Year: 2014
Type: dissertation
Abstract: Background: Ph.D. students make a key contribution to research in the biomedical sciences. Despite this and ongoing increases in student enrolments, little empirical data exists to inform our understanding of teaching and learning processes in this important area of scholarship. Aims: We aimed to undertake a series of semi-structured interviews to identify the elements that biomedical Ph.D. students perceived to play an important role in their learning. Methods: Semi-structured interviews were undertaken with 49 Ph.D. students and 8 supervisors from research-intensive universities in Australian, the United Kingdom and the United States. Interviews were transcribed in verbatim, validated and analysed for emergent themes (inductive analysis) using a Miles and Huberman notation and memoing approach. Results: Three primary themes (learning relationships, assessment objectives, motivational orientations) were identified. Individual thematic analyses were structured using Marton and Booth‟s phenomenographic of reduction. With regards to the act (learning relationships), student learning was found to be supported by three distinct and equally important learning relationships, with supervisors, other students and postdoctoral researchers. With regards to the direct object (assessment objectives), students reported significant ambiguity with regards the criteria against which their work would be assessed. With regards to the indirect object (motivational orientations), students reported adopting a combination of three motivational orientations: instrumental, benevolent interest and innate interest. Conclusions: This thesis presents some of the first, discipline-specific data to inform our understanding of learning processes in the biomedical doctorate. These data suggest that doctoral learning in the biomedical sciences is supported by a complex network of learning relationships. It adds weight to earlier work in doctoral education that suggests doctoral learning is highly influenced by student and context-specific factors. It concludes that improving learning processes in the biomedical doctorate requires: i) clarification of the aim(s) of the contemporary biomedical doctorate; and ii) further work to support research-informed refinements to support student learning in this area.
Author: Matthew W. Kemp
Language: English
Subfield: Education
Field: Social Sciences
Domain: Social Sciences
SDG: Quality education
Open Access status: green
OpenAlex ID: W1559259605