1. SENIOR INTERNSHIP 1
Senior Internship: Research Assistant and Intern for Dr. Jennie Brown
Brittany Lund
Franklin Pierce University

2. SENIOR INTERNSHIP 2
Throughout the spring semester for this academic year I worked as a Research Assistant
as well as a personal Intern for Dr. Jennie Brown. The internship taught me many different skills
that apply to and have increased my knowledge in the psychology field. I learned important skills
that are used in a research setting, as well as skills if I were to ever pursue a career in teaching. I
also learned many different skills that can be applied in the working world. I currently do not
want to pursue a career in research, however I now posses the skills to better understand research
to stay up to date in the field of psychology. I also learned social skills in a professional setting
when I present research at the New Hampshire Psychology Association Conference this April.
At the very beginning of this internship I was assigned, along with other interns, to find
information and research on attribution. We were all specifically assigned to focus on research
involving attribution and gender. Attribution is a term more specifically from the field of social
psychology and has two primary meanings, first focuses on explaining why someone acts or
behaves in a particularly way and second focuses on traits that may have caused the behavior
(Malle, 2011.) Each and every intern found articles from time to time and summarized them for
Dr. Brown. I was assigned to create a google doc where all of the interns could cite and
summarize the articles they had found, that way we each did not summarize the same articles
over and over. Dr. Brown is working on creating a study to run where she examines attribution
and gender, this research was to provide background information on specific research relating to
gender.
I summarized more than ten articles on attribution for Dr. Brown, so I will not go into
detail about all of them however there was one particular study I found to be very interesting.
The study looked at the attribution of gender role stereotypes in different gaming situations. The
study used Prisoner’s Dilemma Game setting to expose subjects to one of three different

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situations (cooperative, competitive or tit-for-tat). There was an unknown confederate in the
study that examined the sex differences in the three different conditions. A Chi-Square analysis
revealed that there were significant gender differences for attribution for those in the three
different conditions. There were significant findings for the men being more competitive than
females when placed in all situations. This supports previous research that has found that
competiveness is related to masculinity. Females were found to be more cooperative in all
situations (King, 1991.) This research can be applied to Dr. Brown’s future research because it
supports the hypothesis that there are gender differences related to attribution.
Throughout the semester I also worked on improving the research involving The Effects
of Note Taking on Individual Quiz and Exam Scores, which was a study done by Dr. Brown and
other fellow interns. The research was done to examine whether note taking would correlate with
academic performance in undergraduate students. Dr. Brown does not use a lecture in her
courses and has students do readings outside of class. Students are then evaluated on an
individual quiz which she calls a reading assessment. Students are incentivized to take notes
because they are allowed to use their notes on these individual quizzes. Students are not allowed
to use the textbook; these quizzes are taken online outside of class. Students will not be
penalized if they do not take notes, but receive a small amount of extra credit if they do. Due to
the fact that I presented this research in the Academic Showcase as well as the NHPA
conference, I had to gain a full understanding of the background information based on note
taking at the collegiate level.
Previous research has been done on note taking in a college setting to examine whether
note taking is a valuable and useful tool for students. Note taking has been found to increase
memory and understanding of material (Kierwa, 1989.) While taking notes students are required

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to physically rewrite the information, which is shown to increase retention of material compared
to taking notes on an electronic device such as a laptop (May, 2014.) A study was conducted at
Princeton and UCLA, where psychologists examined the knowledge retention of students who
took notes on a laptop and those who had handwritten notes. Those who had handwritten notes
were tested on their knowledge and showed a higher understanding and retention of the
information (Education Week, 2014.) With that being said, Dr. Brown does not allow students to
receive the extra credit for having taken notes if they are on a laptop.
With that empirical evidence, Dr. Brown aimed to examine the scores of students who
did not take notes versus the scores of those who did take notes, looking for a positive
relationship between note taking and higher performance. Dr. Brown collected data from Fall
2010 to Spring of 2015 from her undergraduate students (n=594) that participated in her Team
Based Learning Courses (n=28.) All student’s identities were confidential and were treated using
APA ethical standards. She recorded whether students had taken notes, along with the individual
quiz and exam scores, and she kept track of this data in an excel spread sheet. The data collected
was analyzed doing and ANOVA using the SPSS software. The data found the scores of students
who took notes to be statistically more significant than the scores of students who did not take
notes. The results for exams in all of the courses was r(632)=.220, p=.000 while for quizzes it
was r(469)=.385, p=.000. For laboratory courses the results were r(188)=.230, p=.001 and
r(128)=.405, p=.000 respectively. Therefore, Dr. Browns hypothesis was supported, in that note
taking will positively correlate with undergraduate performance.
As with all research there were limitations. Dr. Brown has the student’s self report
whether they had taken notes, therefore some could have lied to receive credit. For those who did
take notes, there was not measure of the quantity or quality of the notes, which could further the

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research on note taking and performance. Although there was a respectively large sample size,
the data was only collected from the psychology department here at Franklin Pierce University.
Due to the fact that Team Based Learning in a nationally used teaching technique, further
research could examine note taking across the country from different cohorts as well as different
universities and departments. Dr. Brown could also expand her research by taking into account to
quality and quantity of the notes of those students who do participant in note taking.
That being said, that leads to some of the other worked I was assigned to do. Dr. Brown
teaches various class from General Education to 400-level courses. For her Evolutionary
Psychology course that I am currently enrolled in this semester, she uses the Team Based
Learning technique along with the note taking incentives. She asked that I create outlines for
students that contain bulleted points varying from important psychologists and theories to key
terms from each individual chapter from the Evolutionary Psychology textbook she uses for the
course. The psychology textbook contained a total of 13 chapters, therefore I created 13
individual outlines. The outlines simply contained the names of the psychologists and
researchers, the names for the theories and the key terms. I did not elaborate and make in-depth
outlines containing the important information from the chapter, as this would deter the students
from having to physically take notes themselves. Creating these outlines improved my reading
skills, as well as note taking. I also learned organization skills when balancing my times with
other course requirements.
As stated before, many previous studies show that taking handwritten notes specifically
benefits students and is an important tool for achievement in higher education (Thomas, 1978;
May, 2014.) If I had created an in-depth outline for each chapter, students would not receive the
benefit of the understanding and recall of note taking when having to take notes on their own.

