Collaborative Research:Research: Advancing Engineering Education Research through Peer Review Analysis

关于知识是如何社会构建的以及边界工作如何塑造科学领域的发展的问题，对任何领域的发展和壮大都是至关重要的。同行评议是知识社会建构和知识生产微观政治的重要场所。它是新知识成为一个领域的一部分的门户。作为一个新兴的跨学科领域，工程教育研究提供了一个宝贵而及时的机会，让人们了解学科发展的过程，并更好地理解同行评议在一个新兴的跨学科领域的微观政治。此外，在工程教育研究中，该领域的边界可能会对最终影响工程教育实践的见解产生影响。作为一个相对较新的领域，人们注意到，工程教育研究在某些方面仍然不发达，包括纳入社会科学领域的理论和方法。然而，很少有研究确定该领域的边界是如何建立和维护的。本研究是对一大批工程教育研究者同行评议经验和编辑观点的首次调查。本项目的研究目标是通过同行评议过程，确定形成新兴工程教育研究领域的研究常态和价值。该项目的干预目标是开发和实施针对工程教育研究人员的材料，使他们更好地了解自己的领域以及如何在新的方向上发展。对《工程教育杂志》的40名作者和至少5名编辑进行了深入的定性采访。作者包括那些发表过文章的人和那些文章被拒绝的人，以及属于这两类人的人。这些访谈探讨了参与者对该领域边界的同行评议经验和信念。经验和信念中的新兴模式将被用来确定塑造该领域的理论、方法论、认识论和主题规范性。这些模式为工程教育研究提供了新的见解，特别是其主导价值、边界和跨学科水平，从而也为在一个新兴的跨学科领域中知识的社会构建提供了新的见解。根据访谈的结果，正在为不同的群体举办针对利益相关者的研讨会：目前和未来的工程教育研究人员。这些研讨会和相关材料旨在帮助工程教育研究社区批判性地反思和推动该领域的发展。该奖项反映了NSF的法定使命，并通过使用基金会的智力优势和更广泛的影响审查标准进行评估，被认为值得支持。

Questions about how knowledge is socially constructed and how boundary work shapes the development of a scientific field are of central importance to the development and growth of any field. Peer review is a key site of social construction of knowledge and micropolitics of knowledge production. It serves as a gateway for new knowledge to become part of a field. As an emerging and interdisciplinary field, engineering education research presents a valuable, and timely, opportunity to learn about processes of disciplinary development, and to better understand the micropolitics of peer review in an emerging and interdisciplinary field. Moreover, in engineering education research, the boundaries of the field can have implications for insights that ultimately influence engineering education practices. As a relatively new field, it has been noted that engineering education research remains underdeveloped in some regards, including inclusion of theoretical and methodological approaches from social science fields. However, little research has been done to identify how the boundaries of the field are established and maintained. This study is the first investigation of a large group of engineering education researchers' peer review experiences and editors' perspectives. The research objective of this project is to identify research normativities and values shaping the emerging field of engineering education research through the peer review processes. The intervention objective of this project is to develop and implement materials targeted to engineering education researchers so that they better understand their field and how it can be advanced in new directions. In-depth qualitative interviews are being conducted with 40 authors and at least 5 editors of the Journal of Engineering Education. Authors include those who have had articles published and those who have had articles rejected, as well as those who fall into both categories. The interviews explore participants' peer review experiences and beliefs about the field's boundaries. Emergent patterns in experiences and beliefs will be used to identify theoretical, methodological, epistemological, and topical normativities that shape the field. These patterns provide new insights into engineering education research, specifically, its dominant values, boundaries, and levels of interdisciplinarity, thus also providing new insights into the social construction of knowledge in an emerging, interdisciplinary field. Based on findings from the interviews, stakeholder-specific workshops are being conducted for different groups: current and future engineering education researchers. These workshops and associated materials are designed to help the engineering education research community critically reflect on and advance the field.This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.