Insights from the Perspective of an Undergraduate Researcher

I recently completed my first semester of independent research. As a Biological Basis of Behavior major at Penn, I have the opportunity to work in a lab for 10-12 hours per week and earn credit. I currently work in Dr. Anjan Chatterjee’s lab, the details of which I will elaborate on in a separate post. I started working in the lab last July and plan on continuing the project during this upcoming semester.

Now that the semester is over, I have unsurprisingly been reflecting upon the things I learned. I’ve realized that I had many misconceptions about what “research” entails. I’m still not quite sure where my previous views of research originated from…maybe high school biology and chemistry labs or inaccurate stock photos in textbooks. Regardless, I hope to dispel some of these ideas which I know, after speaking to other undergrads, are not unique to myself.

Here are some of the things that surprised me the most.

1) Research takes a really, really, really long time.

When I started in July, I was expecting to have completed an entire project and sent out a paper to be published by the end of the semester. Long story short, I was wrong. Getting enough subjects was one of the initial hurdles. The practical challenges of finding people who met the criteria just hadn’t occurred to me. I learned the hard way that not everyone wants to come to the lab to participate in our study, even if they already signed up to do so. I was also overwhelmed by the sheer amount of data we collected. Each subject yielded a 30,000 line spread sheet with over 12 columns of numbers. With over 55 subjects, it took (and is still taking) awhile to format everything so that it can be analyzed using a statistical program. I’ve read many studies in the past, but I now have a better understanding of the sheer amount of time and effort that went into each article. A succinct 5-page paper could easily take thousands of hours to produce. Researchers are probably some of the most patient people out there.

2) Labs are not all sterile places filled with test tubes and pipets.

Look what comes up when I type in “research lab” on Google: https://www.google.com/search?q=research+lab&safe=active&espv=210&es_sm=91&source=lnms&tbm=isch&sa=X&ei=4jTIUumNBsbNsQSAqIDgDQ&ved=0CAkQ_AUoAQ&biw=1223&bih=651. This makes me feel slightly better about the fact that this was exactly how I envisioned a “lab.” Microscopes. Rubber gloves. Colorful chemicals. Lab coats. I could not have been further from the truth. I guess I never really considered cognitive neuroscience labs when I was younger. My research professor’s office overlooks a beautiful pond and has walls covered in modern art. There is no “lab” per se. The researchers who work for Dr. Chatterjee have their own offices and cubicles scattered throughout the 3^rd floor of the Center for Cognitive Neuroscience. There are some patient testing rooms, but all of our eye tracking trials were run in a regular office at a desk. If I were to walk into the building and remove all the neuroscience posters on the walls, it would look more like a scene from corporate America than a prestigious scientific institution, aside from the fact that no one wears a suit.

3) Labs are actually social places.

This one goes along with my previous misconception. In that sterile place, I imagined people in lab coats and goggles pipetting things into test tubes for hours without any human contact. While there are a lot of opportunities for individual work, there is almost just as much collaboration. I did not do anything without first consulting with my two co-workers and discussing what the best course of action would be. In weekly lab meetings, everyone updates the group on their progress and any problems they faced during the previous week. We even had lab dinners which, while not centered around the research, definitely allowed me to get to know people better which helps the overall chemistry of the group in the long run. I know that it’s cheesy and that we’ve all been hearing this from a young age, but cooperation really does yield to better results.

Working in a lab was not what I expected it to be, but I had a great experience overall and look forward to continuing my research in the future. While the excessively long excel spreadsheets continue to haunt me, I genuinely believe all this work will be worth it if I am able to provide some new insights to the scientific community. On top of that, I’ve met some extremely interesting people to look up to as I continue my undergraduate studies. I’m excited to see what challenges and successes next semester will bring.