Grimnir

Even if conclusions were derived independently? It seems weird to me to continually cite another paper when you went through the effort of gathering and synthesizing the papers on your own. I'm going to take the suggestion to just cite where the similar conclusions are in the discussion section. Thanks for the responses!

Hi all, I'm in the process of writing a literature review and I'm wondering what the etiquette is for citing a previous review that has some overlap with your paper? For example, if you are writing an updated review on a focused topic but some of the subtopics overlap with another broad review done previously: Is it enough to cite the previous review in the introduction and state that you are building on and updating some of the findings or do you need to specifically cite this paper every time you reach similar conclusions? This is my first time doing a review so I'm rather paranoid. Thanks for the help!

I don't know. I feel like I did something wrong and made a bad impression like I strung them along. Not sure what I could have done differently though. People apply to PhD programs all the time and decline for all sorts of reasons. At no point did I confirm I would be attending. Sigh.

I declined an offer two weeks ago to a fully funded sociology program and my potential adviser seemed pretty angry. This was an entirely unexpected reaction. Has anyone else experienced this? I was extraordinarily polite when declining and responded within a week to the offer as soon as I had reached a definite decision. I was pressed for reasons for not attending and I let the him know that my decision was reached for personal reasons only and that I had decided it was in my best interest to continue working. I wished him luck and his responses were pretty sarcastic and curt. I felt bad enough about declining the offer since I had worked so hard to get that far, but this sort of response made me feel even worse. I didn't even get the obligatory "I wish you luck in your future endeavors".

I have been consumed by this dilemma since I made this post. Literally not thinking about anything else. I think I want to just take the MCAT and prove to myself I could have done well and gotten in. LOL. Messed up, but I seriously think this is more about my desire to prove myself than anything (even though I do have a very genuine interest in medical science). The medical students can have their misery and 500k in debt. I don't think it is worth it for anyone who wants a life.

I've been looking at schools near me. The community college only offers organic I and lab and the other 2 nearest colleges within commuting distance <1 hour and schedule their classes during work hours. Not sure how I would be able to continue working my current job and still get the pre-reqs. Also, applying and interviewing is very expensive. 2000 to 6000 bucks. And yeah, I am kind of worried about the regret. But the amount of debt these kids take on is absolutely terrifying. I mean, even a doctor making 180k a year can pay off 500,000 in loans in 10 years by living a middle class life, but just knowing you're that much in debt is nauseating...Apparently even at that disgusting amount you still would take home about 65,000 after taxes, which is the equivalent of around 90k normal salary....

I don't want to be rich I just want money to survive and have a retirement and not force my kids to be debt slaves like me. And yes, I applied.

I'm trying to play devil's advocate a bit here in favor of medical school and no one is giving me any good fodder to work with LOL. Honestly, I'm not even close to being decided. This decision blows. Defend the honorable PhD from the arrogant MDs!

I was just posting a statistic that might be more relevant to people on here And honestly, I don't know what I want to do. I know for a fact if I go to medical school I will always be employed, will always be paid well, and will most assuredly have no difficulty finding a spouse who is also well compensated. If I go into PhD I will probably eke out a comfortable upper middle-class existence. I'm actually having a hard time listing the pros of a PhD vs medical school unless you absolutely hate treating patients and have no interest in medical science. The major draw for me is independence and I really do enjoy research. But I can have both of these as a physician...

The acceptance rate to medical school is 40% for people with social science backgrounds. Your odds are actually a lot better than a clinical psych program with 2% acceptance.

Nothing is assured, but given my credentials and publication/research experience, I am fairly confident I could do it. The people I have seen get into medical school don't exactly wow me with their intellect...It seems more like hard work than intellectual capacity. Given how scared shitless I am, I'm pretty sure the motivation factor shouldn't be a problem. $400 a month goes to capital. The interest rates for private loans are 3.9% to 5.6% (53k). The federal loans are 5.5 to 6.8%. (27k) I applied to cognitive and some social. My interest is in imaging.

I am 80,000 in debt and have 25,000 in savings. I likely wouldn't accrue additional debt during PhD. But for medical school I would have to return to do a year of school which would eat through my savings and if I didn't get in to medical school, I would probably have to hang myself because a psych BS gets you crap salary. It's nice the loan people get you before you have a chance to have a real job and realize what a 700 a month payment feels like. My situation is evidence of why this country's educational system blows. I am being pushed out of fields for purely financial reasons and nothing even remotely related to my competency.

I don't know why this has happened, but in the past 2 weeks I have gotten major cold feet about my decision to pursue a PhD in psychology. I long thought being a professor was my ideal job, but having talked to PhDs and done my research it seems like this dream is about dead, and even if you do have the opportunity, you have to make huge financial sacrifices and work like crazy for a pittance. Throughout high school and my first year of college I was absolutely convinced I would be a neurologist or something similar. I used to devour medical textbooks like novels. Then for some reason I can't fully explain I chickened out and got it in my head that I wasn't going to be competitive for medical school and that the financial costs were much too high. Reevaluating myself now, having gained some real world experience, I see that I was completely full of crap. I have a 3.6 science GPA and a 3.8 overall GPA and all the med school prereqs but orgo. Now I am getting cold feet about pursuing a PhD and I have interviews soon...not good. I am REALLY worried about job security and the financial aspects. I don't doubt I can complete a PhD but as someone who has considerable undergraduate debt I really do not know what to do anymore. I spent hours crunching numbers and it appears that even if I went $400,000 dollars in debt and got into a lower paying specialty in medicine (200k a year) that even after taxes and loans I would be pulling $85,000 a year. After it was paid off I would be making anywhere from 140 to 180k a year after taxes (assuming my salary would increase over this 10 year period). This is more than a PhD makes pretty much ever and the physician NEVER has worry about employment or funding and people worship the ground you walk on (besides PhDs). I'm not someone who is out to get rich, but the stress of not having a job and bills about killed me after I graduated. I am terrified I am signing myself up for more of this crap after investing 5-6 years in further education... Don't get me wrong, I enjoy research a lot, but looking at how bad things have gotten has scared me quite a bit. I don't want to be an eternal post-doc earning 40k a year with my loan burden. If I REALLY want to do research, I can still do that as an MD and be more financially secure. But honestly, I don't know. I would have to go back to school and finish my prereqs, study for MCAT, and do a little volunteering/shadow during this period. The thought of backtracking like this makes me half ill as well, but it almost seems preferable. If anyone can talk some sense into me, I would appreciate it.

Any specific courses anyone recommends taking? Which programming language is in the highest demand in industry?

What is the job market like for social science PhDs outside academia? What skills should you acquire during PhD to be competitive for this job market if the ever dwindling tenure positions end up being out of your reach?