whole different world": Student researchers’ perceptions of the value of interdisciplinary research teams

Presented at ERM: Broadening Methodological Impacts

The paper category for this abstract is Work in Progress Empirical Research.

Engineering Education research teams are often interdisciplinary, bringing both benefits and challenges to groups of individuals with various backgrounds. However, it is unknown how student members of EER teams value interdisciplinary collaborations. The purpose of this study is to examine student researchers’ perspectives on the value of contributing to an interdisciplinary research team that is outside of the students’ core discipline. Using the epistemic identity framework as a lens, we constructed a composite narrative drawing on data from multiple student members of two research teams to present their perceptions on the value of participation in EER teams. Findings highlight how participants understand the benefits of exposure to various disciplines and methodological approaches and the positive effects of collaboration on identity development that come from their engagement in interdisciplinary research contexts. Results from this study provide a needed student perspective within the literature and underscore the need for increased opportunities on EER teams for undergraduates in disciplines outside of their primary area of study.

Authors

Dr. Danielle Vegas Lewis http://orcid.org/0000-0001-7266-6328 University at Buffalo [biography]

Dr. Danielle Vegas Lewis is currently the Postdoctoral Associate in Dr. Courtney Faber's ENLITE lab in the Department of Engineering Education at the University at Buffalo. Her research agenda aims to understand and disrupt the ways in which socially constructed identities allow for the reproduction of social inequality, with a focus on understanding the ways institutions of higher education and other social structures challenge or uphold hegemonic environments in which majority populations accumulate power that harms students underrepresented in certain contexts.
Ms. Isabel Anne Boyd http://orcid.org/0000-0002-6244-9335 Georgia Institute of Technology [biography]

Isabel is a first year Ph.D. student in the Wallace H. Coulter Department of Biomedical Engineering at the Georgia Institute of Technology and Emory University. She has conducted several mixed-methods research projects centered around diversity and inclusion in engineering and is passionate about engineering education.
Lorna Treffert University at Buffalo, The State University of New York [biography]

Lorna Treffert is a 1st year Ph.D. student in the Theory and Practice in Teacher Education Department at the University of Tennessee, Knoxville. She holds both a BS and MS in Industrial and Systems Engineering. Her research interests include facilitating diversity and inclusion within engineering education and applications of operations research in an education context.
Dr. Courtney June Faber http://orcid.org/0000-0001-9156-7616 University at Buffalo, The State University of New York [biography]

Courtney Faber, Ph.D., is an Assistant Professor of Engineering Education at the University at Buffalo (UB). Prior to joining UB in August of 2023, she was a Research Associate Professor and Senior Lecturer in Engineering Fundamentals at the University of Tennessee, Knoxville. She was also the Director of the Fundamentals of Engineering and Computing Teaching in Higher Education Certificate Program. Her research focuses on empowering engineering education scholars to be more effective at impacting transformational change in engineering and developing educational experiences that consider epistemic thinking. She develops and uses innovative research methods that allow for deep investigations of constructs such as epistemic thinking, identity, and agency. Dr. Faber has a B.S. in Bioengineering and a Ph.D. in Engineering and Science Education from Clemson University and a M.S. in Biomedical Engineering from Cornell University. Among other awards for her research, she was awarded a National Science Foundation CAREER Award in 2022 to study epistemic negotiations on interdisciplinary engineering education research teams.

Note

The full paper will be available to logged in and registered conference attendees once the conference starts on June 22, 2025, and to all visitors after the conference ends on June 25, 2025

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