Shame in engineering: Unpacking the socio-psychological emotional construct in the context of professional formation

Abstract

This paper summarizes the outcomes of early research activity that is related to an investigation on shame in the context of engineering education. We are investigating shame as an individual experience that occurs in the particular sociocultural context of engineering education and practice. We list the research questions below and provide detail regarding our working theoretical model for shame and justification for investigating this in the engineering education context. Furthermore, we provide a summary of our data collection efforts. We are using interpretative phenomenological analysis (IPA) to interview engineering students about their experiences of shame and ethnographic focus groups to describe the landscape of sociocultural expectations that establish a platform for students' experiences with this emotional construct.