[Presenting at University -You- Rejected]

I've met lots of potential students who ended up going elsewhere. Declining in itself doesn't create a negative impression.... the only ones I remember negatively are the ones who made bad impressions in other ways (e.g., egotistical, dim, verbose, socially awkward) and who I was usually happy they ended up somewhere else.

 

If someone gives you side-eye just because you went to another program, that reflects poorly on them, not on you.

 

Frankly I would be more concerned about whether it's worth your time. Graduate student conferences are fine for the experience, but almost worthless for your vita.... so do you want to give a practice talk? Then go for it.

[life of a psychology grad student]

At the minimum, consider your research a full time job that's 9-5pm Monday-Friday, with some coursework or TA work in evenings and on weekends.

 

Next consider your post-graduate school career. Do you just want to complete a PhD? Then see the minimum above. Do you want an academic job? Then you'll probably need to put in hours more like your sister's, especially if you want to end up working at a top program. There's really no ceiling to how much you can work if you're ambitious.

[Invited to Submit...What Does This Mean?]

 

 

 Journal of Psychological Sciences

 

This sounds like a completely scammy journal named to mimic an actually good journal, Psychological Science. When I google "Journal of Psychological Sciences" it's the real Psych Science that comes up instead. Psych Science doesn't invite submissions.

 

As others have noted, spam invites to publish are really frequent once your email address is out there. 

[Talk to Me About Data Security]

TrueCrypt would probably be a good way to secure your files that doesn't cost money. You'd want them to be encrypted on both the USB and the external hard drive. I'd also check with others in your department have done as there's likely a data management protocol that others at your institution have successfully used.

 

There were some concerns about TrueCrypt raised last year and the developers abandoned the project but, realistically, unless you're hiding data from the NSA I suspect it's still fine.

 

 

 

One concern you should be prepared to address is what you will do if either the USB, Livescribe, backup recorder, or external HD is lost or stolen (as in, your bag containing the drive is stolen, your house is broken into, etc.). Yes, this is a worst case scenario but it has happened to more than one person that I know... 

 

 

 

For cloud backup I use SpiderOak, which purports to be completely client-side encrypted so that it's impossible for them to access your files. I also use BTSync instead of dropbox to keep files synced between my work and home laptops. Advantages: free, storage limited only by your harddrive size, nothing's in the cloud. Disadvantage: Both computers must be turned on simultaneously to sync.

 

I think encrypted file containers using TrueCrypt synced via BTSync to two computers in two physical locations would be pretty darn safe and secure, especially with the raw original data locked away somewhere else on a physical drive. 

[phd criminology -need advice]

Hi everybody!

I would like to write a phd proposal in criminology, and I need to find an interesting topic. Do you have any ideas? 

Any suggestion would be really appreciated thank you very much

 

Why do criminals commit crimes? Is it their broken homes, or are they just bad seeds?

[Time spent with cohort and lab members]

Think of it more like a workplace. You need to get along with them because you'll be in classes together and, maybe, doing research together. But nothing says you need to be friends, just be collegial.

 

Also, nobody has to travel in a group to conferences but you'll probably save a lot of money if you can get along well enough to travel together. For example, my advisor would cover half a hotel room so I could either cover the rest myself or share, so I always shared.

[Keeping track of conferences]

Some of these things, like 'what are the best journals?', are better picked up by experience than by a list somewhere. So, I suggest (also) checking with a senior person in your lab about the major conferences in your subdiscipline, then google the conference websites.

 

e.g., I could tell a social psychologist that the major conferences are SPSP, SESP, ISJR, SPSSI, IARR, APS, and CPA (if Canadian, and only the SP preconference.. the rest is too clinical). MPA is great if you're near Chicago.

[What computer would you recommend for Psy/Couns students]

re: RAM.  I have an ASUS Zenbook with 4GB and that's the only thing I dislike about it-- sometimes when I have chrome, powerpoint, spss, and photoshop open (e.g., prepping a talk) it runs out and tells me to shut something down.  Unfortunately the case is sealed up tight and I can't just substitute a bigger chip.

[What computer would you recommend for Psy/Couns students]

 Honestly, you need longevity over the bells and whistles.

 

This. Something that's light and has good battery life. If you have to plug in your laptop for a 50 minute lecture or presentation you look like a lameo, and you don't want to lug around anything heavier than a few pounds all day.

 

Get at least 8GB RAM so you can have lots of programs running simultaneously.  An i5 processor is probably sufficient because an i7 will be a battery drain. An SSD is faster, quieter, and more power efficient too. If you need more space, get an external hard drive and park it on your desk.

