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5 - Undergraduate Research

Sociocultural Perspectives

from Part I - Theory and Research on Undergraduate Research

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  11 August 2022

By
Ines Langemeyer  and
Monika B. Nerland
Edited by
Harald A. Mieg ,
Elizabeth Ambos ,
Angela Brew ,
Dominique Galli  and
Judith Lehmann
Harald A. Mieg
Affiliation:
Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin
Elizabeth Ambos
Affiliation:
Council on Undergraduate Research, Washington DC
Angela Brew
Affiliation:
Macquarie University, Sydney
Dominique Galli
Affiliation:
Indiana University–Purdue University, Indianapolis
Judith Lehmann
Affiliation:
Universidad de Buenos Aires, Argentina
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Summary

Sociocultural approaches form a theoretical tradition that explains learning, identity development, and knowledge creation not merely as cognitive or as purely internal psychic processes. Rather it understands these educational phenomena relationally as practices that belong simultaneously to the development of the individual as well as to the society and its cultural ways of life. Commencing from these ideas, this chapter argues that undergraduate research and inquiry-based learning can be investigated as ways of ensuring student participation in and engagement with practices of doing research. A sociocultural view on these practices raises awareness of the broader context in which education develops, and how such development is influenced by all kinds of cultural and material relations. Higher education is not only understood within the boundaries of the university or the college. It can also be studied as culturally shaped by professional practices and ethics, or by epistemic cultures that form different manners of knowing. The focus on practices is important because it is a key to the reconstruction of ‘how we know what we know’ as a resource for student learning.

Keywords

undergraduate researchinquiry-based learningenculturationepistemic culturesepistemic practicesprofessionssciencehigher educationsociocultural approaches
Type
Chapter
Information
The Cambridge Handbook of Undergraduate Research , pp. 59 - 71
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Print publication year: 2022

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