Information about Undergraduate Research Assistant (UGRA) Positions in the VEMI Lab

We are always interested in finding talented undergraduate research assistants (UGRAs) to work in the Lab. The hours are flexible and the environment relaxed and supportive. UGRAs interested in Position 1 will learn about research through hands-on experience at all stages of the research process from recruiting participants and running experiments, to designing new studies, to presenting findings at conferences, to having the opportunity to be part of writing and publishing the results. Position 2 also affords an excellent hands-on learning experience for Students with technical interests in learning about our VR and AR technologies and creating experimental scripts and designing interfaces for our research. Please poke around the VEMI Lab site and find out more about who we are, what we do, and our research techniques and philosophy. If you are interested in our research and think that you would be a good match for joining the team, then by all means, fil out and send in an UGRA application (accessible below).

Eligibility:

Students from all academic backgrounds are eligible, as long as they can perform all of the duties and technical requirements described under the relevant positions below. Be sure to indicate on the application which position you are applying for.

Position 1: Running behavioral experiments

The primary responsibility for this position is helping to recruit and run participants for ongoing research in the lab. Duties also include assisting with literature reviews, experimental design, and data analysis. Students who have made substantive contributions to a project may also be part of conference presentations or journal publications. This position is ideally suited for a motivated student who wants to gain experience with behavioral research and experimental design, and it represents a great opportunity for graduate school preparation or a research career in various fields, including, but not limited to: experimental or cognitive psychology, Cognitive science, cognitive neuroscience, behavioral geography, environmental planning, human factors, human-computer interaction, and others.

Position 2: Scripting, 3D modeling, and virtual reality development

The primary responsibility for this position involves writing code for experimental design and development of multimodal virtual reality or augmented reality environments to support lab-related research. If you are familiar with coding and willing to learn Python and other languages, this would be the job for you. Another part of this position involves the creation of new and innovative interactive demos and 3D models. Experience with Photoshop and Modeling Programs (e.g. Maya, 3D Max, Blender, etc) is important. You need not know all the technical details to be a good candidate--a

s long as you love programming and are intrigued by learning new and creative ways of code development and implementation, you can learn the specifics once in the lab. You may also be directly involved in the design and development of new multimodal interfaces, spatial displays for mobile contexts, and exciting demos which showcase the possibilities of our technology. This position is well suited for somebody who wants to get programming experience, learn about virtual and augmented reality technology,or is interested in graduate work or a career in the fields of human-computer interaction, human factors engineering, 3D animation, game development, or multidimensional data visualization.

Other Requirements:
Candidates for both positions must be highly responsible, willing to take initiative, able to work independently as well as on a team, have excellent problem solving abilities, good organizational skills, and be extremely detail oriented. Strong oral and written communication is important and the ability to complete and deliver projects according to an agreed upon schedule is critical.

Commitment and Compensation:

Both UGRA positions can be structured as volunteer, educational credit, or paid employment. There are pros and cons of each structure which should be considered when filling out your application.

Volunteer:

Working in the lab as a volunteer represents an excellent way to gain research experience. This is a good option for people who don’t have a strong research background, are trying to determine whether research is part of their future, or do not need, or are unable to receive, research credit or pay. This option requires the least time commitment--only one semester--but preference is given to applicants who are able to extend their position for at least 2 semesters.

Educational Credit:

Working in the lab as part of a directed research project not only gives you research credits for your experience (e.g., PSY 492 or SIE 598), it also is looked on favorably by graduate application committees. In addition, while I embrace including all UGRAs who have made substantive contributions to a project on my publications, I generally believe that co-authors should be collaborators and not paid employees. Thus, volunteers and credit-based students are most likely to be part of conference and journal publications which come out of the lab as they will have the greatest opportunity to work at all levels of the research process.

Paid Employment:

The main advantage of a paid position is that…you receive money for your time and efforts (everybody has to pay the bills). The compensation will be contingent on your experience but will be at one of the three top pay levels for student employees (i.e., pay level IV, V, or VI). Students in a paid UGRA position will assist with different projects around the lab or may work on specific problems but are less likely to design and run their own research. Students applying for either the credit or pay based positions are expected to make a two semester commitment, contingent on a 2 month and 4 month review. Due to the technical nature of the equipment we use, and the complexity of our experimental designs, a one semester appointment is not sufficient to truly learn the ropes and get a realistic view of the lab experience.

Click here for the application for our UGRA positions.

If you have additional questions, contact Dr. Nicholas Giudice

Please browse our website to learn more about us and our research.

The University of Maine is an Equal Opportunity/Affirmative Action Employer.