BIONB 4110 - Neuroscience Journal Club for Undergraduates

Spring. 1 credit.

Prerequisite or corequisite: BIONB 2220 or equivalent.

C. D. Hopkins.

The Neuroscience Journal Club for Undergraduates is intended for Biology students who wish to become familiar with the scientific literature in modern neuroscience or behavior by learning to select, read, understand, analyze, and orally present summaries of original research papers from the current literature. Students will become familiar with the structure of scientific papers, the differences between various journals and the culture of science, scientists, and authors. BIONB 4110

Outcome 1: Students will learn how to read, analyze, understand, and orally summarize a recent scientific paper in the subject areas of behavior and neuroscience.

Outcome 2: Students will learn about the structure of a typical research paper in neuroscience or behavior.

Outcome 3: Students will learn strategies for making effective oral presentations using slides and graphics and demonstrate creativity for engaging audience participation and discussion.

Outcome 4: Students will learn about the human and social dimensions of scientific research by learning about the authors, the institutions at which they work, the journals where the work is published, and the funding sources for research.

Outcome 5: Students will learn about electronic resources for searching and abstracting recently published papers in the scientific literature, and they will learn about various on-line support resources including encyclopedias, citation analysis services, review articles, news stories, and on-line resources.

Outcome 6: Students will learn to work in groups.