The Clemson Summer Program in Applied Psychology provides student participants with research training in human factors and health psychology. The program objectives are to increase talented students' interest, understanding, and commitment to research, science, and scientific careers. These objectives should increase and sustain student participation in research, professional activities, and entry into graduate programs. The students selected will have strong backgrounds in mathematics, biological science, social science, and/or industrial engineering, will exhibit potential interest and commitment to science and research, and will be selected mainly from non-research colleges and universities. Program activities will include a supervised program of collaborative research with eleven participating faculty from the Psychology and Industrial Engineering Departments. Support activities will include course work (3 credit hours) in research methods in applied psychology, seminars, site-visits, and the Conference in Applied Psychology. Research partners in industry, government, and education will collaborate via participation in support activities and research projects. Students will present the results of their research at the Conference on Applied Psychology. Follow-through annual activities will include travel support for additional professional presentations, collaborative publications, and advising to support applications to graduate programs.
The intellectual merit of the program is to identify and evaluate techniques that increase student understanding of science and science careers, increase student participation in professional activities, and encourage student application to graduate programs in science. The broader impact of the program is to promote undergraduate research at the institutional level through the visible success of the program, to provide a model of effective undergraduate science education through professional national dissemination of the program characteristics and outcomes, to promote participation by underrepresented groups, and to extend the benefits of the program to the public and private sector through partnerships with defense, industry, and government entities.
This award contributes to the Foundation's continuing efforts to attract talented students into careers in science through active undergraduate research experiences. This Site is supported by the Department of Defense in partnership with the NSF REU program.
