Research Assistant - Term PT

Vanderbilt University • Nashville, TN

10d

About The Position

The Research Assistant is part of the Visual Cognition Lab in the Psychology and Human Development Department at Vanderbilt University and is responsible for coordinating laboratory research. This will involve work on two related projects funded by grants from the National Science Foundation and the Templeton foundation. In the first project we are exploring technological supports for nursing simulation training. In this project there are two key themes. The first is to understand how on-line indicators of a first-person simulation learning experience such as gaze are structured by event perception, and can ultimately support reflection and self-regulation. The second is to develop technological supports for simulation education that improve learning by integrating event perception and self regulation. The second project explores attention, memory, reflection and, ultimately, deeper understandings derived from the experience of viewing morally-challenging films. Both projects focus on links between visual cognition and higher-level cognition, and they explore how people learn from highly meaningful events. This position involves administering cognitive testing, running participants in experiments, data management, coding, data analysis, training and supervising undergraduate assistants, some scholarly writing and publication, conference presentations, as well as various administrative duties and assisting with reports. The position reports directly to the Laboratory Director, Daniel Levin, but works in support of our full interdisciplinary team including: Vanderbilt Researchers Gautam Biswas (Computer Science), Meiyi Ma (Computer Science), Angela McNelis (Nursing), Alyssa Wise (Teaching and Learning), along with Allison Eden (Michigan State University), Carl Plantinga (Calvin University), Murray Smith (University of Kent).

Requirements

• An bachelors degree in Psychology or related field from an accredited institution of higher education is necessary
• Experience in conducting behavioral research studies involving adult participants is necessary
• Experience in institutional review board processes is necessary

Nice To Haves

• Experience with computer software including media, office, and statistical applications is helpful
• Willingness to work some evenings and weekends is helpful
• Experience scripting and/or programming is helpful
• Experience supervising research assistants is helpful
• Experience in conducting experiments involving eye movement data collection is helpful

Responsibilities

• Scheduling and consenting participants, contributing to the disseminate of our work through community events and communications.
• Administering behavioral experiments. Requires use of standard protocols to administer psychoeducational measures and use of specialized computer software to collect behavioral and eye movement data. Position requires administering and monitoring in-person and on-line testing via Qualtrics.
• Data scoring and entry, data management, data coding, and data quality checks.
• Training and coordinating undergraduate assistants who aid in various lab duties, such as collecting and coding data.
• Preparing and presenting posters and talks at academic conferences and in the community. Helping to draft manuscripts for publication and managing the revision process.
• Maintaining information technology, website, purchasing, participant payments, and bookkeeping, coordinating schedules, facilitating and attending research assistant and lab meetings.
• Helping with periodic review reports for Institutional Review Board and for granting agencies. Participating in preparing research papers for presentation and publication.

What This Job Offers

• Job Type: Part-time
• Career Level: Entry Level
• Number of Employees: 1,001-5,000 employees