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Hey I would appreciate people's thoughts on my application, it's been a long road getting here and to hear some opinions from others with experience would go a long way in helping me assess myself honestly and possibly course correct. I plan on applying for programs this fall in both Canada and the US. Research Experience: Undergrad: 2 years in a developmental neuroscience laboratory (2nd author pub), learned how to process ERP's, E-Prime, etc.) 1st Post-Bacc: 2 years in a research in lab in NYC (Canadian originally), doing treatment focused research but also incorporating biomeasures (2 pubs forsure possibly 3 and 1 poster presentation). Trained in SCID interviewing, HRV, ERP, Peer-Reviewed manuscripts, built an online intervention service, collected fMRI data, and grew immensely in SPSS. 2nd Post-Bacc: Just started a new job at the VA using brain-based approaches to look at trauma in veterans. Education/Testing: Bachelor of Arts in Psychology, Philosophy Minor (GPA Psych: 3.5; Overall: 2.5; Last 60 credits: 3.7) - So my father became extremely sick early on in my degree and I essentially failed my entire first year, and could not get the grades dropped unfortunately. Proceeded to take 3 courses per semester as I cared for him part-time until I graduated but for the last 2.5 years of my undergrad had almost entirely straight A's. Does anybody care about the situation I was in with caring for my father in the admissions process? General GRE: Going to write soon (Magoosh tells me I'm scoring around 154-157 for both verbal and quant) Subject GRE: 78th percentile What are people's thoughts here? How does my application look?

I am Canadian as well, U of A grad, but decided that most of the professors who do research in clinical don't really have much to offer me aside from U of C and U of T, the latter of which I have essentially given up trying to gain acceptance to. Even then there's only 2 faculty who resemble my own interests from what I saw, so I'm strictly interested in the US and U of C. There's so many more options in the US for my research interests (psychophysiological approaches to cognitive-emotion interactions, particularly in mood disorders), so I've decided to apply to a bunch of programs there and try to apply for post-bacc jobs as well in those labs incase I don't get acceptance (1st time applying). It doesn't seem like many people are interested in doing neuroscience based research through clinical compared to more cognitive, social, personaslity, type research, which is fine, but the number of faculty for those types of interests reflect that.

Hey guys, I could use some advice on browsing for research positions in neuro/psych related labs. I have decided to postpone my applications for clinical psych this year, because I wanted to take some time to see the world and continue building my research skills, that said I'm finding it incredibly difficult to attain a paid position in a lab. I'm from Canada, but most of the labs around me are simply not interested even if I volunteered (and my credentials are solid), the only positive responses I've received are one school from Eastern Canada saying contact them if I'm interested in the spring, a volunteer position in New York, and the potential for paid opportunities in 2 labs in philadelphia. I was really hoping this process would be easier, does anyone have any advice on what I can do here? I'd rather not waste a year when I could've simply applied to do a masters instead. I'm more than willing to go where I need to. Thanks.

I've noticed for the clinical programs that interest me the 'average' has been right around 158/159 for both verbal and quantitative. That seems ridiculously high to me, but I've only just started studying for my GRE and maybe this is more than achievable I don't know. But honestly yours seem like reasonable scores that won't get you rejected, they just may not get you in, so let the rest of your application do the talking!

This will be my 1st round of applications to clinical PhD programs, and I definitely don't plan to get my hopes up, it seems like I'm going to need more experience before I can really put a strong package together (despite 2 years of research and a pub in undergrad). But for: 1) I just contacted PI's and asked about whether they were taking students, asked what tools they offered in their lab (psychophysiological, MRI, etc), and then shared my interests with them and how they tied into the work they did. 2) I've had 4 out of about 15 respond with many emails where we've engaged eachother back and forth, and then probably another 2 or 3 provide their number for me to contact them. 3) I'm looking for a PI who is proficient in psychophysiology that offers an opportunity for MRI work, and is interested in exploring mood disorders and integrating neuroscience with clinical treatment options. If they don't fit this becuase there's no MRI, I still consider them but if they aren't interested in neuroscientific approaches or applying neuroscience to improving clinical therapies than it's not gonna work.

The opportunities I've seen at NIH have mainly been for US citizens or permanent residents unfortunately, but I'll keep searching their site. I've sent out applications for paid research opportunities at Duke, and a few places in Canada but they basically throw my application into a pool of people and then hire from it when a supervisor needs a project, so it could be next month or a year from now if there isn't a PI sharing similar interests who has work. I took interest in 3 or 4 labs in NY and all of them were volunteer based, which makes things hard for me when I'd have to move and find a job alongside volunteering just to live for the year I have to stay for. I'll take a look around at other major universities and see what they're offering though. Appreciate it.

What Masters programs are you considering if you're interested in clinical? I'm from Canada so I don't really know of many places other than NYU, Columbia, Boston College that offer terminal MA's in psych.

Hey so I am a recent arts graduate who majored in psychology that is looking to apply to clinical psych PhD programs in the United States (from Canada). I don't intend to apply to more than 5 or 6 PhD programs because it seems like my chances coming out of undergrad are quite slim, despite the fact I have 2 years of research experience. So, I'm in a bit of a dilemma which I'm hoping some people can help me out with here. At my university in Canada there aren't many paid RA positions, and I've gathered enough experience with the two supervisors who share the same interests as me. I am interested in anxiety and depression, and integrating neurobiological and cognitive perspectives in these disorders to understand risk markers. My question: What options do I have for paid research in Canada or the United States? Is most post-bacc research in the US volunteer work? I am willing to move if I have to. Or, am I better off applying for some master's programs in the US (my own preference) and going that route assuming I don't get into the PhD programs I apply for? If anyone knows some labs relating to my interests in anxiety and depression, or can point me in the right direction I'd appreciate it.