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The outlines I created were simply a tool for students who have trouble finding the important
concepts and topics within each chapter to focus on when taking notes. It is a hope that these
outlines will improve students understanding as well as the quality of their notes. Dr. Brown
could then move away from the technique of having the students self-report and examine the
relationship between quality of notes and achievement in her courses.
Having worked on this particular study, I learned skills that could also help my note
taking skills and improve my performance in her class as well as other courses. I also learned
extensively about the Team Based Learning technique which could help me down the road if I
were to ever pursue a career in teaching, as the TBL technique is not limited to the collegiate
level. My performance in her course had improved and I had scored the highest in the class on
the first individual exam. Students were beginning to worry and needed help with various tasks
in the course, and most importantly studying for the quizzes and exams. Twice a week I would
hold a study group for my fellow Evolutionary Psychology students, working mostly as a tutor. I
learned organizational, as well as leadership skills when helping the students whom attended.
Dr. Brown also teachers a Criminal Justice course at UMASS Lowell that focuses on
criminal profiling. I would help her organize and create assignments on UMASS Lowell’s
Blackboard, which is their version of campus web. I would create assignments as well as
organize the due dates and enter that information to be a place for students to turn in assignments
for the course. I also helped her prepare course material, specifically focusing on each individual
chapter within the Criminal Profiling textbook she uses for that course. I had to read each chapter
to gain an understanding of the knowledge to help with course preparation. I improved on using
the online program Blackboard, my reading ability and my organizational skills.

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The New Hampshire Psychology Association (NHPA) conference was certainly an
experience that taught me many skills I can use in the working world. I improved my ability to
formally present in a professional setting. I have not been particularly keen on presenting, and I
do not enjoy being a public speaker. However, presenting to high achieving peers, as well as
other professors with Ph.D.’s and Master’s Degree’s, I was definitely put on the spot. That being
said, the experience made other presentation settings seem much more relaxing. These skills will
help me in the working world as well as if I end up pursuing a graduate degree. In almost all
classes, there is a presentation, and I feel much more prepared to present in a more professional
atmosphere other than the undergraduate setting.
At the NHPA conference, there was also a round table discussion session, where students
could network with professionals with careers in various fields of psychology. The different
fields included Neuroscience, Research, Private Practice, Social Work and Therapy/Counseling.
All panel members had attended graduate school or are currently attending. I personally chose to
Network with the panel members at the Social Work table. There were three women who had all
received their Master’s in Social Work. They gave advice as well as recommendations for
graduate schools. I personally thought this experience was very enlightening and encouraged me
to eventually pursue my Master’s Degree, more specifically in Social Work. It was also very
helping in teaching how to communicate and network with professionals within the career field I
am interested in. It is always good to know people to help with internships, interviews,
recommendations and many other tasks.
Throughout the semester, I also helped here and there with different data analyses. I
helped a fellow intern organize and statistically analyze her thesis data. Dr. Brown would
occasionally send me an excel sheets and have me analyze data. I also helped create various

8. SENIOR INTERNSHIP 8
figures for various research projects. This expanded my skills in understanding behavioral
statistics, as well as how to use Excel and SPSS. Although I do not plan to pursue a research
based career, these are viable skills that can be used in many different work settings.
Another learning experience from this internship was working with others. Several of the
research projects, as well as creating the posters for presentation were done with partners. Work
was divided between the interns, however everyone played a key role in the completion of the
tasks. If one intern were to drop the ball, it would set the project off course and hurt the entire
group. The research done for the Academic Showcase as well as the NHPA conference had
specific deadlines to be completed. All projects had deadlines, therefore time management was
key when balancing the different internship projects. As stated before, I also improved my
professionalism through presenting in higher academic settings. I improved my research skills
and understanding of scholarly articles. I gained skills that can be helpful in the teaching as well
as learning setting. My data analysis skills improved, using programs such as SPSS and Excel to
do so. My skills improved in writing professionally in APA format. Through research and course
preparation I also gained a greater understanding in several psychological focus areas such as
Evolutionary Psychology, Attribution and Criminal Profiling. Overall, I believe this internship
prepared me in many different ways from the working world.

9. SENIOR INTERNSHIP 9
References
Kiewra, K. (1989). A review of note-taking: The encoding-storage paradigm and beyond.
Educational Psychology Review. 1(2).
King, W. C., Miles, E. W., & Kniska, J. (1991). Boys will be boys (and girls will be girls): The
attribution of gender role stereotypes in a gaming situation. Sex Roles, 25(11-12), 607
623. doi:10.1007/bf00289567.
Malle, B.F. (2011) Attributions Theories: How People Make Sense of Behavior. Chadee, D.
(Ed.), Theories in Social Psychology (pp. 72-95) Wiley-Blackwell.
May, C. (2014). A Learning Secret: Don’t Take Notes with a Laptop. Scientific
American.
S.D.S. The Pen is Mightier than the Keyboard. Education Week. 2014. 34(3), 1-9.
Thomas, G. S. (1978). Use of Student Notes and Lecture Summaries as Study Guides for
Recall. Journal of Educational Research.