 

I would err on the side of a smaller screen size for mobility and buy a second monitor for your desk. Dual wielding monitors is the best, I wish I'd discovered it years ago.

[SF Bay Area - looking for PhD grad students in neuroscience]

whewwwwwww, that's a lowball offer.

[Getting thesis committee signatures]

Serenade, not sure why you would say this here. The OP's issue would have been the same regardless of whether or not there were spouses involved.

 

And it might have facilitated things, e.g., a quick dinner table conversation might have resolved all of the problems.

 

Advisor: "Hey, did you ask for all these changes?"

Spouse: "Yes, I thought blah blah blah."

Advisor: "That makes sense but it needs to be in tomorrow."

Spouse: [shrug] "No problem, it's your student."

[Using a table from an article]

Also, according to some rules tables and figures are copyrighted, which can be problematic in a thesis because (at least with mine) I had to certify that I owned the copyright to everything in it. But there's nothing stopping you from recreating your own table/figure...

[When is it too early to present at conferences?]

Completely agree. My MA advisor told me they were insignificant because I was "only" MA; he also thought MA students shouldn't write theses, publish papers, or basically engage in any kind of professional development. Learned to take his most of his advice with a grain of salt. 

 

What? If anything you get more credit for doing these early, e.g., "She organized a symposium at [conference with 30% acceptance rate]? That's really impressive!"

 

Good thing you figured out not to listen

[Applying for Master's in Psychology holding Bachelor's degree in Engineering]

I don't always mean to be the dream crusher, but while theoretically one might be able to get into psychology graduate school with a BEng--to be frank--your background is not strong and does not contain evidence that you have the requisite knowledge required for graduate-level work.  First, your GRE scores are very weak--I googled the conversion chart and your verbal and psych scores are < 20th percentile and AW < 40th percentile. If anything, someone with an Eng background should have higher-than-average quant scores but yours are not great either (65th percentile). Second, as others pointed out, psychiatry is not social psychology so you can't point to that internship experience as evidence of having the required background knowledge either.

 

About writing a good statement -- anyone can state reasons for why they want to attend graduate school or switch fields, but in addition to that it's important to demonstrate it with concrete experiences and evidence of ability--and the bar is set that much higher when someone lacks an undergrad degree in the subject. I wouldn't expect a M.Eng program to admit me, essentially, on my statement alone. Show, don't tell. 

 

 

But I'm just some internet person, so if you really want to apply, go ahead and apply to see what happens. Have realistic expectations though. You might be able to counteract some of the negatives here by applying widely, and also think about whether your financial situation would allow an unfunded program.

[Equal Variance in Post Hoc?]

If it helps calm your fears, ANOVA is usually very robust to violations of its assumptions. Also, based on those bins I would be surprised if it's normally distributed. In university students you'll get a positive skew and in grownups you'll probably get a negative skew.

[Journal submissions and impact factor]

^^ I came across this article today that argues these things need to change.

 

Few scientists, or indeed Editors of journals, will argue that Impact Factor is the best indicator of research quality and rigor; there are other available measures such as citation half-life that are perhaps more informative. Let us try to change the dominant influence of Impact Factor and realign the motivation it generates among scientists to publish only in a restricted group of journals. [We should promote] the inclusivity, rather than the selectivity, of neuroscience publishing.

 

[Journal submissions and impact factor]

Lastly: If one feels a low-IF journal is perfect for the type of research/publication they have in mind, and wants to at least keep the option of becoming an academic respectably open, would you recommend they choose a different journal?

 

Just out of curiousity, what makes this journal 'perfect'? We can talk about the criteria for what makes a good or bad outlet.

 

 

I've just now found out about impact factor, and I'm wondering how big of a deal it is. I've seen people say it's sometimes easier to obtain more grant money for publications to higher-IF journals. Is this true--and if so, to what extent? How much does publishing to higher-IF journals matter in terms of post-graduation tenure-track position prospects?

 

Impact factor is only one aspect of journal prestige, and prestige is everything. Other things that matter are the audience of the journal (do people who matter read it, or does it reach wide audiences? does its research get media attention?) and rejection rates (as a proxy for quality, i.e., novelty, experimental rigor, and theoretical contribution). If you know the rejection rate at JPSP is 85-90%, that says something about the papers that get accepted. In contrast, at PLOS One the rejection rate is only 30%, so it's not especially difficult to get in, but lots of people read it because it's open access, and I see it mentioned in the media a lot.