I was under the impression the first few years didn't raelly matter for most places? You're probably fine if it's just your last 60 credits or 2 years...

Ok well like I said you definitely want to stay in the realm of cognitive neuroscience and clinical psychology than if you are interested in neuroimaging and behavioral work. If you want to work with schizophrenics, teh most traditional route would be to apply for clinical psych programs and scower schools who have faculty that share your specific interests, also take some of the work you've already read and look into those authors and the authors they reference in their work. I'm not exactly sure how a neuropsych degree fits into all of this, but you may find that the faculty members you are interested in at various schools only offer a clinical or neuropsych program anyway, so whichever it is apply for that. If you want to learn more about each of those programs than look at the details each school has provided on those programs and go from there. Personally, I'm not ruling out cognitive neuroscience programs either because even they offer clinical opportunities to do research with a variety of disorders, so really just keep your options as open as you can, and be more focused on the type of work people are doing that you like.

I'm applying to clinical programs as well, with an interest in cognitive markers for depression and anxiety using various neuroimaging tools. Honestly, I would first try hard to narrow down what it is you wanna study in schizophrenic brains, because you've mentioned several scopes of analysis from neurotransmitters all the way out to cognition and social interactions. I wouldn't spread yourself out so thin. For the most part, you're not going to get as many clinical psychologists doing research with genetics and neurotransmitter functions in the brain, because those are in the realm of biology. So, if that is the direction you figure out you wanna head in, than apply to some biological psychology programs and neuroscience programs because they will be what you're looking for. Now, if you're like me and you prefer using neuroimaging tools like fMRI, EEG, TMS, EMG, etc to study neural processes on a systems level in the brain than I would apply for either cognitive neuroscience programs or clinical psychology programs. The cog neuro programs will teach you more programming/computational based approaches and the clinical will provide you with translational training for research and clinical practice. I'm applying for both actually, just because I'm definitely not going to count on any acceptance letters from clinical programs given their competitiveness, but I digress. I haven't looked at enough neuropsych programs, but they seem to be largely grounded in neuroscience research linked with specific assessments, which may differ slightly from the clinical training as far as psychotherapies and other things. But don't quote me on that. Overall, you seem to be on the right path generally but figure out what it is you think you want out of research as far as the scope of analysis. Because you'll be hard pressed to find a lab that studies social cognition, neural processes, neurotransmitters and genetics in their lab.... in fact none I am sure. Once you figure out what it is you want, than start hunting down faculty members who share that scope of analysis with respect to schizophrenia and look at what programs are offered from the psych/neuro/bio departments they work in. Hope this helps.

It's one thing to discuss the environment you grew up in and it's entirely another to discuss your own personal struggles and weak moments I would say, even if you end up reframing them in a clever way that sheds light on your interests. You can't control your family, and if anything your resiliency might come off as impressive. The depression issues for me were a big part of my interests in psychology initially, as you said, they were a starting point for me taking in interest in understanding circumstances that put individuals at risk for these disorders, congitive, neuro and environmental markers but I just don't think it's worth the risk to talk about. Unfortunately the application process is probably going to force me to lie or at least vastly stretch a story about how I became interested in psychology, kind of like your internship position. It'll probably sound cheesy regardless though...

Well, it's time to change my approach immediately I guess... because the very first paragraph told me the mental health route was not a good idea. Thanks for this resource!

I haven't exactly been upfront with my issues to my supervisor, she's not an emotionally available person, but she'll be looking over all of my application before I apply which was kind of her, so she'll see my 'issues' I ahd to deal with during my degree. The other two letters are strong, but they don't know my well enough to include those issues. Whether my supervisor decides to say something about it or not I don't know. It's hard because my interest in clinical psychology and research was really fuelled by my own depression, but I don't really want my 'problem' to be the center of attention in a personal letter. And of course my passion was really what carried me through the tough times with my dad. So it's tricky.

I'm telling you, everyone has a massive hard-on for the hippocampus, and understandably so but let's spread some of the research interests around a little bit, I thought universities encouraged diversity! Well, maybe not Harvard. Unfortunately I refuse to contribute to the skyrocketing obesity rates for the sake of your academic success but I KNOW there's plenty of people who would love to support your efforts. From my perspective preventative work is interesting in the field of mental health, especially with the lack of viable treatment options for people who struggle with these disorders. I would make the case preventative work in that field is as important as any other, especially with depression rising up the depth charts in human problems according to the UN.... Ya, I'm not overly thrilled with a 3.5 (despite the fact I acknowledge it is a solid GPA) just because I want to get into clinical, and my competition is fierce. I have a lot of other things going for me that I am going to have to convey somehow, someway in my letter I guess. 1000 words may not be enough for my sotry though, I started off my degree with clinical depression and graduated while taking care of my terminally ill father for 2 years, that's not exactly a 2 sentence and I'm done explaining sort of issue!