Research competencies in university students: Intertwining complex thinking and Education 4.0

Research competencies are skills that university students must develop to create and socialize scientific products during their academic live. In this research, an experience was implemented to improve the students’ competency levels through its imbrication with complex thinking and the use of Education 4.0 applications, such as remote team workflow development apps, web-based virtual reality, and social robotics. The study was sequential-quantitative and descriptive. A questionnaire was applied before and after the experience to know the perception of 105 Mexican university students, later a rubric was implemented for the teacher’s assessment. The results indicate that the students perceived an improvement in their research skills, however, the evaluation showed a difference between the student’s perception and the teacher’s regarding improvement in said skills. The experience can be scaled to other scenarios, where disruptive teaching strategies can support research skills development.