Academic and Professional Preparedness: Outcomes of Undergraduate Research in the Humanities, Arts, and Social Sciences

As many studies on undergraduate research outcomes are focused on STEM fields, the widely variable experiences in the humanities, arts, and social sciences are less known and harder to study. This article assesses outcomes among students who pursued faculty-mentored research in those fields and concurrently participated in programs administered through UCLA’s Undergraduate Research Center for the Humanities, Arts, and Social Sciences (URC-HASS). As program participants receive support to help counter balance discrepancies across departments and mentors, they also form a distinct sample group useful for statistical analysis. Compared to a quasi-control group of nonresearch students, the research students reported statistically significant better outcomes on average in attaining several of the skills sought by today’s employers, thus demonstrating the potential benefits of undergraduate research in these disciplines.