 

Publishing in prestigious journals is, frankly, everything for an academic. My strategy is always submit to the best journal you can, even if there's only a tiny chance of acceptance. This is especially important early career because you want to look like somebody who is capable of publishing in top journals. Conventional wisdom in social psych is that you haven't 'made it' until you have a first-author JPSP. (I don't know what the equivalent would be for humanistic psych, but you could talk to grad students or profs in your program.)   If you graduate with a bunch of third tier publications but no big ones then it suggests that you might be incapable of producing work that can get in at the best journals.

 

A peer review that says, "This manuscript might be more appropriate for a specialized journal," is politely conveying, "This paper is so flawed or boring that nobody but people who really care about this topic will want to read it."

 

 

tldr: Impact factor is important but it's only one facet of prestige. Ask somebody in the field about those specific journals you mentioned and they can tell you whether it's a good idea.

[Funding for Conference (after switching schools)]

Funding criteria vary dramatically so you'll have to check. I've had conferences paid for where they didn't care, and others I've seen specify that the institutional affiliation I submitted under also needed to be the way paying, or the faculty member with a grant only paying if they were a collaborator on the research.

[Data on Administrative university salary vs Faculty/instructor salary?]

This thread reminds me of an anecdote--I think it's from Naomi Klein's No Logo--where sweatshop workers became dissatisfied because they saw the shirts they were getting pennies to make were being sold for like a hundred dollars. The company's solution was to have foreign workers make the clothes but add the price tags domestically. Maybe you'd be more satisfied if you don't think about how much the consumers are paying for your product

 

 

 

...aaaaand I should have listened to my own advice. I teach large sections that by my math bring in $120,000/section tuition and I get paid $8,000. There are two TA's who each get $5,000.

[McGill vs Harvard]

This thread wins the award for best discussion sparked by a trolling (or at least highly downvoted) post.

[Summer Job]

I was going to say "Go ahead and lie and skip out early if you don't care about burning bridges," until I got to your last line.

 

I don't want to jump to conclusions here so I'll ask first: When would you tell them that you can't finish your term?

 

Option 1: Tell them during your first week and make them immediately wonder why they hired you?

 

Option 2: Tell them at the end of the term ("Actually I'm only staying until next week!") and leave a sour taste in their mouths?

 

Option 3: Tell them when you get the job offer and negotiate for an earlier end date. If you're a good candidate they might have flexibility or, e.g., you finish up before you go. If it doesn't work they can go to the next person on the list.

 

 

Personally I think it is a big deal, and a serious breach of professionalism, to lie about your availability and take anything but option 3.

[McGill vs Harvard]

but if my "dad's friends" (or insert some sort of equivalent here) are the ones doing the hiring for non-academic jobs? :/

 

I completely agree there -- overall institutional prestige probably matters quite a bit for non-academic jobs. I had meant my response in the context of academia, which is the only thing that matters, right?

[Data on Administrative university salary vs Faculty/instructor salary?]

I don't have any hard data at hand, but I know that administrative costs (including insanely high salaries for college presidentsfootball coaches) are exploding.

 

Fixed that for you.

 

 

But seriously, you're comparing apples to oranges in more than one way, which makes the question difficult to answer. Besides what you mentioned (i.e., different job roles), there's also the fact that teaching staff are usually low-status, temporary adjuncts but administrative staff are full-time permanent. Thankfully more institutions are creating teaching-stream appointments that, I hear, come with better salary and stability. I've heard that teaching staff are paid better at business schools because the ridiculously high MBA tuition and expectation of quality teaching promotes it.

[McGill vs Harvard]

the REAL question is though... how come, in Canada, we only get to have 3 prestigious institutions?

 

IS EVERYTHING ELSE CHOPPED LIVER?!!??!?!?

 

 

Hahaha, there are other prestigious programs. Waterloo has top social and clinical programs, and Western's social program is traditionally great (though they've struggled a bit lately). York has a great quant program. There's a lot of great forensic psychology work at Simon Fraser and UVic.  They're prestigious among people who know, but less likely to impress your dad's friends or whatever.

[Is the MA SSHRC tied to the student or school?]

Double post because I wanted to keep the political stuff separate. I see parallels with the government's recent focus on funding business-oriented applied research, which is foolish. There are lots of funding sources for research with business applications--corporations pay for it all the time!--but basic research really only comes from governments/universities nowadays. There's so little money for basic science and now instead it's supposed to subsidize corporate research? Ick.

 

Since this policy and others have been enacted the number of peer reviewed publications, conference presentations, and issued patents by government scientists has dropped dramatically over the past decade. The current federal government has been terrifyingly bad for science in Canada.