What does it mean to teach open science research practices?

An important component of open science (OS) is training and teaching OS practices in the curriculum (undergraduate or graduate) in order to instill OS practices in the current and future generation of professionals and researchers (Azevedo, et al., 2021; Strand & Brown, 2019).

When it comes to teaching open science practices, there are various examples of how this is approached across different disciplines in undergraduate and graduate education. Jekel et al. (2019) emphasize the problem with the lack of transparency in research and the frequency of statistical reporting errors, thus the need to teach and instill transparent reporting in research. In relation to this, teaching students about questionable research practices (QRPs) is important, especially for the students who don’t get a chance to directly interact with research. Other examples include teaching about pre-registration of research, using various platforms during the research process (e.g., Open Science Framework), and writing data management and data analysis plans. Some programs offer replication projects for research intensive courses or undergraduate theses. Further, teaching ethics and transparency in research in undergraduate studies provides an opportunity for students to transition into graduate studies. These are some examples of what it means to teach open science research practices.

There are many benefits to the open science movement, from access to transparency of data and research. When it comes to teaching these practices in higher education, such practices are often acquired in graduate studies or at the interest of a particular faculty member. However, incorporating aspects of open science practices in the early stages of undergraduate curriculum includes many benefits. Some of these benefits are related to equity in education. For instance, at teaching intensive universities, teaching research based concepts with open science in mind can be beneficial to students who may not know about opportunities to enter research (Frankowski, 2021). Students from underrepresented backgrounds (e.g., first generation, ethnic/racial minorities) may not be informed about opportunities for participating in research, for instance, participating in independent studies, honors theses, or undergraduate research funding (Morrison et al., 2020, as cited in, Frankowski, 2021). Introducing these concepts in courses can not only introduce students to research but provide opportunities they might not have known about.

Overall, what better way to train the future professionals and researchers than to teach them research practices in the context of open science research. There is a potential to improve the problem of incomplete data, with training about QRPs and how to be transparent at each step of the research process, and increase inclusivity of exposure to research. Even if students do not want to be researchers, teaching students about the research lifecycle and transparency has a potential for greater engagement with the scholarship beyond reading a scholarly article, better understanding of the research process, and being able to tie research to their profession. 

Some organizations that promote teaching open science practices:

The Open Science Framework

The Open Science Framework (OSF), a product of the Center for Open Science (COS), is an online system that can be used to manage and archive projects.

Framework for Open and Reproducible Research Training (FORRT)

FORRT provides pedagogical resources designed to support the teaching and mentoring of open and reproducible science.

ProjectTIER

Project TIER promotes the integration of principles of transparency and reproducibility in the quantitative methods training of undergraduate and graduate students involving computations with statistical data. ProjectTIER includes curriculum examples in various disciplines, and replicable short projects that can be embedded into courses.

Collaborative Replications in Education Project (CREP)

CREP provides professional growth opportunities, training, and support, for teachers and students interested in implementing and completing replication projects.  

Open Science and Open Scholarship Terminology

There are many different terms related to “open science”, below are some definitions that give further elaboration on the meaning behind the core terms along with a link to a more extensive glossary of terms.

Open Science: the idea behind open science or scholarship is that all research should be openly accessible, transparent, rigorous, reproducible, replicable, and all inclusive (Pownall et al., 2021; FORRT, 2022). “Open science has six major aspects: open data, open methodology, open source, open access, open peer review, and open educational resources” (FORRT, 2022, para. 1). 

Open Scholarship: the term “open scholarship” goes a step further to encompass all the disciplines, including non-science-based disciplines and it includes all scholarly activities such as pedagogy and teaching (FORRT, 2022). 

For an extensive list of definitions of open science terms, please refer to Framework for Open and Reproducible Research Training (FORRT) glossary page. 

References

Azevedo, F., Liu, M., Pennington, C. R., Pownall, M., Evans, T. R., Parsons, S., Elsherif, M., Micheli, L., Moreau, D. & FORRT (FORRT Community). (2021). Written evidence submitted by the FORRT (Framework for Open and Reproducible Research Training). https://gala.gre.ac.uk/id/eprint/34525/2/34525_EVANS_Towards_a_culture_of_open_scholarship.pdf 

FORRT. (n.d.). FORRT’s Educational Nexus. FORRT. https://forrt.org/nexus/  

Frankowski, S. D. (2021). Increasing Participation in Psychological Science by Using Course-Based Research Projects: Testing Theory, Using Open-Science Practices, and Professionally Presenting Research. Teaching of Psychology. https://doi.org/10.1177/00986283211024200 

Jekel, M., Fiedler, S., Allstadt Torras, R., Mischkowski, D., Dorrough, A. R., & Glöckner, A. (2020). How to teach open science principles in the undergraduate curriculum—The Hagen cumulative science project. Psychology Learning & Teaching, 19(1), 91-106.

Strand, J. F., & Brown, V. A. (2019). Publishing open, reproducible research with undergraduates. Frontiers in psychology, 10, 564.  https://doi.org/10.3389/fpsyg.2019.00564 

Additional Readings

Azevedo, F., Liu, M., Pennington, C. R., Pownall, M., Evans, T. R., Parsons, S., Elsherif, M.M., Micheli, L., Westwood, S.J. & Framework for Open, Reproducible Research Training (FORRT). (2022). Towards a culture of open scholarship: the role of pedagogical communities. BMC Research Notes, 15(1), 1-5. https://doi.org/10.1186/s13104-022-05944-1 

Open Science Collaboration. (2012). An open, large-scale, collaborative effort to estimate the reproducibility of psychological science. Perspectives on Psychological Science, 7(6), 657-660. https://doi.org/10.1177/1745691612462588 

Pownall, M., Azevedo, F., Aldoh, A., Elsherif, M., Vasilev, M., Pennington, C. R., … & Parsons, S. (2021). Embedding open and reproducible science into teaching: A bank of lesson plans and resources. Scholarship of Teaching and Learning in Psychology. https://doi.org/10.1037/stl0000307

Wagge, J. R., Brandt, M. J., Lazarevic, L. B., Legate, N., Christopherson, C., Wiggins, B., & Grahe, J. E. (2019). Publishing research with undergraduate students via replication work: The collaborative replications and education project. Frontiers in psychology, 10, 247.  https://doi.org/10.3389/fpsyg.2019.00247

Sanja Gidakovic, STEM Librarian, University of Central Missouri

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