Research by MEd students

As part of our MEd in University Learning and Teaching, students complete an educational enquiry project in any aspect of university education. For this research project the student works with an individual supervisor and uses the skills gained from the previous stages to devise and undertake an appropriately referenced and theoretically grounded research project based in their own personal and disciplinary context. This may involve quantitative, qualitative or mixed educational research methodology but it is expected to show criticality, reflection and engagement with both generic and discipline specific educational practice and theory gained from the previous stages.

Past dissertations have been on the following topics:

• When ‘light’ dawns upon them: mapping the essence of conceptual understanding of physics learners.
• “They show you how to be”. The impact of self-selected role models on medical student professional identity dissonance.
• Conceptions of engineering leadership and the role of universities in developing engineering leaders.
• What it feels like for a medical student: exploring the emotional content of medical students’ experiences during their psychiatry placement.
• Professional/transferable skills, doctoral alumni views, with hindsight: ‘if I could go back and do it now’.
• Talking about sustainability: conversation as a pedagogy.
• Using a role play simulation in Second Life to teach child psychiatric assessment: do undergraduate medical students perceive it as a useful learning experience?
• Undergraduate research opportunities programme: Motivations in growing communities of practice.
• Seeing behind the scenes: The value of coming to know how medical research is done.
• Do the learning styles of fifth year medical students influence their strategy for study and revision?
• UK surgical trainees’ views of procedure based assessments.
• Training in radiology: How might individualist and sociocultural perspectives help explain learning and what are the implications for e-learning.
• What are the challenges and benefits of introducing self-reflection and peer feedback in formative assessment to enhance student learning in medical education.
• To make war against a sea of troubles: Troublesome knowledge in undergraduate pathology.
• What are dermatologists’ conceptions of how undergraduate medical students learn their specialty?
• A study of loss aversion in learning through analysis of students’ experiences on a physics degree.
• “It felt like I’d come home”. Exploring the development of professional identity in renal physicians.
• The world today: a space for disorientation, self-reflection and re-orientation towards a future ripe for transformation.
• Exploring perceptions of learning in the Operating Theatre
• GENERAL KNOWLEDGE – Understanding Medical Student Attitudes to the Specialist/Generalist Divide.
• Medical trainee’s reflections on medical school and its impact on student to doctor transition
• What helps medical students to achieve academic success in Year 1 and 2?
• Identity Crisis? How do doctoral students negotiate meaning in an interdisciplinary bioscience research context?
• Student measures of teaching excellence and teacher esteem in a research intensive university: are they the same and what forms of capital do students value most?