The University of Wisconsin-Madison seeks a postdoctoral researcher to study failure in STEM based on a video intervention and video game assessment. To apply for the position: Email a cover letter and CV to Sarah Miller, Co-PI, at sarah.miller@wisc.edu.
Project Description and Postdoc Role
To meet needs of the future, the United States must increase the production of STEM college graduates and draw on a broader range of talent, particularly among historically excluded communities (HECs). An alarming proportion of college students who declare STEM majors – especially HEC students – switch to other majors before graduating. Even though students cite a fear of failure as important, failure is rarely included as a topic in STEM coursework or as a focus for interventions. Therefore, a better understanding of the impact of failure and approaches that de-stigmatize and normalize failure is needed to assure greater success and retention of diverse students in STEM.
Our team recently received five years of federal funding to create and study a video-based intervention about failure in STEM. The study hypothesizes that if students are taught about failures experienced by successful scientists or engage in a structured research experience, they will be less discouraged when they experience difficulties or failures. This research will study the effects of an intervention on student failure responses and STEM persistence. The first experiment will test the effect of videos about personal and scientific failures on students’ behaviors and attitudes about failure and STEM persistence. The second will test these videos in two educational contexts, one containing Tiny Earth, a course-based undergraduate research experience (CURE), which may have synergistic effects with the intervention. To assess their failure responses, students will complete a survey and attempt an impossible scientific task—a biology video game. The analysis will seek to understand the interactions between the video intervention and participation in a CURE, student demographics, and course characteristics such as class size and placement in the curriculum.
The person in this role will be part of a highly collaborative research team based at the Wisconsin Institute for Discovery (WID) and the Department of Psychology at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. The team also includes Tiny Earth, a WID-based global network of more than 800 college instructors who teach the Tiny Earth CURE in 33 countries to more than 16,000 students per year. The postdoc will be mentored by Dr. Judith Harackiewicz and Dr. Jo Handelsman.
The position is expected to be primarily on campus, with the possibility to request occasional, local remote work (1-2 days per week). Starting rate will follow the 2024 NIH rates for postdocs. The team is committed to providing opportunities for candidates who identify as belonging to communities that have been historically excluded or marginalized from participating in STEM or higher education.