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Summer Research Reflections: Liam Hoselton, BIB/20

About Me
Hello, my name is Liam Hoselton. I am recent graduate of the Bachelor of International Business program offered through Carleton University. In September, I am going to be undertaking a Master’s of Science in Management, which I plan to follow up with a PhD program in Europe.

This is my second time working with Professor Luciara Nardon through the Sprott Undergraduate Summer Research Experience. however, I have worked on and off as one of Professor Nardon’s research assistants since our first summer research experience together in 2018. This second experience was important to me as a graduating student, as it afforded me the opportunity to finalize some of the research projects we were working on together, and expand my practical knowledge of research and academia before entering my MSc program.

This is my second time working with Professor Luciara Nardon through the Sprott Undergraduate Summer Research Experience. however, I have worked on and off as one of Professor Nardon’s research assistants since our first summer research experience together in 2018. This second experience was important to me as a graduating student, as it afforded me the opportunity to finalize some of the research projects we were working on together, and expand my practical knowledge of research and academia before entering my MSc program.

Research

This summer of research was quite interesting due to the Covid-19 pandemic being constantly in the background of everything. It forced us to take new approaches to facilitate research in a primarily digital and cloud-based space. This change presented itself with a slight learning curve for our research participants, as well as us as researchers, as we all were forced to adjust to a new normal at the same time together. However, I would be remiss if I did not say that the pandemic created opportunities to explore once-in-a-lifetime research questions. So, over the course of this summer, I was able to participate in three studies; completing one, and assisting in the initial set up of two others.

The primary research I participated in was an exploratory study reviewing the narratives of return migration from return migrants around the world. This study looked at the causes and decision-making processes of migrants as they made their decision to return home. The data for this study was collected primarily from the UN’s International Organization of Migration’s project titled, “I am a Migrant.” The “I am a Migrant” project offered us a database of first-hand accounts of migration written by the migrants themselves or directly with the migrant’s involvement. With this dataset we collected 684 narratives, 88 of which met our return migrant criteria. Through these 88 accounts we determined that there were four consistent narratives which emerged: mission accomplished, mission aborted, back to roots, and disillusionment with host.

The mission accomplished narrative consisted of migrants who had set out on their international journey with a clear-cut goal and upon accomplishing said goal, decided to return home; e.g. a foreign exchange student on a year abroad. The mission aborted narrative consisted of migrants who never reach their intended end host destination and instead abort their migratory journey as result of unexpected difficulties; e.g. a migrant who has traveled along an alternative migratory route to Europe who suffers a medical emergency and is forced to return to their home country before arriving at their intended European country. The back to roots narrative involved migrants returning to their home countries in order to reconnect with their families, friends, or culture. Finally, the disillusionment with host narrative saw migrants returning to their home country after failing to integrate with their host country often due a combination of institutional voids (economic, cultural, and legal).

The culminating effort from this study on narratives of return migration resulted in me presenting a draft copy of our paper to the Administrative Sciences Association of Canada 2020 academic conference. This was an incredible experience and was very humbling for me.

The two other studies I had the chance to help on were directly Covid-19 related. The first study looked at the impact of the pandemic on the lives/experiences of international and exchange students in and from Canada. The second looked at the challenges of employment and job searching for recently immigrated women in Canada during the pandemic. This project is one that I will be working on during my Master, and is being actively worked towards a publication.
That being said, both studies are still ongoing and look promising.

Skills/Credentials Gained This Summer

Conclusions

I am quite grateful for this research experience. I feel like this time around I was really able to hit the ground running with a lot of the skills and knowledge I developed from my first Sprott research experience. I believe I learned a lot from this second experience as I had a clearer image of what to expect. Overall, I am confident that I will succeed in my masters where I will truly be able to hone the skills that I have learned for my PhD and future career as an academic.