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Research Skills and Bioethics

Module description

This module will help you develop key transferable skills that will assist you with your studies and career development. You will receive training in scientific writing skills, encouraging you to argue your case in a logical and coherent manner. During the term you will undertake a scientific writing exercise on a topic agreed between you and your personal tutor. Based on the feedback from your tutor, you will fine-tune your work and resubmit it for a summative mark. You will also participate in a group “Dragons’ Den” style exercise that will develop your organisational, team working and presentation skills through the preparation and presentation of a project proposal. As research is typically quantitative in approach, you will also receive training in experimental design and statistics, including experience of programming languages such as R, through a combination of lectures and workshops. You will also be introduced to bioethics, so that current progress in biology can be appreciated in a broader, societal and ethical context. In addition, through this module, you will receive careers advice and employability guidance.

Module aims - intentions of the module

This module aims to prepare you for future roles in research and employment. It aims to enhance your performance in assessments and independent project work by providing scientific writing training. It will also provide you with training in key mathematical and statistical methods. The “Dragons’ Den” will give you insight into the design, costing and communication of research projects, and at the same time develop your organisational and presentation skills. Lectures on bioethics aim to introduce ethical, philosophical and social issues emerging from modern research. In addition, the module aims to provide training in career planning and employability awareness. Parts of this module can count towards the Exeter Award.

Intended Learning Outcomes (ILOs)

ILO: Module-specific skills

On successfully completing the module you will be able to...

• 1. Demonstrate understanding of the process of scientific writing, and the preparation of project proposals and their ethical considerations
• 2. Demonstrate competency in executing statistical procedures and understanding their use in biosciences
• 3. Evaluate your own employability skills
• 4. With some guidance, evaluate your own preparedness to undertake final year projects and dissertations and understand the basic requirements of a good essay
• 5. With some guidance, execute basic bioinformatic and statistical procedures and understand their use in biosciences

ILO: Discipline-specific skills

On successfully completing the module you will be able to...

• 4. Demonstrate competency in the reading, interpretation, and presentation of scientific literature
• 5. Interpret quantitative data, including the application of relevant statistical methods
• 8. Identify critical questions from the literature and synthesize research-informed examples from the literature into written work
• 9. With some guidance, deploy established techniques of analysis and enquiry within the biosciences
• 10. Illustrate and discuss the contested and provisional nature of knowledge and understanding

ILO: Personal and key skills

On successfully completing the module you will be able to...

• 6. Actively engage in group work and effectively manage group projects
• 7. Employ different communication styles to actively engage with the target audience
• 8. Develop ability to link ideas from different sources to build and appraise arguments
• 9. Handle digital data to conduct statistical analysis and visualisation

Syllabus plan

This module will include sessions and activities on: (1) Scientific writing and academic honesty; (2) The development and presentation of project proposals; (3) Societal and ethical considerations surrounding biological research; (4) Training in experimental design and statistics, including experience in mathematical programming languages such as R; (5) Employability skills, including the development of effective applications through CVs, cover letters and interview techniques.

Accessibility Statement:
As part of this module you will be required to undertake extensive group work and deliver a presentation to a panel of assessors (including external markers) that counts towards your summative assessment. The module also has activities that take place in a computing laboratory (of up to 80 students) that are of 1-2 hours in duration, however breaks are possible and students are able to leave the PC cluster for short periods.

Learning activities and teaching methods (given in hours of study time)

Details of learning activities and teaching methods

Formative assessment

Summative assessment (% of credit)

Details of summative assessment

Details of re-assessment (where required by referral or deferral)

Re-assessment notes

Deferral – if you miss an assessment for certificated reasons that are approved by the Mitigation Committee, you will normally be either deferred in the assessment or an extension may be granted. If deferred, the format and timing of the re-assessment for each of the summative assessments is detailed in the table above ('Details of re-assessment'). The mark given for a deferred assessment will not be capped and will be treated as it would be if it were your first attempt at the assessment.

Referral - if you have failed the module (i.e. a final overall module mark of less than 40%) and the module cannot be condoned, you will be required to complete a re-assessment for each of the failed components on the module. The format and timing of the re-assessment for each of the summative assessments is detailed in the table above ('Details of re-assessment'). If you pass the module following re-assessment, your module mark will be capped at 40%.

Indicative learning resources - Basic reading

• Study and Communication Skills for the Biosciences, 3rd Ed. S. Johnson and J. Scott. Oxford University Press. ISBN 978-0-19-879146-1

Indicative learning resources - Web based and electronic resources

• ELE page: https://ele.exeter.ac.uk/

Key words search

Bioethics,  statistics, employability, scientific writing, transferrable skills, project development