The Design of Experiments in Neuroscience

“You are about to start on a great adventure. You are going to transition from reading about science to becoming a scientist.” -From the Preface Using engaging, disarming prose, author Mary Harrington shows neuroscience students how to go about selecting a topic, designing an experiment, analyzing the results, and publishing a paper. This text effectively illustrates basic research methods and design principles by uniquely using relevant examples from neuroscience such as the principles of design of fMRI studies, the use of transgenic mice, and conditional gene knockouts. The author also addresses basic professional ethics, fundamental statistics and data analysis tools, the range of possible experimental designs (from simple descriptive studies to multifactorial designs), and ways to control unwanted variables and avoid common pitfalls. This text is intended as either a core or supplemental text for both undergraduates and graduate students studying research methods in Neuroscience, Neuroanatomy, Neurophysiology, Neurochemistry, or Biological Psychology.