Research Support Intern – CLES, University of Exeter

research

What were your main duties and responsibilities during the course of your internship?

My primary role was supporting a Professor with his past and future research. This included performing literature reviews and compiling and analysing data. For future research I learnt how to use the survey programming software lime survey, and programmed a survey to be used in future research. Further responsibilities included producing a written report of my statistical analysis conducted on a large collection of research findings for other Professors, as well as assisting with participant recruitment and attending research meetings.

What would you say was your biggest achievement over the course of your internship?

I have learnt a lot about the process of designing, conducting and reporting research that I haven’t seen in practice as such at University. I also learnt new skills, such as survey programming, and developed more confidence and independence.

What benefits did your internship bring to your employer?

Primarily, I believe my completion of a written report detailing my statistical analyses would be useful when looking for avenues of future research. I also believe I lightened the workload, particularly by performing tasks such as literature reviews and recruitment.

Did you encounter any problems during the course of your internship and if so, how did you overcome them?

I don’t believe I encountered any major issues, except we found the e-claims system a little difficult to set-up and navigate.