Supporting Data and Code for “What Factors Influence Students’ Disciplinary Science Identity in Undergraduate Field Biology Courses” - Esparza, Reilly-Sanchez, and Smith

This dataset (data and code) accompanies the manuscript <i>“What factors influence students’ disciplinary science identity in undergraduate field biology courses?”</i> by submitted by David Esparza, Ph.D., Laura M. Reilly-Sanchez, and Michelle K. Smith, Ph.D. to <i>Ecology and Evolution </i>in October of 2025. This mixed methods study explores how undergraduate field biology courses shape students’ disciplinary science identity. The researchers used pre-/post-semester surveys (see Survey Data and accompanying Metadata) to better understand students' sense of competence/performance, perceived recognition, and interest before and following participation in one of two undergraduate field biology courses. The authors also conducted and analyzed student semi-structured interviews to identify factors that promote or inhibit students' disciplinary science identity development.Survey data show significant increases in students’ competence/performance and perceived recognition, with a ceiling effect in students' sense of interest in field biology. The qualitative analyses show how fieldwork practice, prior experience and familiarity with the outdoors or fieldwork, and personal community social support contribute to these gains. The combined findings offer practical insights for designing field biology courses that strengthen students’ disciplinary science identity.All study participants provided informed consent before participating in the study, approved by the Cornell University Institutional Review Board (protocol #2001009364). This Figshare record contains anonymized quantitative survey data, qualitative code frequencies, associated metadata, and the R Markdown script used to reproduce all analyses and figures in the paper. Raw qualitative transcripts are not shared per IRB protocol; detailed codebooks with code descriptions and exemplar quotes are available in the article’s supplementary material.