PACS Lab Structure

Learn about the PACS Lab structure, including orientation, ongoing evaluation, student roles and assignments, manuscript and grant support, and authorship guidelines.

Our lab can include Doctoral, Master’s, and undergraduate students. We utilize Google Drive to store non-confidential lab documents. We also have secure server space through SDSU, accessible only on campus.

We hold required lab meetings in Lamden Hall, Room 428 (LH-428) or through Zoom video conferencing. All students working in the lab must attend lab meetings.

Lab Member Orientation and Ongoing Evaluation

All Students

PhD/MS Students

Undergraduate Students

Lab Structure

Graduate Lab Assistants (PhD/MS student)

  • Contributes to PACS Lab tasks (see below)
  • Oversees undergraduate interns
  • Monitors Google Drive
  • Orders materials
  • Independent work on thesis or project

Undergraduate Lab Interns (BS/BA students)

  • Can be assigned to support PACS Lab activities and Graduate Lab Assistants

Lab Tasks (not all tasks applicable to all projects):

Research Project Support:

  • Observational and qualitative coding
  • Participant recruitment
  • Material development and refinement
  • Intervention implementation support
  • Data collection and entry
  • Administrative tasks

Manuscript & Grant Support:

  • References management
  • Article extraction
  • Literature searches
  • Literature reviews
  • Creating tables and figures
  • *Manuscript/grant writing

Master’s Thesis Development:

  • Research question identification
  • Data collection (if applicable)
  • Data analysis
  • Thesis preparation
  • Manuscript preparation

Master's Project Development:

  • Project goal identification
  • Project development
  • Project implementation
  • Project write-up

*Authorship Guidelines:

  • First author typically the individual primarily responsible for the project
  • Upfront promises about authorship prohibited. First author to make authorship decisions after evaluating individual contributions (but during manuscript writing process, not after).
  • Ask: Could this project have been done without this person’s conceptual/ technical contribution?